January 14, 2019 at 11:00 AM - Special Population Committee Meeting

Discussion:  Call to order at 11:00 AM.

Staff:  David Ludwig, Deb Hericks, Priscilla Quintana, Scott Ludwig, Wade Fruhling

Discussion:  Nathan Busch, NeSOC was present to give updates on Systems of Care work throughout the state.  Large concept of state wide mental care and also the Federal grant funding a small portion of the care.  Committee met last week to discuss what works and what doesn't work.  The Leadership Board says they are ready to lead this support together.  They reaffirmed the commitment to outcomes and the road they want to continue.  There are 66 strategies that need to happen to make this a statewide effort.  The Leadership Committee narrowed down to just a couple strategies they want to focus on.  The are talking about a resource management utilization team (Beth Baxter) - pooled pot of funds to serve children with mental health challenges across agencies.  There is a possibility of other sources to add money to this work.  They have about 90% of supports are committed to offering support to services/support.  They want to target the top 10% utilizer of services.  What needs to be in place to create efficiencies and effectiveness?  They have the data, not need to decide how to utilize data to make improvements.  There are school personnel on this committee to continue to make connections.  One of the outcomes is to strengthen the relationship with NDE.  The grant portion of the NeSOC we are working in coordination with the Project Aware Grant.  Working more collaboratively with NDE to help with success.  They are working on second carryover of funds from the Feds.  Submitted for 2.6 million dollars, plans on how to utilize funds in regions 1 and 3 to use the funds.  Scottsbluff  (Region 1) would put in place an IOP (Intensive Outpatient Program) program to keep students in the classroom.  Other services are also within the  grant.  Expansion/Development of evidence based services based on the 10% profile.  Treatment programs for DD and BD challenges to increase the effectiveness of care.  Partnered with Lincoln Public Schools to discuss chronic absentees.  Look/define how to measure attendance.  The are looking to LPS-wide community response program.  Areas of concerns are transportation/health issues.  Advise Committee to connect with region supports to get on their agendas.  Nathan will send us a list of support agencies.  Need to look how to equitably reach on areas of regions across the state.  Focus on SED (social emotional disturbance) students to help them pre-diagnosis and help parents.  Encourage Communities to reach out to the ESUs.  

Discussion:  NDE not present at meeting.

Discussion:  The ESPD Committee will meet tomorrow.  Amy Rhone, NDe plans to met with the ESPD Committee.  Presentation on behalf of NSLHA (National Student Speech Language Hearing Association) they will also record the training.  Will help to make deicsions with a lot of more data.  MIPS will also be on their agenda, most of the first day of conference is on MIPS.  The conference is scheduled for February 14-15, 2019.  They will also be meeting with KSB.  They are also sharing job descriptions.  Greg Prohaska is training on MOE (Maintenance of effort).  

Discussion:  Executive Director met with Nick Pace.  UNL will be holding a Criitcal Issues Forum on February 25 fro 8:30-3:00 at Southwest Community College.  Researchers, school leaders, and community service agencies will provide short 25 min presentations and resources related to mental health and its impact on students and schools.  Possibility of the ESUCC Mental Health Group to present at this forum.  The things discussed were: 
1)      Nate will include a sampling of mental health screening/programs as a possible group dissertation topic when we promote potential topics to students;
2)      The Critical Issues Forum will hold a slot open in the agenda for an ESU presentation. We plan to finalize the agenda and schedule in the next week or so.
3)      If ESU would like to contribute to the Forum as a co-sponsor.
There is also an PreK-12 Advisory Committee that Melissa Wheelock is serving on.  Matt McNiff would also be a good person to present at this forum.  

Discussion:  Executive Director shared the information on the MSA.  Discussion regarding the SRS Tier Structure.  SRS Manager shared the tier structure is the possibility of trying to balance the structure better.  

Discussion:  SRS Advisory Committee shared their thoughts on the Tier Structure.  There are a number of districts getting a hard sell from other vendors to leave SRS.  The increase is proportionate but do we need to review to make more equitable.  Continue to discuss adding the 504 and SAT process to SRS.  Another discussion was is the SRS Advisory role, does Special Population take over this responsibility.  Continue to discuss and revaluate the role.  Begin discussion after the 19-20 MSA is approved for the following year.  

Discussion:  Mental Helath conference will be Tuesday June 11 and Wednesday, June 12, 2019 at the Younes Center in Kearney.  Rule 51 will be open for proposed changed.  

Discussion:  Executive Director shared that we are trying to put other Innovative Grant monies toward the development of this project.  The team created a timeline for the process to scale up this process.  They have finished the first pahse of the conversion to Zend 3 and have moved on to the testing phase.  Review of this timeline was completed.  Mid-march beta testing will begin.  Focus on large schools and smaller schools involved in process.  Wade Fruhling to put together a Google Doc of Beta users to share out at the next Committee meeting. They will present to the IllniCloud in March.  July 1 they will roll out the new site.  August begin training on new system.  

Discussion:  Nothing new to report, the team has been focusing on the SRS conversion.

Discussion:  Project Para Conference went well.  They are working on the summary report.  There have been a lot of new users added to the Project Para website.  

Discussion:  meeting adjourned at 11:58 am.