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RTI report prompts special-education staffing and parental‑trust questions; district to present strategic plan
Summary
An RTI International evaluation identified strengths in early childhood programs and inclusive practices, and weaknesses in workload, staffing formulas, evaluation tools for twice-exceptional and multilingual learners, and family trust; district staff said a strategic plan with staffing proposals will be circulated for board feedback.
A presentation by RTI International on July 17 summarized a six‑month evaluation of special-education services for Howard County Public School System, highlighting both program strengths and operational gaps and prompting calls from board members for more detailed, actionable recommendations.
RTI found a strong foundation for inclusive practices and early childhood services but identified strains created by staffing formulas that do not account for total workload, rising caseloads and limited protected planning time. RTI lead Sofia Farmer said Howard County "does have a strong foundation for inclusive practices" but noted "staffing and workload" were recurring barriers in interviews and surveys.
The report highlighted four recurring themes: staffing and workload mismatches; weaker supports or tools for some student groups (notably twice‑exceptional students and English‑language learners); delays and inconsistencies in evaluations that left families feeling adversarial toward the system; and professional learning that respondents called too compliance‑driven and not job‑embedded.
Jen Riccardi, acting executive director of Special Education, told the board the district had already begun staffing and central‑office changes and that a draft strategic plan would be circulated for board feedback. Superintendent Barnes said he would deliver a draft strategic plan to the board "by the end of the day tomorrow" and that some positions requested by staff had been prioritized for the upcoming budget cycle.
Board reaction split on the report's usefulness. Board Member Watts said she was disappointed the RTI report did not offer concrete staffing formulas or immediately actionable recommendations: "I was hoping to learn something new from this report, and I have not learned anything new." Other board members pushed staff to translate RTI's analysis into specific costed staffing models and to examine peer districts such as Montgomery County and Virginia jurisdictions that use workload‑based or weighted staffing formulas.
RTI recommended building a coherent framework of inclusive practices (multi‑tiered systems of support and universal design for learning), aligning staffing formulas to reflect total workload (including IEP writing and planning), improving evaluation tools for complex student populations, increasing parent collaboration and trust through clearer processes and job‑embedded professional learning with coaching rather than compliance training.
What happens next: district staff said they will incorporate RTI's recommendations into a special‑education strategic plan, work on staffing formula options for the FY2027 budget cycle and form an implementation team with ongoing reporting to the board and public.
