50 Years Of Progress For The Individuals With Disabilities Education Act May Be At Risk

By GARRY RAYNO, InDepthNH

CONCORD, NH — The NH Association of Special Education Administrators held its annual meeting Friday while celebrating the 50th Anniversary of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) and the progress it has brought.

But the act’s future is laced with uncertainty under the current political and cultural climate as many educators fear the progress gained over the last half century leading to greater access to education and integration into classrooms for students with disabilities may be erased.

They are concerned about the possibility of moving the Office of Special Education from the US Department of Education to the US Department of Health and Human Services, reduced or block grant federal fundings and greater restrictions on federal funds.

At the state level, they expressed concerns about a proposed bill to study centralizing special education services in one or two locations, echoing the long gone Laconia School model, as well a focus on the costs pressuring a return to segregating special education students from their peers.

They also bemoaned the inconsistency of state aid that shifts the burden to local property taxpayers.

The organization’s members also heard from US Sen. and former governor Maggie Hassan, whose experience to find services for her disabled son led her to enter politics, and from Emmy Award winning Concord filmmakers Dan and Samual Habib.

“Today we celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act and the decades of support it has provided to children with disabilities and their families. We celebrate critical programs like early intervention, assistive technology, speech pathology and counseling that IDEA has funded, and the Individualized Education Program (IEP) plans have been made possible,” said Jane Bergeron-Beaulieu, executive director of the NH Association of Special Education Administrators. “We also renew our commitment to fully fund and staff IDEA, at the federal Department of Education where it belongs, and to ensure funding, services, and rights for students with disabilities remains strong for the next 50 years. A half a century of inclusion, opportunity, achievement, and empowerment for children and youth with disabilities is a tremendous legacy to build on, and we are eager to continue to invest in and support the next generation of students.”

Bergeron-Beaulieu, said the state has been one of the leaders in the country, spearheaded by the University of New Hampshire’s Institute on Disabilities.

The center helped educators and parents develop programs and services that fully included their students in school programming, she said.

In New Hampshire parents are directly involved in the programs developed for their students and are integrated into the team working for their child, said Rachel Borge, Director of Special Services for the Hudson School District.

“We empower our families to be active participants,” she said.

Timothy Koumrian, Director of Student Services the Winnisquam School District, said the biggest challenge they face, given the breadth of the needs of these students, is how to make the classroom experience accessible, not just physically in the room, but participating with their peers.

Chris Beeso, Special Education Director for Mascoma Valley School District, noted The Laconia State School that housed disabled students away from their families and their peers, was at one time considered the gold standard across the country.

“The way we have evolved from that, we have learned so much from that experience and we want to be inclusive,” he said.

A bill that will be introduced into the Legislature for the 2016 session, House Bill 1221, would study centralizing special education services and supports in one location.

The bill is sponsored by Rep. Bryan Morse, R-Franklin, and would create a commission to study if the services could be centralized in several locations around the state as a way to reduce the cost for individual districts.

Another bill, House Bill 1099, would study the cost of privatizing special education services with Rep. Gregory Hill, R-Northfield, the prime sponsor.

Koumrian said a number of civil rights laws deal with disabilities for a reason.

“We are returning to a time when those rights were really not respected,” he said, noting the civil rights laws connect the IDEA to an obligation to provide opportunities.

Koumrian said before the law passed only 20 percent of students with disabilities were in public schools, while now almost 100 percent are.

When then President Gerald Ford signed the IDEA into law in 1975, only 20 percent of children with disabilities were in public schools with the rest institutionalized in places like the Laconia School, or at home with no access to education.

The law guaranteed disabled children the right to a free and appropriate public education, and improved the future for millions of children.

But Congress has never fully funded the IDEA, instead covering about 13 percent of the promised 40 percent of the costs.

New Hampshire does not pick up the cost of special education until the cost of services for the child reaches three-and-a-half times the state average student cost or about $70,000, and then begins paying 80 percent of the cost under what was called catastrophic aid.

But often not enough money was appropriated and what districts were reimbursed was prorated.

Last year the legislature passed a law setting the state’s share at a minimum of 80 percent once the threshold has been reached.

Until the threshold is reached, local school districts pay the costs through local property taxes while the federal government pays about 13 to 15 percent.

Catherine Plourde, Director of Student Services at Oyster River Cooperative School District noted there was not enough money last school year, something like a $17 million shortfall, because of the Education Freedom Account, or the state’s voucher program.

She said the funding is so uncertain, you do not know where the money is coming from because they give so much to EFAs.

Bergeron-Beaulieu said people ask why special education is so expensive.

“In New Hampshire we strive to include (students with disabilities) with their peers as much as possible,” she said. “To do that they need support and services (to be) successful.”

She said the focus on cost will put special education students together in one classroom not integrated with their peers.

“Out of sight, out of mind,” Plourde said.

The other change the group fears is the switch of federal oversight over special education from the US DOE to the US HHS, which they said would change the goal.

Borge said the change would shift the goal which is education access to a medical model, which is a medical condition that needs remedy.

“As a field we worked really hard (to have) students with disabilities be perceived as students first,” she said. “Many disabilities are not physical or obvious.

“(Changing oversight) sends the message our students are ill or something,”Borge said, “and that is wrong and a horrible conversation that puts us right back where we were.”

Garry Rayno may be reached at garry.rayno@yahoo.com.

This article first appeared on InDepthNH.org and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.