Alice Cogswell and Anne Sullivan Macy Act

The Alice Cogswell and Anne Sullivan Macy Act would rewrite parts of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) to strengthen special-education and early-intervention services for children who are deaf, hard of hearing, deafdisabled, blind or visually impaired, or deafblind. States would have to identify these students even when they are officially classified under a different disability, file written compliance addenda within two years showing how they deliver services such as American Sign Language and Braille instruction, and keep a full continuum of specialized placements open — treating the closure of a school for the deaf or the blind as an illegal cut to special-education funding. The bill would require evaluations tailored to each group (for example, language-proficiency and Braille assessments), add teachers of students with sensory disabilities and one-to-one interveners to the list of qualified early-intervention personnel, and direct the Education Department to expand training programs for these specialists. It would create a new Anne Sullivan Macy Center on Visual Disability and Educational Excellence, run by a consortium of nonprofits and universities under a contract of at least five years, funded by "such sums as may be necessary" with no more than 15 percent of each year's appropriation allowed to carry over. The Secretary of Education would have to monitor state compliance and report findings to Congress, review and republish long-standing policy guidance at least every five years, and issue new regulations defining "deafblindness" and "intervener services." Families of these children, special-education teachers, educational interpreters, and state education agencies would be the groups most affected.