The new director of special education for Park Ridge-Niles School District 64 vowed Monday to improve services for students with disabilities by retraining the district’s staff on how to develop federally mandated plans for each student in the special education program.
“We will be more aggressive in developing a robust special education program,” said Lea Anne Frost, who started as the district’s director of student services less than two months ago.
Frost is one of four new employees in the student services division, which the board agreed earlier this year to expand by three positions: a new elementary school special education coordinator, a new behavior analyst and a new psychologist.
The additional psychologist allowed Frost “to balance caseloads, so psychologists can be more attentive,” according to a report she prepared for the board.
After Frost started July 1, the district’s special education staff received additional training on the process of crafting individualized education plans, which are required by the federal government to determine what services students are to receive and what accommodations must be made for them.
The district has also changed how it prepares those plans “to ensure greater compliance in identifying student needs. This is evident in the new forms we will be using within the IEP system to define eligibility for services and the creation of appropriate IEP goals,” according to Frost’s report.
In May, an audit by an outside consultant found that services offered to District 64 students enrolled in special education classes declined during the past two years.
Federal law requires that school districts offer all options to students with disabilities that are necessary to meet their needs.
District 64 officials “were too focused” on test scores when deciding whether to place students into one of two programs, according to the audit completed by Lisa Harrod of LMT Consulting. Harrod urged the board to base placements on an evaluation of students’ individual skills and goals as part of a formal special education individualized education plan meeting and not in informal meetings or phone calls with parents.
Frost said she was also working to expand the professional development offered to members of the special education team and to “ensure consistency across schools.”
Board member Larry Ryles urged Frost to take steps to address the “perception that there has been a lack of compassion in District 64” for students enrolled in special education classes as well as their families.
In December, parents objected to a proposal that would have had special education students start middle school one year early. After several parents told the board the change would undo years of efforts to integrate their children into mainstream classes, the proposal was dropped.
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That issue prompted several parents of students with significant disabilities to urge District 64 leaders to overhaul the entire special education program, saying they were dissatisfied with the treatment of their children and frustrated that they had not been consulted about changes.
Miki Tesija, who led the group of parents who objected to the change of middle school start time, said she found Frost’s plan for the upcoming school year “vague.”
“It is unclear to me what the goals are and how we are going to achieve them,” Tesija told the board.
Tesija said she was disappointed that the Parents and Teachers Talking Together initiative, known as PT3, which is designed to increase the communication between district administrators and teachers and parents of students in special education classes, would not meet until Sept. 20, a month after the start of school.
“I am concerned that we are going to waste another year without taking concrete steps to help our children,” Tesija said.
Tom Fisher, another parent who has criticized the board’s handling of the district’s special education services, said he was concerned that the district was not acting quickly enough to form a committee to advise the board on how to improve the district’s special education programs. The board voted July 9 to create that committee.
However, Superintendent Laurie Heinz said several issues needed to be clarified regarding the special education committee before it could begin to meet, including how it would work with the Parents and Teachers Talking Together initiative and what its scope of work would include.
Heinz said she planned to meet with board members Ryles and Fred Sanchez, who had been appointed to serve on the special education committee, to grapple with those issues and review applications from district residents who have volunteered to serve on the committee.
“We are very focused on moving forward as soon as possible,” Heinz said. “We want to do it right and do a quality job.”
The board is scheduled to discuss the special education committee again at its next regular meeting, scheduled for 7 p.m. Sept. 24 at Field Elementary School.
Board President Anthony Borrelli said it was important to ensure the board committee had the “correct fit.”
“The goal is to try to get this all off the ground as soon as possible,” Borrelli said.