Subtitle C—National Activities To Improve Education of Children With 
Disabilities 
Sec. 121. Personnel development to improve services and results for children 
with disabilities. 
TITLE II—IMPROVING THE EFFECTIVENESS OF SPECIAL EDU-
CATION AND RELATED SERVICES FOR STUDENTS WITH VIS-
UAL DISABILITIES 
Subtitle A—General Provisions 
Sec. 201. Identifying students with visual disabilities. 
Sec. 202. State plans. 
Sec. 203. Evaluations. 
Sec. 204. Consideration of special factors. 
Sec. 205. Technical assistance for parents and educators of students with visual 
disabilities. 
Subtitle B—Anne Sullivan Macy Center on Visual Disability and Educational 
Excellence 
Sec. 211. Center establishment and mission. 
Sec. 212. Administration; eligibility; governance; structure. 
Sec. 213. Activities. 
Sec. 214. Authorization of appropriations and carryover. 
Sec. 215. Relationship to other programs and activities. 
TITLE III—IMPROVING THE EFFECTIVENESS OF SPECIAL EDU-
CATION AND RELATED SERVICES FOR CHILDREN AND YOUTH 
WHO ARE DEAF-BLIND 
Subtitle A—General Provisions 
Sec. 301. Identifying children who are deaf-blind. 
Sec. 302. Related services. 
Sec. 303. State plans. 
Sec. 304. Evaluations. 
Sec. 305. Consideration of special factors. 
Sec. 306. Technical assistance for parents and educators of children who are 
deaf-blind. 
Sec. 307. Conforming regulations. 
Subtitle B—Improving the Effectiveness of Early Intervention for Infants and 
Toddlers With Deaf-Blindness and Their Families 
Sec. 311. Content of plan. 
Subtitle C—National Activities To Improve the Education of Children With 
Disabilities 
Sec. 321. Personnel development to improve services and results for children 
with disabilities. ensuring sufficient teachers of the deaf-blind 
and early intervention specialists. 
SEC. 2. PURPOSES. 
The purposes of this Act are as follows: 
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(1) To better ensure delivery of high quality 
special education and related services to students 
with visual disabilities or who are deaf or hard of 
hearing or who are deaf-blind through specialized in-
structional services and methodologies designed to 
meet their unique language, communication, and 
learning needs. 
(2) To better ensure delivery of high quality 
early intervention services to infants and toddlers 
who are deaf or hard of hearing or who are deaf- 
blind and their families through specialized services 
and methodologies designed to meet their unique 
language, communication, and other developmental 
needs. 
(3) To foster the proliferation of research sup-
porting the development and evaluation of effective 
and innovative assessments and instructional meth-
odologies consonant with the unique learning needs 
of students with visual disabilities. 
(4) To enhance accountability for the provision 
of such services. 
(5) To support the development of personnel 
serving students with visual disabilities or who are 
deaf or hard of hearing or who are deaf-blind. 
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SEC. 3. FINDINGS. 
The Congress finds the following: 
(1) When American author, Mark Twain, im-
mortalized Helen Keller’s teacher, Anne Sullivan 
Macy, with the moniker ‘‘the miracle worker’’, his 
words, though meant as praise, reflect the mis-
conception that educating individuals with disabil-
ities is a nearly insurmountable task requiring ex-
traordinary feats performed by gifted and saintly 
persons. Rather, the work of teaching children with 
disabilities can and does occur when committed and 
qualified but everyday special educators are properly 
prepared and supported to practice their professions. 
Yet, the educational systems within which they act 
must also be held accountable for results. 
(2) In 1817, Thomas Hopkins Gallaudet and a 
deaf teacher, Laurent Clerc, opened the first Amer-
ican school for deaf students—the American School 
for the Deaf—with young Alice Cogswell as its first 
pupil. Ultimately the school grew into a national in-
stitution and the mother of many other schools. As 
Alice demonstrated, deaf and hard of hearing chil-
dren can learn and achieve to high levels when they 
have full access to language and communication; are 
taught by professionals with specialized training; 
and have access to educational placements that rec-
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ognize and provide for their language, communica-
tion, social-emotional, and academic needs. 
(3) Deaf and hard of hearing children who are 
identified early and receive appropriate early inter-
vention from specialized, qualified providers achieve 
higher language and communication outcomes. How-
ever, currently, early intervention services typically 
are not provided in a timely manner and severe 
shortages of specialized early intervention profes-
sionals result in many deaf and hard of hearing chil-
dren not reaching their developmental potential. 
Similarly, research demonstrates that students with 
visual disabilities are among the highest performing 
students with disabilities in terms of academic 
achievement, and yet they are among the least em-
ployed, even after successful accomplishment of post- 
secondary academic objectives. 
(4) Likewise, children who are deaf-blind have 
the same capacity to learn and achieve as any other 
children. However, they must have ongoing access to 
the same environmental and educational information 
that their sighted and hearing peers can access auto-
matically. These children require direct learning ex-
periences, including hands-on experiences and in-
tense involvement in educational routines and activi-
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ties. They must receive specialized direct instruction 
in their preferred mode of communication in a range 
of academic and functional areas. 
(5) Students who are deaf, hard of hearing, or 
deaf-blind require more language and communica-
tion access and support to acquire skills than they 
are currently receiving. It has been the U.S. Depart-
ment of Education’s position since 1992 that ‘‘[a]ny 
educational setting that does not meet the commu-
nication and related needs of a child who is deaf 
does not allow for the provision of [a Free Appro-
priate Public Education] and cannot be considered 
the [Least Restrictive Environment] for that child’’. 
(6) Moreover, a principal way that sighted, 
hearing students acquire knowledge and skills is 
through incidental learning, naturally observing oth-
ers and the environment. Deficits in incidental learn-
ing leave students with sensory disabilities behind in 
an array of skill areas. In addition to core aca-
demics, deaf and hard of hearing students, for exam-
ple, must also receive specialized instruction and 
services designed to maximize their capacity to learn 
effectively and live productively and independently. 
Similarly, students who are blind or visually im-
paired must also receive instruction in the expanded 
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