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player ready...Park Ridge – Niles School District 64 administrators recommended that school board hire an additional special education coordinator, acknowledging that its program for elementary school students who have significant disabilities “is not working well.”
The District 64 board had been set to meet Monday night to consider that recommendation, but that session was canceled Sunday when it became clear a quorum of board members would not be able to attend the meeting, said district Superintendent Laurie Heinz. The proposal will be considered at a future meeting, she added.
District 64’s elementary special education coordinator is responsible for traveling between four elementary schools, while the district’s assistant director of student services is responsible for the district’s fifth elementary school, according to a report prepared for the board.
Special education coordinators are responsible for modeling best practices for staff while observing classroom lessons “to support student learning,” according to the report. In addition, coordinators attend meetings to craft individualized education plans for disabled students. Those federally mandated plans determine what services students are to receive and what accommodations must be made for them.
“Unfortunately, the elementary school model is not working well, as the coordinator’s assignment of four buildings is too large to provide staff with the appropriate support,” according to the report. “Under the current model, the elementary coordinator spends a little more than one day at each building, with most of that time being spent in IEP meetings. As a result, the coordinator has little time to support staff in the classroom, lead professional development on best practices, and observe and support students in the classrooms.”
District 64 has two middle school special education coordinators, and that model “is working much better as that coordinator is able to spend 2.5 days at each building throughout the week.”
“With an additional coordinator, the four elementary buildings would be split evenly between two coordinators, while the assistant director continues to support one elementary building as part of her duties,” according to the report. “It is the belief that if we replicate the support provided at the middle school, where the coordinator is able to spend 2.5 days at each building, the district will be able to positively impact the support we provide students and staff at the elementary level in special education.”
The salary for the position is budgeted for $74,000 annually, according to the report.
District officials are preparing to launch an audit of the district’s special education policies and programs after some parents objected to a proposal to have some students with disabilities start middle school one year early. District officials have since dropped that plan.
The results of that audit may lead the District 64 administration to return to the board to request funds for new positions “based on recommendations that may be received concerning the district’s current service delivery model,” according to the report to the board.
The recommendation was based on the results observed during 18 months of having one special education coordinator be responsible for all five elementary schools and then later assigning one school to the assistant director of student services, Heinz said.
The recommendation to hire an addition special education coordinator was endorsed by Interim Director of Student Services Mike Padavic, Heinz said.
“Mr. Padavic confirmed what our administration had been monitoring,” Heinz said.
The meetings of the District 64 board that took place on Dec. 11 and Jan. 22 featured emotional testimony from parents who said they were dissatisfied with the district’s special education programs. The first meeting of a parents’ group formed by District 64 officials in response to those complaints was scheduled to take place Feb. 7 at Lincoln Middle School, 200 S. Lincoln Ave., Park Ridge.
Heather Cherone is a freelance reporter for Pioneer Press.