Special Education Costs

As a special educator and director of special education for several years I can attest to the high financial costs of such programs and servicing students with disabilities in our public schools. I know firsthand that the monies set aside are not equitable for all groups of children both because the needs vary across individual students as well as some parents know how to work the system to get districts to agree to costly settlements. In the past four years as director, I lowered the special education costs significantly by bringing students back into district (long-term savings), permitting out of district students to enroll in our special education programs (tuition paid), and taking a close look at our related service providers (conducting RFPs and developing a collaborative partnership with these agencies). Even with those cuts, the special education budget still made up a large portion of the district budget (largely due to staffing, a few costly settlement agreements, and projected crisis intervention costs covering all students in need) .
I agree with Paul's statement that "the needs of students differ and sometimes a student needs a different approach than others. If we are servicing the students in the same system...we should expect to pay more for some students". Fairness in not treating everyone equal. The key is to be equitable the best you can and make sure you are providing students with a free & appropriate public education! We need to examine the issue of educating students with disabilities with a historical perspective. Parents fought for their children to be educated in public schools because of the discrimination they faced in previous. Laws and regulations are the outgrowth of such discrimination and the very reason why special education advocates continue to be influential today. Unfortunately, these mandates have grown to 209 in NYS, many procedural not instructional focused (results from court decisions) and have tied the hands of districts. The reality is that special education decisions made by IEP teams need to take into account instructional best practices as well as state regulations (including court decisions). If staff is not trained and cognizant of special education law, districts may be sued (i.e., procedural violation even if they are following “best practices” and producing results) and faced additional hearing costs.
In the article "Excellence versus Equity", the authors made the following comment that I agree with 100%: "High functioning educational systems that pay attention to needs of individuals students serve all children well. Therefore, it is NOT a decision about how to target scare resources to one specific subgroup at the expense of another". The whole premise of special education is on individuality and developing targeted interventions with measurable outcome. As educational leaders, we need to help our staff and parents not to compete with one another about “subgroup” are getting all the resources at the cost of another. What is ironic is that the reason why special education continues to maintain a large budget is because of the mandates and regulations. Will our neediest students continue to get the high quality services they need if districts no longer have to provide them? If there is a program/strategy that is evidenced-based and proven to work for a specific disability would a district set aside monies to train staff if they are not required to? Would this lead to more lawsuits? Jeff and Paul comment about the gifted students and not doing such a great job on the other side of the spectrum. I agree! What is the reason for this disparity? Could it be as what the authors of the “Excellence versus Equity” article commented “Federal government did not impose minimum standards of gifted education”. What many don’t realize is that gifted education falls under “Special Education” however there is less of a focus partial because it is not required.
I agree that reform is needed in special education but due to the complexities of this field, there are no easy answers. Special Education should not be viewed as the primary reason why districts are faced with today’s financial hardships (meaning just cut special education and all our problems will go away and the rest of the students will be better serviced with the additional monies available) just as teachers alone are the cause of our failing schools (and we should not link their evaluations with state tests). Special Education like all other departments need to make some difficult decisions when it comes to costs (look to deliver services more wisely and maximize existing staff’s expertise/collaboration) but until the state reduces the mandates…we are obligated to meet them. This is the ugly truth. We do not have a choice as I share with many general education teachers who think it is ok to pick and choose what accommodations on a student’s IEP to follow. From my perspective, the most costly (in dollars as well as time) aspect of special education that needs to be reduced is litigations. This alone will save millions and will facilitate the mindset change from “compliance- driven” to “instructional-driven”.