High-Leverage Practices Help Guide Development of New CEC Standards

The Council for Exceptional Children (CEC) released two new sets of CEC Standards for special educator preparation programs in July 2020.

The first set is the 2020 Initial Practice-Based Professional Preparation Standards for Special Educators (Initial K-12 Standards), which is an updated revision of the 2012 Initial K-12 Standards.

The second set is the Initial Practice-Based Professional Preparation Standards for Early Interventionists/Early Childhood Special Educators (EI/ECSE).

In developing the standards, the CEC Standards Development Work Group (SDWG) employed a rigorous process that was informed by the most current research and sources available, including the High Leverage Practices (HLPs).

CEC developed and published the set of HLPs for special educators and teacher candidates in partnership with the Collaboration for Effective Educator Development, Accountability and Reform (CEEDAR) Center.

The HLPs are organized around four aspects of practice: Collaboration, Assessment, Social/ Emotional/Behavioral, and Instruction. From these four aspects of practice there are 22 practices intended to address the most critical practices that every K–12 special education teacher should master and be able to demonstrate. The selected practices are used frequently in classrooms and have been shown to improve student outcomes if successfully implemented.

“Throughout our work developing the initial practice-based standards, the work group consistently referred to the HLPs to guide how we prioritized and articulated the most critical practices that new special educators should be able to demonstrate,” said SDWG Co-Chair Virginia (Ginnie) McLaughlin.

SDWG Co-Chair Dee Berlinghoff added, “As educator preparation programs begin utilizing the new CEC standards for curricula development and program accreditation purposes, the HLPs will have a direct impact on educator preparation for years to come.”

The themes of the HLPs are evident in the new standards, which include standards on supporting social, emotional, and behavioral growth, assessment, instruction, and collaboration. As part of the guidance being released related to the new standards, a crosswalk of the HLPs and the standards will be available on the CEC website in Fall 2020.

CEC submitted the standards to the Council for Accreditation of Educator Preparation (CAEP), as required, for inclusion in the SPA Program Review Process. Pending CAEP’s acceptance, they will become optional for use for reports submitted in Spring 2021 and required in Spring 2023 for use in the SPA Program Review Process