An independent facilitator may be requested by either the parent or the school, in any of the participating school districts. However, both parties must agree to participate in this voluntary process. The IEP Facilitator training will instruct volunteers who will be attending IEP meetings: 1. Talk to parents and school staff in advance of the meeting 2. Assist the team with establishing an agenda 3. Guide the discussion and keep the focus on the student 4. Make sure everyone has a chance to speak and be heard 5. Help resolve disagreements 6. Use communication skills to help parents and school personnel to work together to make decisions about the program 7. Help team members develop and ask clarifying questions about issues that may have occurred in the past 8. Help keep the team on task and focused on the agenda topics 9. Remain impartial, and not take sides, place blame, impose a decision on the group, nor offer an opinion on the appropriateness of a decision In addition to training volunteer IEP Facilitators, the Trainer will: 1. Establish a call system for parents and all Maryland Local Education Agencies and Public Agencies (LEA/PA) Organize and establish protocols to plan and assign facilitators 2. Plan and deliver training courses for IEP facilitators 3. Follow up after each IEP facilitated meeting to discuss and debrief the service 4. Conduct status checks (Quarterly) with IEP facilitators and continue support through the contract as needed 5. Submit monthly logs of work performed 6. Submit on a timely basis, invoices for payment 7. Work directly with LEA/PA Special Education Directors/Supervisors to inform stakeholders of the service
