Shoreline Unified School District’s special education program has drawn attention since state data last year revealed a disproportionately large number of special ed students compared to the total student body.
The sprawling district has about 500 students this year; 95 of them are enrolled in special ed programs. Though that number dropped from 125 students last year, the nearly 20 percent ratio of special to general ed students falls far out of line with state guidelines, which discourage districts from providing over 10 percent of their students with special education services.
“We are disproportionate,” said Patricia O’Connor, the director of Shoreline’s special education program. “You cannot help that. You cannot stop that. And it happens for a variety of reasons.”
During a report to the district’s board on Nov. 20, Ms. O’Connor discussed the “over-identification” of these students, who may simply be struggling with math or grammar and do not have a full-blown learning disability. She mentioned plans for a new student-assessment approach that could help trim down the number of students for whom the district undertakes labor-intensive individual education plans and outsources schooling.
Shoreline is also paying closer attention to whether English Language Learners—or students whose primary language is not English—have been misdiagnosed as eligible for special ed services. “Children who may be English Language Learners do not always need speech [service] because English is not their first language,” Ms. O’Connor said. “There were cases where they were over-identified and all they need is extra support to learn to speak the vocabulary. So we had a good look at whether they were over-identified children.”
Instead, Ms. O’Connor and the teachers she oversees plan to place more emphasis on intervention, assessing educational needs within the general education classroom setting prior to recommending a student for special ed services. This process, according to Ms. O’Connor, has the potential to decrease the number of Shoreline students eligible for special education even further.
“What we mean by intervention is that teachers have to approach the instruction of that child in a different way,” she said. “It could be any extra support in the classroom by a teacher.”
The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, a federal law reauthorized by George W. Bush in 2004 to align with the No Child Left Behind Act, requires that students assessed for special ed needs receive an Individual Education Plan. An I.E.P. identifies the student’s specific needs and outlines annual achievement goals; it is a physical document provided to the student’s parents and administered by an I.E.P. assessment team composed of teachers, specialists and parents.
To help screen students that may be over-identified, Shoreline has hired a part-time psychologist who has expressed interest in leading both annual and triennial I.E.P. reviews and a student study team that makes intervention assessments to prevent the need for an I.E.P. Although the position dropped from full-time to part-time after the district’s previous psychologist retired at the end of last year, the new psychologist believes he can handle the position’s responsibilities.
“I’m the one who tests students for assessments,” said Jack Correia, who has worked as a psychologist for over 20 years in numerous states. “Special education can be a restrictive environment, depending on the services. When students are pulled out for self-contained classrooms, there’s less interaction with their peers. We always want first and foremost to keep students all together in general ed classes.”
Shoreline Unified hired Mr. Correia as an outside specialist through an agency called ProCare Therapy, Inc., a nationwide school staffing agency. His post is one of many specialized outside services for Shoreline’s special education program that cost the district anywhere from a few thousand dollars to over $30,000 a year per service. These include the hiring of resource specialists, occupational specialists, and, now, the school psychologist.
“The more issues the child has, the higher the cost will be,” said Susan Skipp, the district’s chief business official. “For a student with a very specialized need, we may not have classes for that student. The budget [for special education] changes constantly because students move in and then leave, and our costs are based on where a student lives.”
Last year, Shoreline sent eight students to Special Day Classes through Marin County’s Office of Education at a total cost of $135,000 to the district; a dozen more students were sent to other outside programs. These costs are adding up: Ms. Skipp projects that Shoreline’s special ed budget—which includes salary costs, contracts, transportation and specialized services—stands at an estimated $1,750,000. The district contributes $1,155,000 of that amount, plus another $260,000 for transportation; state and federal supply cover the rest, she said.
Despite this high cost in the midst of Shoreline’s budget crisis, Ms. O’Connor said the district does not intend to make any additional special ed staff cuts in the near future. Cutting the psychologist’s employment in half, as well as eliminating a one-on-one instructional aid position that will not be replaced, is enough to satisfy her. “We didn’t make that decision lightly,” Ms. O’Connor said, referring to the staffing cuts. “But we’re in a good situation the way we have special education staffed now. Right now, at this moment, it looks like we’re going to maintain the way we are with special education.”