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Funding for special ed may decline Mail Tribune / Jim Craven Jarod Tobiasson, 7, a student in the special education class at Abraham Lincoln Elementary in Medford, mugs for the camera during a session of making necklaces out of Cheerios and Froot Loops. A pullout by Klamath Falls could wind up hurting smaller districts that depend on the Jackson ESD to educate disabled students By DAMIAN MANN Mail Tribune A plan to boost funding for special education in Southern Oregon is in jeopardy because one district is pulling out of a regional program for severely handicapped students. Klamath Falls City Schools officials say they are leaving the $4.4 million STEPS (Specialized Training and Educational Program Services) because they can provide the services for about the same cost as the regional provider and keep their 30 handicapped students closer to home schools. The STEPS program serves 212 students in three counties through the Jackson Education Service District, based in Medford. Why handicapped kids can cost so much to educate Robin Niedermeyer of Central Point, who has an 8-year-old daughter with cerebral palsy, said it's difficult for many people to understand why it costs so much to teach severely handicapped students. The idea, however, is simple: "We would hope that these students can learn to live independently or with some assistance," she said. Her daughter, Hannah, is in the Jackson Education Service District's STEPS program, which costs $4.4 million for 212 students in Jackson, Josephine and Klamath counties. Most of these students will never take part in the normal curriculum. Instead, a group of specialists and volunteers trains them to perform simple tasks - everything from toilet training to getting dressed. In Hannah's class of eight students, six aren't able to speak and have to be trained to push a button on the door that initiates a recording, "I want to go to the bathroom," or a button by the sink that says, "I want to wash my hands." "These kids are never going to test out on standardized tests," she said. If they are not trained now, Niedermeyer said, they will just become more of a burden on society when they get older. It is a frustrating but heartwarming process as her daughter learns to put on her coat and use her walker, she said. "The little milestones are so important - the things that other parents take for granted." ESD teacher Tammy Martin said the STEPS program requires lots of staff members to attend to the special needs of these students. Some have to be fed through a tube. Others don't know how to use the bathroom. Still others suffer seizures or become violent and need to be restrained. With so many health problems, nurses and other specialists are needed. "The biggest cost is staff, and you need plenty of staff for safety," Martin said. "When you have a kid that is potentially violent, it is important to retain staff. ... My biggest fear is that when they cut so far, there will be the concern about safety." In many cases, it is a time-consuming process to teach some of these children tasks such as brushing their teeth. "The goal is that they become less of a burden on society rather than more of a burden," she said. "You don't need to read in order to put stock on a grocery shelf." Like everything with special education, receiving the right training is a complicated process. Niedermeyer acknowledged that many parents have unreasonable expectations about what a child can accomplish in school and what kind of instruction should be provided. "Reality does set in more," she said. Parents go through a process called IEP (Individualized Education Program) where they meet with school officials to determine the type of education their child needs. "The IEP is such a disappointment," said Niedermeyer. "They spend four to five minutes on the positive and the next one-and-one-half hours on the negative stuff." The hope is that after a lot of give and take, school officials and parents can agree on training needs for their children. "They are not sitting there putting their time in," said Niedermeyer. "These kids work and work very hard." "Four years ago, the ESD could provide these services at a considerable savings, and today we can provide these services for approximately the same costs," said Cec Amuchastegui, Klamath schools director of communications. The pullout comes on the heels of a major proposal by the Jackson ESD to boost its special education budget by $700,000 to $10.6 million, despite a $400,000 reduction in state revenues next year out of an overall $16.6 million budget. "We are more consumer-oriented than we were several years ago," said Paul Rickerson, director of ESD special education, which services 13 school districts in Jackson, Josephine and Klamath counties. In 2000-2001, 2,659 students received special education services from ESD. With Klamath's decision to pull out of STEPS, the ESD will have little choice but to alter its proposed expenditures on special education, a decision that could