Special Education

A developmental disability that significantly affects verbal and nonverbal communication and social interaction evident before age three (3) that adversely affects educational performance. This includes other pervasive developmental disorders.

Child Find is a statewide effort by the State Department of Education and the Department of Rehabilitation Services to locate, identify, and evaluate children with disabilities. If you know of a child, birth to age 21, who is not receiving any education services or feel that your child may be in need of special education services, please contact your local school or call the Department of Special Education  at 334-874-1600 

Selma City Schools has Child Find procedures that ensure that all children within its jurisdiction, ages birth to twenty-one, regardless of the severity of their disability, and who need special education and related services are identified, located, and evaluated.  These Child Find procedures also apply to children who attend private schools, within the Selma City School district, highly mobile children with disabilities (i.e. migrant and homeless children, or children who are wards of the state), and children who are suspected of having a disability and are in need of special education even though they are advancing from grade to grade.

Why is Child Find Important?

Child Find helps the child, the family, and the provider to plan appropriate services and link families to these services. Special education services are provided within Selma City Schools for students who have been identified as eligible for special education services. Students identified as eligible for special education services must meet the following two requirements:

• Federal and state eligibility requirements as having a disability; and,
• Need specially designed instruction.

The staff is dedicated and committed in supporting instructional outcomes for all students. The Department of Special Education welcomes any comments and concerns. Please feel free to contact the Director of Special Education, Courtney Utsey at 334-874-1600 for more information or if you have any questions.

Child Find Brochure

Child Find Information

A combination of both hearing and visual impairments, the combination of which causes such severe communication and other developmental and educational needs that they cannot be accommodated in special education programs solely for children with deafness or children with blindness.

A delay that adversely affects daily life and/or educational performance in one or more of the following developmental areas and results in the need of special education and related services.

1. Adaptive development,
2. Cognitive development,
3. Communication development,
4. Social or emotional development, and/or
5. Physical development.

A condition in which one or more of the following characteristics are exhibited over a long period of time and to a marked degree, adversely affecting educational performance:

1. An inability to learn which cannot be explained by intellectual, sensory or health factors;
2. An inability to build or maintain satisfactory interpersonal relationships with peers and teachers;
3. Inappropriate types of behavior or feelings under normal circumstances;
4. A general pervasive mood of unhappiness or depression; or
5. A tendency to develop physical symptoms or fears associated with personal or school problems.

Emotional disability includes schizophrenia but does not include children who are socially maladjusted, unless it is determined they have an emotional disability as defined above.

Intellectually gifted children and youth are those who perform at or have demonstrated the potential to perform at high levels in academic or creative fields when compared with others of their age, experience or environment. These children and youth require services not ordinarily provided by the regular school program. Children and youth possessing these abilities can be found in all populations, across all economic strata, and in all areas of human endeavor. Gifted students may be found within any race, ethnicity, gender, economic class, or nationality, In addition, some students with disabilities may be gifted . Selma City School System shall prohibit discrimination against any student on the above bases with respect to his/her participation in the gifted program.

How Does A Student Become Eligible for Gifted Services?
Procedures are in place to ensure that students who exhibit gifted characteristics are referred for gifted services. These include: public notice, equity to ensure that efforts are made to identify students among all populations and socio-economic groups, Second Grade Child Find and standard referrals made by teachers, counselors, administrators and parents/guardians. Parents must be informed when students are referred.


Who May I Contact to Obtain More Information Concerning Gifted Services?
Please contact Courtney Utsey, Director of Special Education by calling 334-874-1600. 

An impairment in hearing, whether permanent or fluctuating, that adversely affects a child's educational performance. The term includes both deaf and hard of hearing.

Significantly subaverage general intellectual functioning existing concurrently with significant limitations in adaptive behavior and manifested during the developmental period that adversely affects the child's educational performance.

The combination of impairments (such as intellectual disability and blindness or intellectual disability and orthopedic impairment) the combination of which causes such severe educational needs that they cannot be accommodated in special education programs solely for one of the impairments. Multiple disabilities does not include deaf-blindness.

