Volume 30, No. 16, January 13, 2011
The aritcle titled "Finding Efficiencies in Special Education" addresses the financial aspects of special education and what can be done about them. The first issue raised talks about FAPE, a free and appropriate education for students with special needs. Fape does not address the current budget cuts many schools are going through. This creates a discrepency with parents and administration. Parents are used to not being told no. If their child needs something for their education it has mostly been supplied to them. This dilema puts the schools in a tight spot. Can they turn parents down? Can they say no to certain needs of the student if they cannot afford it in their new limited school budget? And if they have to say no are they in fear of a lawsuit? In the past when students with disabilities have not received appropriate services the school has been sued and lost quite a bit of money. Does this mean that Special education students will receive services even if the school cannot afford it? Each state is given a special education budget annually and their districts are at the mercy of what the state gives them.
The arguement is now becoming about how efficiently the monies are being spent rather than just reducing the budget. A huge push for inclusion is one way to save budget money. Another is to clossly look at each students IEP and determine if all things listed are still neccesary.
I agree with both the family (parents) and the schools argument on this issue. First of all the schools should be able to say no to some services. For example when I worked in Hawaii one the Autistic students at our school received dolphin therapy, a cost the school paid for. Dolphin therapy has not been scientifically proven to help with Autism, so eessentially the schools are paying out quite a bit of their budget to unsubstantiated therapies. I also agree with the parents in that their child needs a free and appropriate education. Parents may feel that if the school is given the right to say no to services that they may take that too far and a free and appropriate education may no longer be free or appropriate. The bigger question of this issue is "what is appropriate"? The answer is something that must be agreed upon by all parties involved. If all parties are reasonalbe and cognicent of the constant lowering of school budgets an agreement may be easier to come by. Unfortunately this is usually not the case. I guess we will just have to wait and see what happens to the future financial state of special education.
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