Assistant Director of Special Education Program Improvement, Oversight and Monitoring

Thurston County, WA - USA

Yearly Salary: $ 102547 - 114577

Posted on: 3 days ago

Vacancies: 1 Vacancy

Job Summary

Description

WASHINGTON MANAGEMENT SERVICE

JOB ANNOUNCEMENT

Assistant Director of Special Education: Program Improvement Oversight and Monitoring

$102547 - $114577 annually

Closes December 142025

The Washington State Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction (OSPI) seeks to fill Assistant Director of Special Education for the Program Improvement Oversight and Monitoring. This permanent full-time position is based in Olympia Washington. This position may be eligible for partial to near full-time telework. Telework is a combination of in-building and off-site days. During your initial training period you will be required to be in the office 3 days a week.After youve completed your initial training you may have the option to work from home on a flexible telework schedule. While were happy to offer this balance of in-office connection and telework flexibility this isnt a fully remote position. To be eligible youll also need to reside in the state of Washington.We encourage interested candidates to visit the OSPI website to gain insight into our agency.

About OSPI and our initiatives

OSPI is the primary agency charged with overseeing public K12 education in Washington state. Working with the states 295 public school districts and 7 state-tribal education compact schools OSPI allocates funding and provides tools resources and technical assistance so every student in Washington is provided a high-quality public education.

At OSPI we recognize that our employees are the key to the success of the agency. We are committed to our work but value the balance with our personal lives. We demonstrate our commitment to employees by providing an environment that stimulates professional growth and values them for their expertise. OSPI is a great place to work and has several initiatives to help create a great working environment including:

We support a healthy work/life balance by offering flexible/alternative work schedules and mobile and telework options. (Depending on job duties and work location.)
We have a tuition assistance policy and support employees seeking tuition waiver through participating higher education organizations.
We have an Infant at Work Program that is based on long-term values of newborns and infant-parent bonding. Eligible employees who are new parents or legal guardians can bring their infant (six weeks to six months) when returning to work. (Depending on job duties and work location.)
We value and are actively involved in promoting diversity equity and inclusion within OSPI by way of cross-divisional collaborative committee. The focus of the committee includes employee engagement and education; reinforcing OSPI values; and maximizing the value of diversity and identifying strategies for inclusion.

Vision Mission and Values
Vision: All students prepared for post-secondary pathways careers and civic engagement.

Mission: Transform K-12 education to a system that is centered on closing opportunity gaps and is characterized by high expectations for all students and educators. We achieve this by developing equity-based policies and supports that empower educators families and communities.

Values: Ensuring Equity Collaboration and Service Achieving Excellence through Continuous Improvement Focus on the Whole Child

Equity

Each student family and community possesses strengths and cultural knowledge that benefits their peers educators and schools. Ensuring educational equity:

Goes beyond equality; it requires education leaders to examine the ways current policies and practices result in disparate outcomes for our students of color students living in poverty students receiving special education and English Learner services students who identify as LGBTQ and highly mobile student populations.
Requires education leaders to develop an understanding of historical contexts; engage students families and community representatives as partners in decision-making; and actively dismantle systemic barriers replacing them with policies and practices that ensure all students have access to the instruction and support they need to succeed in our schools.

Position Overview
The Assistant Director for Special Education Program Improvement Oversight & Monitoring is a leadership role responsible for supervising the onboarding and development of new Special Education Program supervisors and taking a leadership role in overseeing and supporting priorities that are central to educational benefit for students with disabilities improvement efforts and organizing federal monitoring within the Special Education division and including for the program improvement team. This position plays a pivotal role to ensure that local education agencies (LEAs) comply with federal and state special education requirements in regard to special education services and that large scale improvement efforts (i.e. statewide IEP coordination across agencies for transition early childhood programs) have adequate oversight and monitoring. Additionally the Assistant Director collaborates across teams to enhance Washington States general supervision system focusing on student outcomes and ensuring comprehensive and accountable special education programming from ages P-22.

