What's Required
The Individuals with Disabilities Education Improvement Act of 2004, formerly the Education of the Handicapped Act (P.L. 94-142), includes "hearing impairment" and "deafness" as two of the categories under which children with disabilities may be eligible for special education and related service programming. While the term "hearing impairment" is often used generically to describe a wide range of hearing losses including deafness, the regulations for IDEA define hearing loss and deafness separately.
Hearing impairment (called auditory impairment in Texas) is defined by IDEA as "an impairment in hearing, whether permanent or fluctuating, that adversely affects a child's educational performance."
Deafness is defined as "a hearing impairment that is so severe that the child is impaired in processing linguistic information through hearing, with or without amplification."
Thus, deafness may be viewed as a condition that prevents an individual from receiving sound in all or most of its forms. In contrast, a child with hearing loss can generally respond to auditory stimuli, including speech.
What We Do
Referral for Students with an Auditory Impairment
Students with a documented Auditory Impairment (AI) should be immediately scheduled for a Response to Intervention (RtI) meeting. Evaluation for possible special education services should not be delayed by the Response to Intervention process.
1. Spring ISD’s Audiologist or an outside agency has assessed and identified a child as having a hearing loss. Spring ISD’s Audiologist will send a copy of the audiological report to the school nurse and referral source on the home campus.
2. The AI certified itinerant teacher is contacted by Spring ISD’s Audiologist or school contact person who has a report from an outside agency indicating a student has a documented hearing loss.
3. The AI certified itinerant teacher will make contact with the campus RtI chairperson and the classroom teacher at the student’s home campus. The classroom teachers is given an auditory impairment questionnaire to complete.
4. The AI certified itinerant teacher will schedule a meeting with the RtI chairperson to determine whether the student needs a Section 504 plan for accommodations or needs an evaluation for special education. The campus based team, including the AI certified itinerant teacher, will attend the meeting to review the referral information.
5. If the student is referred for special education testing, the AI certified itinerant teacher contacts the audiology department and requests a Nurse Request form for an ontological exam. The audiological form is sent to the nurse consultant and an ontological exam is scheduled with an ENT. The AI certified itinerant teacher completes a communication assessment. The campus based Evaluation specialist completed the Full and Individual Evaluation (FIE).
6. The AI multidisciplinary team will review information from the ontological, the audiological, the communication assessment and the draft of the FIE to make recommendations related to AI services. The campus based Evaluation Specialist will receive information from the AI multidisciplinary team regarding AI services for the student. The AI certified itinerant teacher completes the ontological, audiological and communication assessment for the FIE.
7. The AI certified itinerant teacher must attend the ARD and will review all information related to the AI disability condition and will discuss recommended services.
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