[T]here is a turf war going on between the Agency of Education and the Office of Professional Regulation over who gets to license speech language pathologists who teach in Vermont’s public schools.
The two state agencies have dug opposing trenches.
The Office of Professional Regulation argues that they can streamline certification making it more convenient for licensees and releasing them from additional fees.
The Agency of Education wants speech language pathologists – clinicians that work in the classroom – to continue to maintain an education endorsement. AOE argues that licensing through the agency ensures that educators — including speech language pathologists — are effective at teaching kids.
Chris Winters, deputy secretary of state, told lawmakers on the House Committee on Education, that the two agencies are at an impasse “where there is too much of a gap between us.”
“It is going to be up to the Legislature to determine what the path is from here,” Winters said.
Last week, HEC lawmakers ventured into the breech after they learned about a bill, S.217, that would give OPR complete licensing rights over speech language pathologists regardless of whether they work in a classroom, private practice or hospital.
AOE says the change in licensure threatens speech language pathologists status as teachers, potentially eliminating benefits and protections afforded to other educators. It would also eliminate AOE’s ability to ensure that the speech language pathologists are highly qualified educators. As a result of the licensing change, the Agency of Education faces losing about $100,000 a year in fees.
Speech language pathologists, also known as therapists, diagnose and treat communication and swallowing disorders. In schools, speech language pathologists often work in the special education realm.
Jo-Anne Unruh, of the Vermont Council of Special Education Administrators said it is important for speech language pathologists who work in the schools to have the educational endorsement provided by AOE,“When SLP’s work with students in schools, the focus is very different than in a clinical environment.”
Last year, Act 38 moved the clinical licensing of speech language pathologists to OPR as long as those who planned to work in the public school continued to go to AOE for an educational endorsement. OPR thought that AOE would issue the endorsement with a minimal process and minimal fee, according to Winters.
The fees at AOE went up when the new process was implemented last September- from $35 a year for a total of $105 for three years to $50 a year for a total of $300 for five years with a $50 processing fee. Continuing education requirements for speech language pathologists also increased from 30 hours for three years to 45 hours for three years.
This has upset some speech language pathologists who have found the dual licensing and fees to the two agencies “onerous” and want just one agency to handle the licensing process. That is what S.217 is trying to fix.
The new fees and requirements concerned the Secretary of State’s office because they believe they were not developed in accordance with the Vermont’s Administrative Procedure Act since there was no formal rulemaking, with public input and publication in the Administrative code.
The Vermont State Board of Professional Educators is responsible for setting standards for issuing educator licenses and endorsements. The board also has oversight over the licensing process as administered by AOE. In a letter to Sen. Ann Cummings, D-Washington chair of the Senate Education Committee, referred to a “longstanding administrative rule” 5444 that allows the VSBPE to create or change the standards for an endorsement as needed.
“We’ve actually made it worse so that is why we are back again this year with S.217 – trying to fix that,” Winters said of the new licensing process.
Beyond the power struggle is another story, one that has the potential to affect many of Vermont’s school children. The conflict reveals a clash of worldviews — one arguing for streamlined efficiency and the other to philosophies around quality teaching and ensuring that low income students are served just as well as those with means.
S.217 didn’t make it through cross over – the deadline for new legislation to be considered by the General Assembly. Since then the House Government Operations Committee incorporated the bill into H.562, otherwise known as the OPR bill. Winters says that the drafts they are working on resolving the issues speech language pathologists educators had with retirement benefits and bargaining rights.
The House Committee on Education first learned of the legislation last week.
David Sharpe, chair of the committee, asked Lisa Durstin, who represents the Vermont Speech-Language Hearing Association, why the bill was never brought before the education committees when it is “clearly an AOE issue.”
“To us it was a regulatory issue and not an education issue because in our minds we didn’t see anything changing for school based SLPs….in our minds, it wasn’t an education issue,” Durstin said. The association, which represents speech pathologists and audiologists, supports moving all licensing to OPR because it is more convenient and less costly.
Greg Glennon, legal counsel for AOE, told HEC lawmakers that a minority of speech language pathologists — about 100 — have complained.
