Special Education advocates say the District could face lawsuits
if the position is left vacant too long Advocates for Special
Education students and their families say the Morgan Hill School
District should add another position to its department, or it might
find itself in legal trouble, with current employees stretched thin
as they struggle to meet all state and federal requirements.
Advocates for Special Education students and their families say the Morgan Hill School District should add another position to its department, or it might find itself in legal trouble, with current employees stretched thin as they struggle to meet all state and federal requirements.
“Two years ago, we said goodbye to one of our only program specialists,” Special Ed advocate Linda McNulty told school board members during their Oct. 11 meeting. “The position was eliminated during budget reductions. In November 2004, there was a report by FCMAT (Fiscal Crisis and Management Assistance Team) that said our district was notably deficient in Special Ed staff … I recommend that we reinstate the program specialist, at a 1.5 position.”
For one position, the district would have to budget from $60,000 to $70,000 for salary, but the district is also responsible for paying 13.42 percent of that salary, plus $5,000 in benefits, putting the total cost per year for one position in the range of $78,000 to $84,400.
The district is indeed considering reinstating the program specialist position, according to Director of Student Services Ray Houser.
“The superintendent (Alan Nishino) is looking into this very carefully with his team,” Houser said Monday. “Hopefully, this is something that could happen pretty soon.”
A program specialist handles a variety of responsibilities, Houser said, including working on Individual Education Plans for Special Education students, developing new programs and working with new teachers to develop their programs.
“A program specialist would allow us to be more effective in our Special Ed services, to more effectively serve our students,” he said.
Aside from working with students, staff and parents, the district’s Special Education Department is responsible for completing a vast amount of paperwork, required by the state, by the federal government, as well as the district. Right now, according to district psychologist Vanessa Gatewood, there is a whole array of services psychologists could provide to district students, staff and parents if there was a program specialist in place to handle some of the voluminous paperwork.
“We are all trained to offer a variety of services, including counseling for individuals and groups, teaching teachers about data collection, helping them with differentiation, bully-proofing in the schools,” she told trustees during the meeting, reading from a long list of services the psychologists now have no time to offer.
Parents of Special Education students are often upset when they hear people describe costs for the programs as “encroaching” on the district’s budget, thinking that the programs and students themselves are being criticized, but the reality is that the federal and state mandates concerning these programs are not backed by dollars.
McNulty said the district needs to move quickly to put someone in the program specialist position or possibly face lawsuits for not meeting requirements.
“I attended one IEP (meeting) in the last month that has been compliant,” she said. “All the others were non-compliant.”
Nishino said during the meeting that his former district, Alameda, had a program director that was dedicated to Special Education for three-fifths of the position, with the remaining two-fifths devoted to another requirement, CELPA, so the district was able to afford a 1.5 program specialist position. Gilroy School and San Jose districts have program specialists that handle much of the administrative work in the departments.
Marilyn Dubil covers education and law enforcement for The Times. Reach her at (408) 779-4106 Ext. 202 or at md****@*************es.com.