Key Responsibilities
This position will serve as the Assistant Director focusing on Oversight and Monitoring in the Program Improvement unit within the OSPI Special Education division. This position will:

General Supervision System: Ensure the divisions general supervision system is comprehensive and focused on positive student outcomes by coordinating team efforts and ensuring all elements of monitoring corrective actions and reporting are functioning effectively and cohesively
Program Reviews: Provide leadership for on-site program reviews of local districts and other public agencies that receive federal funding to ensure compliance with special education requirements on behalf of eligible students.
Desk Reviews: Provide leadership for desk reviews of program compliance data and information for local school districts and public agencies identifying areas for program improvement and ensuring adherence to federal and state regulations.
Report Development:Analyze state-wide data collected from on-site and desk reviews to inform statewide program improvement efforts and create reports to effectively communicate priorities based on this data.
Federal Special Education Monitoring: Organize and lead efforts across the Special Education division to maintain and enhance the states general supervision system ensuring that systems are student-focused and outcome-driven.
Team Leadership and Supervision:Provide guidance and support for program improvements and compliance activities and working closely with the Executive Director of Special Education. Directly supervise members of the Program Improvement Team ensuring their efforts align with the divisions goals and objectives. This includes supervision and the continuing to develop the infrastructure for an internal Early Childhood Special Education team that partners closely with Early Childhood Education and the broader program improvement team ensuring strong coordination of services under IDEA Part B Section 619 and ties to division improvement efforts. This team will provide technical assistance and monitoring within Washingtons mixed-delivery systemincluding school districts child care providers and Head Start programsto strengthen inclusive practices ensure compliance and expand access to high-quality early learning experiences for young children with disabilities.
Collaboration and Coordination: Work closely with other division teams and agency members to ensure coordination of program review findings with broader policy and program goals contributing to the development of corrective action plans and system improvements. Take on a more active leadership role overseeing the OSPI liaison roles for statewide Education Service District (ESDs) to provide support directly to the ESDs and to regional Special Education liaisons so they can effectively support ESDs related to oversight and monitoring for special education leaders.

Provide Project Management Structures to Large Scale Improvement Efforts: This role provides project management leadership for the divisions large-scale improvement initiatives. This includes:

Strategic Planning & Coordination: Translating legislative requirements division priorities and federal IDEA expectations into actionable work plans with clear timelines milestones and deliverables.
Cross-Agency Collaboration: Facilitating alignment across OSPI divisions ESDs districts and external partners to ensure initiatives such as inclusionary practices statewide monitoring modernization and statewide IEP implementation are coherent and well-coordinated.
Resource & Risk Management: Identifying necessary resources (staffing funding TA supports) and proactively addressing barriers or risks that could delay implementation ensuring projects stay on track and within scope.
Progress Monitoring & Accountability: Establishing data systems and reporting mechanisms to track progress toward division goals share outcomes with leadership and adjust strategies based on evidence of impact.
Capacity-Building: Supporting division staff district leaders and partners through structured communication training and coaching ensuring sustainability of improvement efforts beyond the initial project cycle.

Additional Leadership Responsibilities:

Lead Federal Special Education Monitoring: Provide leadership and organization for the divisions federal special education monitoring efforts facilitating collaboration across teams and ensuring a focus on accountability student benefits and program effectiveness. This includes but is not limited to:

Leading organizing facilitating participating and assigning work to team members and ensure it is completed
Providing expert level leadership and guidance and direction on complex or uncommon requests and projects
Providing leadership in training coaching and mentoring new team members making sure the team has the tools resources and information needed to complete their tasks
Providing input regarding areas of need and recommend improvement activities identifies training or resource needs
Providing leadership to the team and making decisions in collaboration with the Special Education Executive Director and Team leads
Provides leadership in organizing our preparation and organization of federal general supervision monitoring.

Perform other duties as assigned by the Assistant Superintendent/Executive Director of Special Education.

