Maryland work group urges MSDE plan to set staffing and service-delivery standards as funding questions loom

Members of the Maryland Blueprint Special Education work group on Tuesday pressed state leaders to turn recommendations into enforceable standards and stronger accountability for special education funding and staffing.

The group unanimously discussed a proposed recommendation that "MSDE should develop a plan for a plan, with specific tasks and timelines within 60 days to set evidence‑based baseline standards for staffing and service delivery," including guidance for LEA staffing plans, vacancy reporting, teacher‑to‑student ratios and paraprofessional qualifications and career paths. Co‑chair Liz introduced the proposal and opened the floor for feedback.

The recommendation grew out of a series of prior sessions that the group said identified gaps between existing MSDE guidance and on‑the‑ground practice. Participants noted that guidance exists for staffing plans but is inconsistently implemented; the recommendation is aimed at improving communication, monitoring and accountability so that local education agencies follow clearer, evidence‑based standards.

A public commenter and advocate, Mary Ann Williams, urged the group to use available funds and to improve transparency about federal pandemic dollars. "We supposedly have the money now. Let's actually use it to directly impact students and make it count," Williams said in a written public comment. Multiple educators echoed concerns about pay and working conditions for paraeducators.

Betsy Perry, a special education teacher in Montgomery County, said paraprofessionals are often low paid and sometimes hired as temporary staff without benefits, which undermines retention and training. "We're in the middle of a humongous teacher shortage crisis and paraeducation crisis," Perry said, urging the group to consider pay and pathways in any standards for paraeducators.

The panel also heard a national overview from Tammy Colby, principal researcher at the American Institutes for Research, who stressed federal constraints and the wide variation in state funding approaches. "The big thing to understand is that there is no requirement, technically, by the federal government that any state provide funding for special education," Colby said, noting only maintenance‑of‑effort and limits on distribution mechanisms are required at the federal level.

Nate Levinson walked the group through Maryland's single‑weight funding formula and a simple numeric example: "The current special education weight is 0.99," he explained, applied to the foundation program cost (the presentation used $8,789 in the example) and the prior‑year October student count to generate an LEA allocation. Levinson and others warned that a single weight and a 75% rule directing funds to the student’s school may not adequately cover very high‑cost students and that Maryland does not currently operate a high‑cost safety net program for unusually expensive cases.

Participants raised other fiscal and operational concerns, including whether the formula accounts for transportation and out‑of‑district tuition costs, the difficulty of accurately measuring the full cost of special education services under current budgeting systems, and a shortage of staff to deliver services even where funding exists.

Organizers concluded the session by sending participants to brief breakout groups; small‑group shareouts largely favored moving toward differentiated (multiple) weights to reflect differing student needs, called for closer attention to transportation and nonpublic placement costs, and repeatedly noted a human‑capital shortage as a barrier to implementation.

The draft report and recommendations will be updated and submitted to MSDE leadership for review; Dr. Hickman told the work group the team plans to submit the final report to the Advisory Implementation Board (AIB) by 2024‑07‑01. The group will meet next on June 26 to consider significant disproportionality issues in identification and discipline.