Middle School Self-Contained Special Education Teacher | 2026-27 School Year

FirstLine Schools•New Orleans, LA

2d•Onsite

About The Position

FirstLine Schools is seeking passionate Special Education Teachers for self-contained settings for students with cognitive needs. The Discovery Plus Program serves students with cognitive impairments in grades 3-8 who have significant cognitive delays and require support in areas like life skills, speech, occupational therapy, and motor skills. The program's mission is to equip students with the skills for purposeful lives through rigorous academics, intentional life skills teaching, and a supportive classroom environment with related services. Teachers are expected to demonstrate effectiveness through FirstLine's Vision of Teaching Excellence, which focuses on high expectations, effective planning, cognitive engagement, leading instruction, and building a community of learners. Special Education teachers are crucial for helping students with IEPs achieve their learning goals and collaborate with various service providers, leaders, and paraprofessionals. Certification or progress towards certification is required.

Requirements

2 or more years of lead teaching (as the teacher of record) for students with cognitive needs
Demonstrated success working with students in an urban, open admissions school
A BA or BS
A strong background in and command of content area
Louisiana Teacher Certification (SPED) Completed or in progress (or be eligible to hold for our out-of-state applicants) in the specific disability/grade levels served, as necessary
Experience using UNIQUE curriculum preferred
Believe deeply in the mission and values of FirstLine Schools and Discovery Plus Program

Nice To Haves

Believe in every student’s ability to achieve in a rigorous college or career prep curriculum
Achieve results based on agreed-upon expectations
Take personal responsibility
Highly detail-oriented
Open to learning and evolving with AI as a tool at work
Collaborate effectively with a range of stakeholders
Share a commitment to creating great schools in New Orleans
Strong written and verbal communication skills
Ability to embed and model the FirstLine Commitments: We Keep Learning, We Work Together, We Are Helpful, We Are the Safekeepers of our Community, We Share Joy, We Show Results!

Responsibilities

Designs individualized lessons that lead to LA Connector standards mastery and are aligned to expectations/learning connectors for students with disabilities and end-of-year assessment
Provides feedback to scholars by asking pertinent, scaffolded follow-up questions that affirm correctly understood content, clarify misunderstood content or extend scholars’ thinking
Respond to student data and make adjustments to lessons as needed
Implement assistive technology and other individualized student supports throughout school day
Establishes effective classroom routines and manage students effectively using a variety of strategies to meet the unique needs of students in the Discovery Plus program
Inspires and invests students in achieving their goals and in believing that goals are achieved through effort and not innate abilities
Seeks out and constructively responds to feedback from and engages in problem-solving with others
Ensures compliant IEP documentation for all students on caseload by facilitating IEP development, FBA/BIP development and implementation, transition planning, and maintaining other supporting documentation related to service delivery (logs, progress reports, Extended School Year, etc)
Oversee a team of paraprofessionals and manage schedules to best meet the needs of students
Collaborate closely with related service providers to implement push in and pull out services for students
Attend weekly professional development with other self-contained teachers
Join SELF’s Low-Incidence one-year Cohort
Other duties as assigned