Meet the Team

Amy Rhone is state director of the Nebraska Department of Education’s (NDE) Office of Special Education, where she provides leadership, coordination and oversight to the Office of Special Education team. Her leadership role includes supervision, accountability and administrative duties; fiscal and data management; assessment; dispute resolution; and providing professional learning opportunities to the NDE team, districts, and parents and families in the state. One of her main roles includes oversight of the Nebraska Administrative Code specific to special education and federal regulation compliance. Additionally, Amy oversees the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, Part B (school age) and Part C (birth to age three) programs and services, and parent/family advocacy and support. This includes supervision of team members in the development of programmatic support, compliance and monitoring, related services and transition coordination to name a few. Within this capacity, she also serves as the state lead for Nebraska’s Multi-tiered Systems of Support (MTSS), providing statewide coordination around development and implementation. Amy has been with NDE since 2015, serving as assistant director for the three years prior to being named director in March 2020. She previously served as NDE’s statewide PBIS director. Prior to joining NDE, Amy was an administrator of an elementary school, as well as a local special education director in Arizona.

Dr. Micki Charf is the Assistant State Director and Assistant Administrator at the NDE Office of Special Education. Before joining the NDE in 2019, she served in an urban K-12 school system as a teacher for students with Emotional/Behavioral Disorders, and later as a Special Education Coordinator. Dr. Charf then transitioned into general education as an Instructional Coach and Instructional Coordinator, responsible for Assessment, 504, and TeamMATES mentoring. At the NDE, Dr. Charf was previously the Director of Accreditation and revamped the Nebraska Framework into a new process known as Nebraska Continuous Improvement. In her role as Assistant Administrator, she strives to bring together general and special educators through the NeMTSS problem-solving process and to increase school-level usage of IDEA Part B Indicator data. Dr. Charf is also an Adjunct Professor at UNL’s Barkley Center for Special Education and Communication Disorders. Her 2009 dissertation is titled; “Explaining perceptions of principal leadership behaviors that enhance middle school teacher self-efficacy: A mixed methods study”.

Laura Barrett is administrator for Educational Service Unit 13 and co-coordinator of the Nebraska Department of Education’s Multi-tiered Systems of Support (MTSS). Laura has served in various roles within ESU 13 in previous years, including teacher of deaf/hard of hearing students, assistant coordinator for the Central/Western Nebraska Partnership for Children who are Deaf or Hard of Hearing, secondary transition specialist, special education coordinator and director. She was also director of Student Services for Gering Public Schools previously. Laura holds a bachelor’s degree in education, master’s degree in special education, specialist degree and doctorate in educational administration, all from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. She also earned a master’s degree in educational administration from Chadron State College.

 As an administrator, general educator and special educator, Pamela has spent her 18-year educational career working with diverse populations in Arizona, North Dakota and Nebraska within rural and urban school districts. She maintains a strong interest in mentoring new special education teachers, inclusive practice/universal design for learning information dissemination and high-leverage practices in special education. Pamela received her master’s degree as a Rural Special Education Strategist from Minot State University and her doctoral degree in education with an emphasis ins special education from Walden University.