In late spring of 2001, after one year in the district, special services director Merle Montani quit abruptly, citing the need to finish her dissertation.

Without time to conduct a national search for a new director – and aware of the shortage of special education personnel nationwide – the district hired the principal of Woodward Middle School, Clayton Mork.

Mork, who calls himself “a systems guy,” continued the assessment of special education programs begun with last spring’s roundtable discussion.

That meeting of special ed paraeducators and teachers underscored the district’s need to standardize procedure, according to special ed teacher Rebekah Ballmer.

“When staff from all the schools met last spring, it was amazing to find out how differently we did things – and interpreted things,” she said.

Over the summer, special education personnel began to address program inconsistencies by rewriting the many forms required by federal law. Compiled in a “compliance notebook,” the streamlined paperwork was distributed district-wide, Mork says, to make sure everyone would be, literally, on the same page.

In addition, staff combed through the nearly 500 special education student files over the summer, red-flagging mistakes.

“Often it would be clear that something had been done, from the subsequent references in the paperwork, but the documentation was not in the file,” said Holly Keenan, whose job as compliance coordinator is to ensure that the district follows special education laws. Keenan is also helping the district prepare for a special ed program review by the state, slated for spring 2002.

In a 1999 report on special ed in the district, independent special ed consultant Frederick Row identified the need for a consistent approach to help struggling readers. In response, the “reading committee” was formed to research and help select an elementary reading remediation program.

Other plans for the current school year include improving the “transition” services that help disabled students move into the larger community after graduation.

“People within the district recognized the need to standardize procedures,” Mork said, “and put systems in place to make delivery of services consistent and cohesive. Once we get the system, we can refine things and optimize resources.”

Mork has designated the special education site council – a group of parents, administrators, and special ed teachers and paraeducators from all the schools – to lead the change.

The special ed site council met Oct. 8 to identify program strengths and weaknesses.

Lack of funding

Many of the challenges faced by the district – problems reflected nationwide – are cause by federal underfunding of special education, teachers say.

There is no funding for the extra time teachers will spend to research the new reading remediation program and money for teacher training was cut by the legislature – although Bainbridge Educational Support Team (BEST) funds helped close the gap this year.

“Grants and federal funds, it seems, get cut, but we are expected to do more,” district physical therapist Susan Steindorf said. “It is getting harder and harder. Without resources or staff, we are performing triage.”

Special education students represent a broad spectrum of disabilities that may also vary in degree, with students mildly, moderately or severely impacted.

Students with the “invisible” disabilities – including learning disabilities, attention deficit disorder, dyslexia – may appear no different from their peers, and learn in the regular classroom most of the time, with some pull-out to the “resource room,” the classroom for students with relatively mild disabilities, staffed by special ed teachers and paraeducators. The relative subtlety of their problems, coupled with scarce resources and the larger numbers of students so diagnosed, may work against the students getting appropriate help.

Celine O’Leary, a sixth grade teacher at Sakai Intermediate School who was a special ed teacher for 25 years, agrees that there is not enough paraeducator support for the resource room kids in the general ed classroom.

“Most general ed teachers believe in inclusion,” O’Leary said, “but what happens is that with the regular classes so large, they need more paraeducator support, and this district doesn’t have resources for that many paraeducators.”

More severely impacted students join their nondisabled peers for selected classes accompanied by a paraeducator, or they may be taught in the functional skills setting. Their schooling might include socially appropriate behavior or physical therapy.

“Disability” may mean a health problem, a behavior disorder, developmental delays, a physical disability – or a combination of challenges.

Bainbridge High School student Maggie Mackey was born cognitively impaired and became physically disabled at one year, losing feet and fingers to an infection.

In the BHS Life Skills room, Maggie works one-on-one with paraeducator Lorraine Ekholm to master simple skills that prepare her for more advanced tasks. Ekholm works five days a week, seven hours a day for the district. Half to 60 percent of those hours are spent with Maggie, Ekholm says.

Maggie’s mother, Sheri Ley-Mackey, appreciates the strong friendship the paraeducator has forged with her daughter.

The dedication that Ekholm brings to her work is not unusual. Special ed teachers and paraeducators often put in hundreds of upaid hours. It is common for teachers to reach into their own pockets to pay for some supplies.

“You continue to do the job because you love children,” district physical therapist Susan Steindorf said. “That’s why people do this work.”

Maggie glues envelopes shut and places them in a box. Then Ekholm shows Maggie pictures that depict the task she has done.

Learning to recognize the sequence of images is a stage in the journey toward using the “communication board,” the pad of symbols that will enable Maggie to “speak” simple phrases by pushing a button.

Maggie’s progress is documented with a data sheet and written observations.

The class is home to nine students, but traffic in and out of the room is frequent, as students and paraeducators attend regular classes.

When Maggie becomes distracted, teachers prop a bulletin board on a nearby desk, a device only partially effective.

Special education materials are expensive. A few dozen paperback workbooks for elementary school reading purchased by the district this fall cost $500. Several levels of the workbooks must be purchased because students’ skill levels range from children who cannot identify specific letters to those who read close to grade level.

The nationwide shortage of qualified teachers is another sore point.

Large caseloads and the expanding volume of paperwork contribute to teacher burn-out. Teachers note that paperwork keeps them out of classrooms and limits planning time.

Since caseloads may equal class size at grade level, a Bainbridge high school special ed teacher may have 29 students with 29 individual education plans (IEPs).

“We’re bound by law to monitor paraeducators, and that can be a scheduling nightmare if you have four kids who are all reading with the help of a different paraeducator in a different classroom,” Keenan said.

For the district’s few occupational, speech and physical therapists, the caseload is higher, from 30 to 45 students.

Each IEP may take 20 hours, from draft to parent-approved plan.

“Fall is when I do most new IEPs,” Steindorf said. “In October, I’ll have seven or eight to do and by mid-November, 12.”

There is a high level of anxiety among special ed teachers about compliance with laws, a legacy both Steindorf and Keenan footnote to last year’s legal proceedings.

“The lawsuits have created incredible stress for staff and cost to the school district,” Steindorf said. “It has really changed the atmosphere and ‘heart’ of the job.

“Special ed is one area that can only work if everyone considers the greater good of the whole…I’m frightened that if people don’t look at the big picture, we’re going to eat away at the core of what we’ve tried to build.”

Parent representative to the special ed site council Renata Lac points to the need for accountability within the special ed program.

“There are real systemic problems here that need to be dealt with,” Lac said. “There has to be a system in place where you evaluate whether IEPs are working.

“There has to be accountability from the top down; a principal has to be able to go into a room and see if services are really being delivered.

“Our strength here is that we are a small district that can change, not a huge bureaucracy.”

While Mork acknowledges problems, he is upbeat, pointing to recent improvements.

The Renaissance program at Commodore for behavior disabled students and the new functional skills room at Sakai Middle School have moved the district in a positive direction, Mork says, as have the compliance notebook and file review.

Mork notes that prominently listed among the program strengths identified at the Oct. 8 special education site council meeting were the strong cadre of involved parents and the district’s dedicated special education staff.

Teachers and parents say they find Mork responsive to their concerns and they endorse his systematic approach to strengthening the program.

“We have all the raw materials to make things better, (including) the partnership between school and home,” Mork said. “I bring an ability to lead and organize to the table. To do a good job one must enjoy the challenge of solving problems.

“I’m looking at it as a positive thing.”