Legal and Policy Program Associate
Senior Program Associate Pamela C. Kraynak provides legal and policy assistance on special education issues throughout the Northeastern states.
A member of Learning Innovations (LI) at WestEd since 2000, Kraynak helps states bring federal timeline requirements into compliance for hearing systems, finalize interagency agreements and dispute resolution systems, design continuous and focused monitoring systems in special education, and improve conflict management through early resolution training. In addition, Kraynak has provided conflict skills training to special education administrators in Vermont, Massachusetts, and New Hampshire.
Kraynak codirects a leadership academy for special education directors throughout Massachusetts. The academy focuses on using data to inform decision-making, collaborative evaluation, legal and policy issues, conflict management, special education finance, instructional program design and improvement, and access to the general education curriculum.
As part of her work with LI's Northeast Regional Resource Center, one of six federally funded technical assistance centers in the United States for special education, Kraynak coordinates and provides assistance to the northeastern Legal and Regulatory Workgroup. Members consist of legal and policy representatives, mediation and due process coordinators, and complaint administrators from the NERRC region state departments of education who discuss current issues related to the Individuals with Disabilities and Education Act and Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973.
As NERRC Vermont state liaison, Kraynak provides assistance to Vermont education and human services personnel, including updating them on federal special education regulations and case developments.
As national liaison to the Consortium for Appropriate Dispute Resolution in Special Education (CADRE), Kraynak collaborates with CADRE to help states develop early resolution options, presents at CADRE's biennial National Symposium on Dispute Resolution, and works with the Creating Agreement project.
Prior to joining WestEd, Kraynak spent 15 years in private practice, most recently as a founding partner with Blackwood and Kraynak, P.C. While in legal practice, she taught constitutional law and legal writing at Woodbury College, and served on the Vermont Human Services Board as well as the Ad Hoc Task Force on Adoption that preserved the right of second-parent adoption.
Throughout her law career, Kraynak represented school boards, persons with disabilities, parents, and guardians of persons with disabilities. She was instrumental in developing the statutory framework for financing limited equity housing cooperatives and mobile homes in Vermont and helping to establish many of the first limited equity housing cooperatives through representing the resident-managed cooperative corporation.
Prior to practicing law, Kraynak was the Executive Director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Vermont. She provided support to Vietnam veterans through the discharge upgrade program and co-coordinated the Right To Choose Coalition, which preserved low income women's access to reproductive healthcare.
Kraynak serves as a Board member of both the Vermont Parent Information Center, assisting with the merger of two parent organizations, and Transitional Services for Youth and Families, dedicated to children with emotional difficulties.
She graduated cum laude from Vermont Law School in 1985, receiving a J.D.. While in law school, she placed first in the Thomas L. Debevoise Moot Court Competition and received the American Jurisprudence Award for outstanding scholarship in the field of remedies.
Tel: 802.951.8206
802.951.8222802.951.8227
Email: pkrayna@wested.org
Mailing Address:Learning Innovations at WestEd
20 Winter Sport Lane
Williston, Vermont 05495-8134
Project Work:
Massachusetts Leadership Academy for Experienced Special Education Administrators, 2007 and 2008
Northeast Regional Resource Center
Vermont Enhancement Grant
