Since 1938, NASDSE, http://www.nasdse.org/ , has been building on its reputation as a services-focused organization to help state agencies promote and support specially designed instruction and related services for children and youth with disabilities. NASDSE's activities are intended to provide professional support to its members and others interested in special education and to promote the vision that all students can learn to higher levels.

Projects include: 

• Response to Intervention (RtI) 
  This initiative began in response to a need from the entire special education community to have more information about RtI. The initiative began with a satellite conference in the fall of 2004. Following the satellite conference, NASDSE worked with nine RtI practitioners to produce a how-to guide to implementing RtI. A second satellite conference followed. NASDSE is now undertaking a series of technical assistance strategies to help those states and local school districts interested in learning more about, and implementing, RtI in their own communities. Several materials are now available for free downloading. NASDSE and CASE are working together on a series of "Blueprint" documents. These documents -- designed for state-, school district- and building-level implementation of RtI, will walk practitioners through all the implementation steps of putting RtI into place. The blueprints will serve the dual function of providing self-assessment and implementation strategies.
   
• Deaf Education Initiative
  This project has two components:

  (1) revising, updating and expanding out-of-date Deaf and Hard of Hearing Students: Educational Service Guidelines, originally published in 1995; and
     
  

  (2) a new technical/assistance/training component. The training component will be developed and implemented following the publication of the Guidelines document. Training seminars will provide local and state education administrators with information about federal statutes, policy guidance and promising practices from the field of deaf education. It will also facilitate their participation in a strategic planning session for adapting some of the nationally recognized research-based practices to their state-specific needs.
   
• IDEA Partnership
  Funded by the Office of Special Education Programs (OSEP), the IDEA Partnership created opportunities to work across federal agencies, federal investments, national organizations, State agencies and stakeholder groups. The partner organizations participate with states and each other in a variety of cross-stakeholder activities to build capacity of states, districts and schools to improve results for students with disabilities.
    
  Learn about the Partnership and follow the partner work at: http://www.ideainfo.org andhttp://www.ideapartnership.org.  The IDEA Partnership is part of the OSEP national Technical Assistance and Dissemination (TA & D) Network.
   
• National Center for Special Education Personnel & Related Service Providers
  NASDSE's OSEP-funded Personnel Center works to build both national and individual state capacity to recruit, prepare and retain highly qualified, diverse personnel for early intervention and special education programs, including classroom teachers, related service personnel and their assistants and instructional paraprofessionals. In order to accomplish its goal, the Personnel Center has developed a national recruitment campaign designed to recruit individuals from middle school through mid-career changers to the field of special education-related careers.
   
• Project Forum
  This project identifies information needed to improve the management, administration, delivery and effectiveness of education programs and services, and promotes utilization of research data and other information for improving outcomes for infants, toddlers, children and youth with disabilities. Project Forum provides information on emerging issues, studies critical issues, assists with the maintenance of a library of state policy documents and convenes small work groups to gather expert input related to specific topics.
   
• TA Customizer Project on Special Education in Charter Schools
  The three-year TA Customizer Project was funded by the U.S. Department of Education Charter Schools Program in October 2003. It is designed to bring technical assistance to states that will help them transform national training materials related to special education in charter schools into state-specific resources. Two previous efforts directed at NASDSE laid the groundwork for this project -- the research findings of Project SEARCH, and the technical assistance resources developed by the SPEDTACS Project.
   
• Blind Education Initiative
  NASDSE's Blind Education Initiative presents a series of seminars addressing educational services for students with visual impairments. The training modules, "Improving Education Services for Students with Visual Impairments: What Every Stakeholder Needs to Know", were originally funded by grants from the U.S. Department of Education's Office of Special Education Programs (OSEP). Since October 2002, the project has been supported by NASDSE and by fees collected from individual states purchasing the training.
   
• Center for Teacher Quality (CTQ)
  The Center is funded by OSEP. Center staff works with state teams, including state directors or teacher licensing/program approval, state directors or special education and deans of schools of education on improving the preparation, licensing and professional development of both general and special education teachers of students with disabilities.
   