Orthopedic Impairment means a severe orthopedic impairment that adversely affects a child’s educational performance. The term includes impairments caused by a congenital anomaly, impairments caused by disease (e.g., poliomyelitis, bone tuberculosis), and impairments from other causes (e.g., cerebral palsy, amputations, and fractures or burns that cause contractures). If a medical diagnosis is presented, the medical diagnosis alone is not enough to justify being identified in the area of orthopedic impairment. The impairment must adversely affect the educational performance of the child.

Other Health Impairment means having limited strength, vitality or alertness, including a heightened alertness to environmental stimuli, that results in limited alertness with respect to the educational environment, that is due to chronic or acute health problems such as asthma, attention deficit disorder or attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, diabetes, epilepsy, a heart condition, hemophilia, lead poisoning, leukemia, nephritis, rheumatic fever, sickle cell anemia, and Tourette Syndrome. If a medical diagnosis is presented, the medical diagnosis alone is not enough to justify being identified in the area of other health impairment. The impairment must adversely affect the educational performance of the child.

Specific Learning Disability means a disorder in one or more basic psychological process involved in understanding or in using language, spoken or written, that may manifest itself in the imperfect ability to listen, think, speak, read, write, spell, or to do mathematical calculations, including conditions such as perceptual disabilities, brain injury, minimal brain dysfunction, dyslexia, and developmental aphasia. Specific learning disability does not include learning problems that are primarily the result of visual, hearing, or motor disabilities, of intellectual disability, of emotional disability, or of environmental, cultural, or economic disadvantage.

Dyslexia Information

What is dyslexia?

Dyslexia is a specific learning challenge that is neurological in origin. It is characterized by difficulties with accurate and/or fluent word recognition and by poor spelling and decoding abilities. These difficulties typically result from a deficit in the phonological component of language that is often unexpected in relation to other cognitive abilities and the provision of comprehension and reduced reading experience that can impede growth of vocabulary and background knowledge (Alabama Administrative Code 290­3­1­20).

Dyslexia-Specific Screening Process

According to the Alabama Literacy Act, students in grades K-3 in Alabama schools will be given a universal screener that has been recommended by the Alabama Literacy Task Force. The results of universal screenings will be used to determine students’ need for intervention, additional assessment, and screenings for characteristics of dyslexia. Additionally, an assessment for characteristics of dyslexia will be provided for students upon parental or teacher request. 

A communication disorder in the area of articulation, voice, fluency, or language that adversely affects a child's educational performance.

• Articulation – Errors are primarily characterized by substitutions, distortions, additions, and omissions. Phonological errors are in excess of developmental expectations and nondevelopmental processes may be noted. Errors are not stimulable. Connected speech may be unintelligible or may be intelligible only to familiar listeners or within known contexts.
• Voice - The child’s voice is abnormal in vocal quality, pitch, loudness, resonance and/or duration and is inappropriate for the child's age and gender. Deviance is noticeable and distracting to any listener. The disorder adversely affects communication.
• Fluency - Abnormally dysfluent speech is observed during conversation and/or structured speaking tasks. Listeners are distracted by the child’s dysfluent speech and distracting concomitant behaviors may be observed. The child may exhibit fear or avoidance of speaking. The child’s ability to communicate is adversely affected by the disorder.
• Language - Syntactic, morphologic, semantic, and/or pragmatic errors are observed. The child’s ability to comprehend or use spoken language is adversely affected.

An acquired injury to the brain caused by external physical force, resulting in total or partial functional disability or psychosocial impairment or both, that adversely affects educational performance. The term applies to open or closed head injuries resulting in impairments in one or more areas such as cognition, language, memory, attention, reasoning, abstract thinking, judgment, problem-solving, sensory, perceptual and motor abilities, psychosocial behavior, physical functions, information processing, and speech. The term does not apply to brain injuries that are congenital or degenerative, or brain injuries induced by birth trauma.

A visual impairment that, even with correction, adversely affects a child's educational performance. The term includes partial sight and blindness.