“This has led to legislation that will affect well over 1,000 licenses,” said Glennon.
The legislation would extend OPR licensing to all Title 26 clinical treatment professions such as nurses, social workers and psychologists who may work in a school setting or a clinic. It also captures some career and technical educators, such as architects, engineers and cosmetologists. S.217 would move all primary licensing of about 1,200 educators to OPR and they would no longer have to get an endorsement from AOE or pay additional fees, according to Glennon.
Glennon said AOE will take a hit financially if the bill passes. The agency will lose about $100,000 a year in fees.
“These fees directly pay for positions in our Licensing Office,” Glennon said. “We would need a commensurate general fund increase or evaluate which state activities to terminate to compensate for the lost revenue, or we would have to ask the legislature to increase fees on the remaining educators.”
Winters told lawmakers “we understand it would be a revenue loss for AOE, but we are not going to gain anything from doing this.” He reiterated that he just wants to eliminate duplication of services.
That redundancy didn’t exist until September of last year. Before then, AOE issued both the clinical license and the education endorsement to SLPs and other such employees.
“So folks that practiced at the medical center in Burlington who have nothing to do with education would go to the Agency to get their license,” Colin Benjamin, director of OPR, told HEC, before adding, “What it would say on their license on the wall is Vermont Educator License and they have nothing to do with education. So last year one of the problems we were trying to solve was to get those clinicians licensed at OPR and not at the AOE.”
The Office of Professional Regulation administers licenses for about 60,000 workers in nearly 50 professions in Vermont. About half of all students who graduate from the University of Vermont with a speech language training go into the classrooms and the other half choose private or clinical work places, according to Benjamin. That is why both agencies thought it made sense to move licensing to OPR.
In 42 states, SLPs have to get a separate credential from the state’s department of education in order to work in public schools, according to the American Speech Language Hearing Association, ASHA, the national certification body for speech pathologists and audiologists.
At the heart of the matter is the question of whether or not SLPs are teachers. S.217 does not extend that title to SLPs and other Title 26 professionals.
“Teacher” does not include any professional licensed pursuant to Title 26 and employed by a public school district or supervisory union to provide services within the scope of practice of that professional license,” according to the bill.
Steven John, chair of VSBPE and superintendent of Windham Central Supervisory Union, disagrees, writing in a missive to lawmakers on the Government Operations Committee:“A speech language pathologist or a school nurse or other educator licensee that is also licensed through OPR is as much an educator as any other classroom teacher. The faculty in the school building must work as a team to insure student success because teaching is a team effort among professional colleagues.”
AOE and others see the move as an attempt to take over teacher licensing. VSBPE’s John, expressed concern: “It is much more than just checking off a box that certifies someone is eligible to teach in the public schools.”
John goes onto explain that the licensing process has come to support educators by helping them reflect on their practices and improve their teaching. “Our standards for educator licensure now are based on professional growth over the course of an educator’s career in the profession. This perspective evolved over time, and reflects the fact that educator licensing is a nuanced exercise, which requires judgement at each step fo the process; this process often lacks bright lines.”
There is also a federal issue when it comes to licensing teachers. “Federal law requires that educator licensing and teacher quality function as an integrated process through the State’s Education Agency,” Glennon told lawmakers referencing public law 114-95. Funding for AOE is tied to requirements to have a “robust licensure process within the state’s Education Agency that credentials high quality licensees to lead and teach in our public schools,” Glennon said.
IDEA “requires” state agencies of education to take measurable steps to recruit, hire and retain “highly qualified personnel” to teach or serve special education students.
“Licensing is mentioned 20 times in the new federal law (ESSA), which provides up to 11 percent of funding in some of our high poverty settings,” according to Stephanie Brackin, a spokesperson for AOE. “Licensing is one of the levers the federal policy uses to promote systems improvement. As such, it is a lever on which the AOE needs to have its hand.”
Winters says there has been a misunderstanding and OPR is not trying to make an end run at taking over all teacher licensing.
Correction: An earlier version of this story used the incorrect first name for Lisa Durstin.
