Revision: Dec. 1, 2022, 9:16 a.m.
2023 SESSION
23-0292.0
10/05
HOUSE BILL [bill number]
AN ACT relative to screening and intervention in public schools for dyslexia and related disorders.
SPONSORS: [sponsors]
COMMITTEE: [committee]
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ANALYSIS
This bill requires additional dyslexia and related disorder screening and intervention for kindergarten or first grade students.
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Explanation: Matter added to current law appears in bold italics.
Matter removed from current law appears [in brackets and struckthrough.]
Matter which is either (a) all new or (b) repealed and reenacted appears in regular type.
23-0292.0
10/05
STATE OF NEW HAMPSHIRE
In the Year of Our Lord Two Thousand Twenty Three
AN ACT relative to screening and intervention in public schools for dyslexia and related disorders.
Be it Enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives in General Court convened:
1 Schools; Screening and Intervention for Dyslexia and Related Disorders. Amend RSA 200:59 to read as follows:
200:59 Screening and Intervention for Dyslexia and Related Disorders.
I. School districts shall screen all public school students, including English learners, using the Dynamic Indicators of Basic Early Literacy Skills (DIBELS) or an equivalent [cost effective] evidence-based screener for the identification of potential indicators or risk factors of dyslexia and related disorders upon enrollment in public school kindergarten or first grade and one additional time during the current school year, and at appropriate times thereafter, to monitor progress. [Beginning in 2017, such] The initial screening shall be completed no later than November 30 of each school year.
I-a. If any such screening determines that a student fails to meet relevant benchmarks for grade-typical development in specific foundational skills, then the school must complete a secondary assessment within 30 days to determine whether the school should provide such student with modified, differentiated, or supplementary evidence-based reading instruction intervention or refer the student to special education for further evaluation. The school shall promptly inform the student’s parent or legal guardian of the screening results. If a special education referral is made for further evaluation, the state's required timeline shall be followed. During this time general education intervention shall be initiated within 21 days of the initial screening, and continue until a special education determination is made.
II. The student's school district shall provide age-appropriate, evidence-based, intervention strategies to begin by the January 1 of the school year for any student who is identified as having characteristics that are associated with potential indicators or risk factors of dyslexia and related disorders [beginning no later than January 1, 2018].
III. The parent or legal guardian of any student who is identified by the public school as having characteristics that are associated with potential indicators or risk factors of dyslexia and related disorders shall be notified and provided with all screening information and findings, in addition to periodic formal screening results based on individual written intervention and support plans developed with the student's parents or legal guardian.
IV. A parent or legal guardian of any student who is identified as having characteristics that are associated with potential indicators or risk factors of dyslexia and related disorders has the right to submit the results of an independent evaluation from a licensed reading or intervention specialist highly trained in dyslexia and related disorders for consideration by the student's school district. A parent or legal guardian who submits an independent evaluation shall assume all fiscal responsibility for that independent evaluation.
2 Effective Date. This act shall take effect 60 days after its passage.