Evaluation Team

Multidisciplinary Team

A multidisciplinary team (e.g., SST (for new referrals); IEP team (for re-evals)) needs to be involved in determining the evaluation plan — including who will actually conduct assessments and complete the report.

A single individual may be the only one conducting assessments and completing the report (e.g., an SLP); however, a multidisciplinary team (i.e., IEP team) must review these results, determining eligibility and educational needs.

School Psychologists

Share all evaluation plans with your School Psychologist prior to sending the plan home. Please provide at least a week for review and consultation.

Please don’t hesitate to reach out to your School Psychologist with questions. The earlier in the process of developing the plan, the better!

SpEd Teacher Licensure Requirements

Licensure Grids by District

Click your district to view your licensure grid.

A teacher licensed in the student’s disability is required to participate in the student's evaluations. In most cases, this individual completes an observation or interview relevant to the disability area. For example, a licensed ASD teacher might be involved in the evaluation for a student who they do not case manage, and they would most likely observe or interview the student as part of the evaluation.

When the case manager is writing the evaluation PWN in SpEd Forms, any individual filling the role described above should be listed with their licensure. While evaluation PWNs typically only specify "Special Education Teacher," in the example above the teacher would be listed as "Licensed ASD Teacher" (whichever licensure/category is relevant to their involvement in the evaluation). This title should also be used on the evaluation report itself.

ASD

Specifically for students under the ASD category, there are several options for including a licensed team member:

Licensed ASD teacher, licensed at the age/grade level of the student.
Licensed academic and behavior strategist (ABS) teacher for students in K-12, with a range of mild to moderate needs,
Licensed early childhood special education (ECSE) teacher for children from birth through age six.

OHD, TBI, and D/B

The categories of Deaf/Blind, Traumatic Brain Injury, and Other Health Disabilities currently do not have Minnesota teacher licensure. In these cases, the federal standard of, "a teacher knowledgeable about the student's disability" will be utilized. The category Severely Multiply Impaired also does not have licensure but typically one of the disabilities in this cluster has Minnesota licensure.

Service Provider Involvement (Speech/Language, OT, PT, DAPE, etc.)

If you are unsure whether a service provider needs to be included, connect with them to see what information they need to make this determination. If the service provider does need to be involved, provide at least a week’s notice for the service provider to add their assessments into the evaluation PWN.

OTs and PTs

When considering whether or not to add OT or PT to an evaluation or IEP, please refer to the OT/PT Evaluation Flowchart.
In every case, the OT and/or PT must be consulted directly prior to being included on an evaluation plan or IEP.

OT-PT Evaluation Flowcharts.pdf

School Nurse Involvement

Initial Evaluations

SLD, ASD, SLI, and DHH

A health/physical assessment by a School Nurse is not required unless the student has suspected health-related educational needs. For initial SLD evaluations, if a health/physical assessment is not needed, vision/hearing screening information must be reviewed under the Background Information section of the evaluation report.

EBD, OHD, DCD, TBI, and PI

A health/physical assessment by a School Nurse is required because, in order to determine initial eligibility, criteria for these categories requires that the evaluation rule out contributing and exclusionary health-related factors. In the case of OHD, criteria specifically requires that the evaluation includes verification of a diagnosis/disability.

Developmental Delay

If health screening was completed during early childhood screening, is available to the team, and indicates no concerns, then a health/physical assessment by a nurse would not be required. However, the screening information should be included in the ESR.
If there was not a health assessment at screening, or if there are concerns about health, then the nurse would need to be involved in the ESR.

Re-evaluations

For all categories, health/physical assessments are not required for re-evaluations, and it is the case manager and evaluation team's decision regarding whether a health/physical assessment by a School Nurse is appropriate.

It should be added to the evaluation plan if the student has suspected health-related educational needs. This may apply if, for example, the student has a medical diagnosis, the student is prescribed medication, or the student's hearing and/or vision are inadequate.

Specifically for the categories of OHD, TBI, & PI, if a health/physical assessment is not needed, a summary of the initial health/physical assessment must be included in the Background Information section.

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