Required Qualifications:

Masters degree or higher in Special Education Child Development Educational Leadership or education related field.
At least three (3) years of administrative experience in special education at the local state or federal level.
Two (2) or more years experience demonstrated oversight and leadership of project implementation.
Teamwork: Contribution to the development cohesion and productivity of the Program Improvement Team supporting teamwork and cooperation through open communication with all members of the special education department and helping others.
Personal Development: Participating in meetings in an active cooperative and courteous manner. Making effective oral presentations writing clearly and succinctly. Demonstrating understanding and empathy towards others.
Self-Management: Effective and efficient use of work time exhibiting integrity and honesty and working effectively in a diverse work environment.
Judgment: Display balanced thinking that combines wisdom analysis experience and perspective.
Stress tolerance: Effectively handle stressful or adverse situations making good decisions working calmly and accurately and working to calm others.
Accountability:Provide advanced-level leadership in the oversight monitoring and evaluation of special education programs including identifying noncompliance determining corrective actions and ensuring timely resolution in alignment with state and federal IDEA requirements.

This position requires the ability to travel statewide occasional out-of-state travel for national events participation in necessary in-person meetings and a flexible schedule that may include evenings weekends and occasional extended hours for on-site reviews.

*This role requires spending at least two days in the office each month along with participating in scheduled trainings and team or all-staff meetings.

In addition to those required qualifications our ideal applicant will also have some or all of the following:

Desired Qualifications:

Advanced degree in Special Education Education Studies MPA MPP or related field.
Five (5) or more years of administrative experience in special education at the local state or federal level.
2 or more years of supervisory experience.
Experience working with diverse and underserved populations.
Strong background and experience in the field of special education at the local regional or state level including policy and guidance.
Ability and willingness to travel statewide and come into the office for necessary in person meetings.
Excellent communication skills both verbal and written with the ability to make clear presentations to diverse groups.
Strong project management skills.
Experience leading and implementing broad-level systems changes

Compensation
The annual compensation for the position is $102547-$114577 per year and depends upon experience educational background and qualifications. Geographic differentials may be applied based on work location of successful candidate. Washington State offers a generous benefit package including health dental and life insurance retirement and an optional deferred compensation program. Please visitHealth Care Authorityfor information regarding health benefits and theDepartment of Retirement Systemsfor retirement plan information. This is a Washington Management Position. This position is not represented by a bargaining unit.

Application Process

Those interested in this position must apply through. Applications must include the following documents in MS Word and PDF format only:

A letter of interest specifically addressing the qualifications listed in this announcement;
A current résumé and;
A list of three or more professional references.

Please address any questions to:

Sal Salazar Human Resources

Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction
600 Washington Street Southeast
Olympia Washington 98504-7200

:

Persons needing accommodation in the application process or this announcement in an alternative format may contact the Human Resources Office at or or e-mail .

New Jobs Alert Service

OSPI offers a subscription service which regularly notifies subscribers of new OSPI employment opportunities on . Subscribers are notified via text or email alert. If you are interested in this service then please subscribe at this location.

OSPI is an equal opportunity employer and encourages applications from job seekers who will contribute to our diversity. OSPI provides equal access to all programs and services without discrimination based on sex race creed religion color national origin age honorably discharged veteran or military status sexual orientation including gender expression or identity the presence of any sensory mental or physical disability or the use of a trained dog guide or service animal by a person with a disability. If you would like please include your name and gender pronouns in your application to ensure we address you appropriately throughout the application process. Persons needing accommodation in the application process or this announcement in an alternative format may contact the human resource consultant listed in Application Process.

Required Experience:

Director

DescriptionWASHINGTON MANAGEMENT SERVICEJOB ANNOUNCEMENTAssistant Director of Special Education: Program Improvement Oversight and Monitoring $102547 - $114577 annuallyCloses December 142025The Washington State Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction (OSPI) seeks to fill Assistant Director of...