Chapter 14 of PA school code on special education requires that "each school year, [instructional aides] shall provide evidence of 20 hours of staff development activities related to their assignment." (§ 14.105(a)(3)). This includes all aides who work with special education students for any part of the day in a classroom setting.

Since the 20 hour requirement is state law, it must be fulfilled, even if an aide is on a medically related leave.

In addition to the above, those staff members who are required to be trained in CPR and/or Safe Crisis Management may receive up to 6 hours of training on the "re-certification" date at the end of the year.

Those individuals who do not participate in district provided training must earn these credit hours by participating in programs offered by other providers. In order to earn credit hours these programs must be pre-approved by the Assistant Special Education Director and/or the Director of Pupil Services. Such programs will be pre-approved using the following criteria:

• The topic of the course must relate to delivery of instruction for special education students.

• Off-site conferences- Third Party conferences are offered by local providers such as PATTAN, CAIU, etc. Conferences during the school day will be approved on a first come first serve basis and participation will depend on the need and availability of substitutes.

• Virtual Learning- For the purposes of this handbook there are two types of Virtual learning:

• On-Line courses: Are defined as those virtual activities that require active participation of the learner. Examples include but are not limited to:

• Courses that require the user to answer questions or interact with the software in order to move to the next portion of the course.

• Courses that require a completion test in order to print a certificate.

• All courses must have published a pre-determined course length and must provide either a certificate of completion or some other method of documenting completion. (note: if the provider does not offer this documentation, contact Special Education Department Chairperson prior to enrolling).

• The same virtual learning activity will be accepted for credit towards hours only once during an employee’s tenure (i.e. the same course /virtual presentation may not be repeated).

  • This does not apply to required annual trainings (FERPA, PDE mandated training, etc)

• PaTTAN courses published for the current school year are the only courses that will be accepted.

Receiving credit. In order to receive credit for any non-district sponsored training (i.e. the District did not distribute a sign-in sheet at the training) the instructional aide must submit a written summary of the training. Guidelines for fulfilling this requirement can be found below.

Training hours for the current school year must be submitted by the end of business 2 business days after the last teacher work day of the school year. For 2019-2020 this date is anticipated to be June 10, 2020. Any instructional aides that do not complete the 20 hour requirement of staff development by this date will be terminated.

It is the responsibility of the district employee to track and upload training hours into EduPlanet for approval. Instructions on how to submit training hours into EduPlanet are located below. Contracted providers will report their training hours to their employer.

Note: For more information on training opportunities outside of the district programs please contact the supervisor of special education.

Growing up Rural: Inequity for Young Children and Child Care Providers (0.5 hours)

Beautiful Differences (0.5 hours)

Clear Connection: DHH students (0.5 hours)

Helping Others Gives New Meaning to Learning (0.5 hours)

Trauma is a Word- Not a Sentence (0.5 hours)

There are a number of trainings that are may be completed each year. You can access these trainings on this website:

SafeSchools

(To Login, use the first part of your email address and then your district password. For example, Buster Bulldog would use bbulldog as the username.)

These trainings include:

• FERPA: Confidentiality of Records

• HIPPA Overview

• Health Emergencies: Seizures

• Health Emergencies: Diabetes Awareness

• PA Act 126- Mandatory completion every 5 years:

  • PA Act 126: Part 1 Child Abuse History and Reporting

  • PA Act 126: Educator Discipline Act, Sexual Misconduct and Maintaining Professional Boundaries

If you have questions about where you are in the 5 year cycle for Act 126 trainings, contact Stacy Lehman, Human Resources Coordinator: slehman@bigspring.k12.pa.us