• Early Childhood Outcomes Center (ECO)
  OSEP funded the ECO Center at SRI International in the fall of 2003 to promote the development and implementation of child and family outcome measures for infants, toddlers and preschoolers with disabilities that can be used in local, state and national accountability systems. NASDSE has a subcontract with SRI to provide a presence in Washington for ECO.
   
• Monarch Center
  NASDSE works with the University of Illinois at Chicago to promote activities in support of Minority Institutions of Higher Education (MIHEs).
   
• The National Center on Educational Outcomes
  Through a subcontract with the University of Minnesota, NASDSE supports the work of the National Center on Educational Outcomes (NCEO). NASDSE staff assist NCEO in obtaining survey information from states, providing feedback on documents and further assist the Center by representing NCEO in meetings and conferences in the Washington, DC area. NASDSE staff also participate in the project planning calls that involve NCEO staff, the OSEP project officer, and the Council of Chief State school Officers (CCSSO), NCEO's other partner. NASDSE also works with NCEO in the planning of national quarterly teleconference calls on critical issues related to the assessment of students with disabilities.
    
  With the increased attention on assessment of students with disabilities, NASDSEs work with NCEO keeps increasing in importance. NASDSE staff participate with NCEO and CCSSO in the State Collaborative on Assessment and Student Standards (SCASS) working group on Assessing Special Education Students (ASES) that is jointly sponsored by NASDSE.
   
• National Center on Secondary Education and Transition (NCSET)
  NASDSE works with the University of Minnesota to promote the improvement of transition activities for youth with disabilities.NASDSE has been particularly involved in organizing the National Alliance on Secondary Education and Transition, a group of national organizations, to formulate a national agenda for improving transition outcomes for youth with disabilities
   
• Project Intersect
  NASDSE is collaborating with the University of Maryland to conduct a three-year study on access to, and delivery of, special education in charter schools. Using surveys and in-depth case studies, the project will analyze factors related to charter schools' access to the special education infrastructure.
   
• Westat
  NASDSE has a subcontract with WESTAT, an employee-owned research corporation based in Rockville, Maryland. As a subcontractor, NASDSE assists with the following:  investigation of issues associated with state-reported and other data on children and youth the disabilities; studies of special populations (e.g. youth with disabilities in correctional facilities); development of outlines for the Annual Report to Congress; drafting of the agenda for the annual conference of state special education data managers
   
• Special Education Technical Assistance for Charter Schools (SPEDTACS)
  The SPEDTACS Project at NASDSE has produced a set of Primers for Special Education in Charter Schools or mini-texts on special education in charter schools targeted to groups with specific needs. The Primers build on the findings of a NASDSE-conducted research study, Project SEARCH. The three primers are targeted to specific users: one for authorizers tailored to the specific types of entities designated by states as charter authorizers (or sponsors), one for charter school developers/operators, and one targeted to state officials whose role involves them in charter schools. Each Primer also has a background section with two parts: the concepts of charter school legal identity and linkage to an LEA, and the federal laws most relevant to implementing special education in charter schools. The Primers conclude with three appendices: a glossary, a matrix of characteristics of charter schools in the states that have charter school laws as of the date of the printing, and a copy of the handbook, Charter Schools and the Education of Children with Disabilities.
    
• Research Institute for Assistive and Training Technologies (RIATT)
  RIATT provides beginning through advanced hands-on instruction in assistive technology to education professionals and consumers throughout the country. RIATT utilizes both web-based distance education and face to face techniques to deliver instruction, based upon the participants preference. Both methods provide the participant with the multimedia materials (books, videos, CDs and hands-on kits) that have come to be the trademark of this program. In addition, RIATT continues to develop a network of university credit, including undergraduate and graduate credit, credit towards a Masters and Education Specialist degree, Continuing Education Units, Texas Continuing Professional Units and Specialist Certificates. RIATT's Assistive Technology (A.T.) Assessment Institute is a week-long program that provides advanced training in the area of assistive technology assessment for practicing A.T. professionals. The Institute is designed to ensure that each participant receives the skills, resources and collegial support necessary to lead to team-based assistive technology assessment. Participants will acquire several protocols, software and hardware resources used within the Institute, which are highly effective at helping to meet the needs of many students with disabilities. The program's goal is to help professional provide appropriate assistive and educational technology services using universal design criteria. This helps to assure placement in the least restrictive environment while promoting high student achievement.