affect smaller school districts that depend on regional services. "This will hurt the economy of scale of being a regional provider," said Rickerson. The ESD, instead of providing services to Klamath, will now have to reimburse the district for the costs of running its own program. In theory, the ESD is able to provide services at a cheaper rate because it can maintain a large itinerant staff that can be sent to whatever district needs service. However, the Three Rivers School District in Josephine County has maintained it runs its own version of the STEPS program cheaper. ESD officials counter that Three Rivers hasn't fully calculated the costs of its program. Other districts, such as Ashland and Eagle Point, have decided to hire their own in-house psychologists because they say it is less expensive than using the ESD, which has a senior staff with higher salaries. Rickerson said the ESD now operates on a year-to-year basis, hiring more temporary employees as needed. "The downside is that we have more annual fluctuation in staff," he said. Rickerson worries that staff levels will get to a point where it becomes more difficult to provide regional services, particularly for smaller districts. For instance, to make sure ESD can keep enough Braille translators on staff, Rickerson said, it had to contract with the state of California to translate textbook materials. All these changes in regional special education worry smaller districts. "When too many districts pull out, it creates a problem for smaller districts," said Prospect Superintendent Don Alexander. At present, Prospect is allotted $72,000 a year in services from the ESD but pays an additional $29,000 to cover all its needs. Alexander said a district like Prospect that has no special education or curriculum director is very dependent on ESD to handle some of the complicated paperwork required for special education students. Every three years, a school is required to complete an evaluation of a special education student even if that student has temporarily left school. "They can come back and we can lose a lot of money," he said. In one instance, a student returned to school and the evaluation wasn't conducted, leading to legal action and a $10,000 settlement, Alexander said. "One kid could sink our budget," Alexander said. "That's where the ESD comes in to provide a cushion." Eagle Point Superintendent Bill Jones said the district appreciates the ESD's decision to shift funds to support more special education services. But the district has hired two psychologists because it would be about $12,000 cheaper a year than going through the ESD for that service. Because the district will need to buy supplies and materials for the psychologists, Jones said, "there won't be a lot of savings the first year." Despite the boost in funding from ESD and the hiring of psychologists, Eagle Point still expects to pay an additional $360,000 on special education next year. Whether the district decides to opt out of other ESD services in the future is up in the air. "With what's happening with the financial situation, this is a very dynamic situation throughout the state," said Jones. "We will look at this one year at a time." Rogue River Superintendent Charles Hellman said, "From a small district point of view, it is absolutely essential that they (the ESD) meet the needs of small districts in light of the changing circumstances for larger districts." The school system requires the equivalent of 1.3 speech therapists, which would be contracted with ESD. "A small district has sometimes less ability to attract these type of specialists and maybe not on a part-time basis," he said. "Certainly, the bottom line is that the ESD provides efficiencies of services and funding." Ashland schools Superintendent Juli Di Chiro said the district hired its own speech and language translators because they could do it more cheaply than ESD. The district is also going to hire a half-time psychologist for what it was previously spending on a quarter-time psychologist from ESD. "With the hiring of a psychologist, we can now bill Medicaid for some of our costs," she said. "It is almost going to pay for itself. This will be a win-win situation for the district." Di Chiro said districts and the ESD will continue to wrestle with what programs can be run on a more regional basis through the ESD or what can be run cheaper at the district level. Ashland will continue to keep its six severely handicapped students in the STEPS program at an average cost of $24,000 each, said Di Chiro. "We couldn't replicate the quality of that program here," she said. Medford schools superintendent Steve Wisely said his district has no plans to create its own STEPS program. "We don't plan on doing anything that would affect the ESD's plans," he said. "We have always looked out for the smaller districts." Reach reporter Damian Mann at 776-4476, or e-mail [email protected] Mail Tribune Home | Ottaway Newspapers, Inc. | Dow Jones & Co., Inc. | Privacy | Contact Us Copyright � 2001 Mail Tribune, Inc.