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Federal Register / Vol. 86, No. 148 / Thursday, August 5, 2021 / Rules and Regulations We published a notice of proposed priorities NPP for this program in the Federal Register on March 25, 2021 86
FR 15830. That document contained background information and our reasons for proposing the particular priorities.
Under section 681 of the IDEA, the Secretary may give priority to the activities listed in section 681d without regard to the rulemaking procedures in section 553 of the Administrative Procedure Act APA.
The activities required to be conducted under Proposed Priority 1 are activities listed in section 681d, whereas the activities required to be conducted under Proposed Priority 2 include activities that are outside the exemption from rulemaking under IDEA section 681d. As a result, pursuant to the notice and comment rulemaking requirements of section 553 of the APA, in the NPP, the Department specifically invited comments regarding Proposed Priority 2, including: 1 The program requirements under Proposed Priority 2;
and 2 the application and administrative requirements under the common elements section of Proposed Priority 1 and Proposed Priority 2, but only as the requirements apply to Proposed Priority 2. We appreciate commenters input on Proposed Priority 1. For the purposes of this notice of final priority NFP, we address only the comments on Proposed Priority 2, including the associated application and administrative requirements.
We make substantive changes to Proposed Priority 2 by adding a focus on increasing the capacity of parents of students with disabilities to understand the statutory and regulatory bases for, and benefits of, including all students with disabilities in State and districtwide assessments and other assessments used for educational programming and instructional purposes. These substantive changes impact how Proposed Priority 2 focuses attention on the important role that parents play in addressing an identified need to address national, State, and local assessment issues related to students with disabilities, including students with disabilities who are also English learners ELs.
There are also editorial differences between Proposed Priority 2 and its requirements and the final priority and requirements. In this NFP, we refer to Proposed Priority 2 as the priority, and to the Proposed Priority 2 application and administrative requirements common to Proposed Priority 1 and 2, as the requirements.
Public Comment: In response to our invitation in the NPP, eight parties
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submitted comments on the priority and requirements.
Generally, we do not address technical and other minor changes, or suggested changes the law does not authorize us to make under the applicable statutory authority. In addition, we do not address general comments that raised concerns not directly related to the priority or requirements.
Analysis of Comments and Changes:
An analysis of the comments and of any changes in the priority since publication of the NPP follows.
Comment: Four commenters recommended that the Center include a focus on increasing the capacity of parents to understand the statutory, regulatory, and instructional programming bases for including all students with disabilities in State and districtwide assessments. These commenters noted that parents lack sufficient information regarding the participation of students with disabilities in State and districtwide assessments.
Discussion: We agree with the commenters regarding the importance of increasing the capacity of parents to understand the statutory, regulatory, and instructional programming bases for including all students with disabilities in State and districtwide assessments as well as other assessments used for educational programming and instructional purposes. Increasing parents understanding in this area is likely to help ensure their meaningful involvement in decisions States make in analyzing and using diagnostic, interim, and summative assessment data to better achieve their State-Identified Measurable Result SIMR, for those States that have a SIMR related to assessment, while at the same time incentivizing States to ensure the data reviewed and analyzed by the parents are of the highest quality; and thus improve data quality and use under IDEA Part B, consistent with section 611c of the IDEA and the Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2021, which authorizes the Secretary to use funds reserved under section 611c of the IDEA to administer and carry out other services and activities to improve data collection, coordination, quality, and use under Parts B and C of the IDEA.
Therefore, we are revising the priority to require applicants to propose how the Center will increase the awareness of and understanding by parents of students with disabilities, regarding how students with disabilities are included in, and benefit from, participation in State and districtwide assessments and other assessments used
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for educational programming and instructional purposes to improve instruction of students with disabilities and support the implementation of the SIMR.
Changes: We have revised the expected outcomes of the priority by requiring applicants propose how the Center will increase parents of students with disabilities awareness of and understanding of how students with disabilities are included in, and benefit from, participation in diagnostic, interim and summative assessments.
Comment: One commenter recommended revising references to interim assessments to formative assessments, noting that interim implies a less prescriptive and formal process than formative.
Discussion: We understand the point the commenter makes in general regarding the common meanings of the terms interim and formative;
however, we disagree with the commenter that these distinctions apply to large-scale State and districtwide academic assessments. Interim assessments are more prescriptive and formal than formative assessments.
Interim academic assessments typically focus on measuring student achievement based on a subset of State or school district established grade-level academic content standards. As such, they are designed to measure individual and collective student growth and are used to evaluate the effectiveness of teaching practices, programs, and initiatives; and project whether a student, class, or school is on track to achieve established proficiency benchmarks. Interim assessments can also provide information regarding the instructional needs of individual students, but to a lesser extent than formative assessments. In contrast, formative assessments typically are connected to a discrete instructional unit, the results of which are intended to help educators guide the learning process of individual students, rather than measure student performance against State or districtwide academic content and achievement standards.
Changes: None.
Comment: One commenter stated that the structure of the notice was confusing, and, in response to Executive Order 12866 and the Presidential memorandum Plain Language in Government Writing, recommended ways to reformat the proposed priority to improve clarity.
Discussion: The formatting for the notice published in the Federal Register was consistent with the Departments formatting requirements for publishing proposed priorities. However, we
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