A leaked proposal that would establish \u201cspecial education specialty schools\u201d in Houston for a significant change in how and where special education students are taught had several Houston ISD parents of those students alarmed over the weekend.<\/p>\n
And Monday many of those parents besieged the district\u2019s central special ed department and their children\u2019s schools but reported that the only official answer they got was that the program would be explained at the end of the school year or into the summer. We put in a request to talk to someone at HISD about it but didn\u2019t hear back from the HISD press office.<\/p>\n
According to Meredith Yaker, the mother of three children in HISD one of whom is in special ed, this action by the HISD administration will probably affect just as many children as those who\u2019ve been going to the 12 schools designated for closure in the 2026-27 school year.<\/p>\n
The difference, she said, is that no one knew about the special ed plans, which are designed to go into effect as early as next fall.<\/p>\n
There is a certain amount of confusion about what those special ed plans mean. Will students be directed to go to different school entirely? Reading the section about whether siblings could be allowed to move with them (doubtful on an as-space-available basis) it appeared so.<\/p>\n
But others wondered if it meant the students would be bused to a different location for just part of the day. And if so, wouldn\u2019t they lose valuable instruction time in transit?<\/p>\n
The push to mainstream students with disabilities accelerated in the mid-1970s with the call to place each child in the \u201cleast restrictive environment.\u201d Limiting special ed kids to only certain schools in the district, seems to go against this, some parents believe.<\/p>\n
Jessie Dugan has 6-year-old twins, a boy and a girl. Her son is autistic which inspired her to become an advocate for special education at HISD school board meetings. She says her son has benefitted greatly from his exposure to mainstream classes for part of the school day In fact, it\u2019s been the catalyst for him learning to speak more words. \u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cGeneral ed time is the reason he can speak. He has gone from completely non-pseaking and from several years of therapy he had improved. But we saw the biggest jump when he had the chance to be in general education with everybody else.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThis sets back disability rights 30 years,\u201d Dugan said, adding that she and other special ed parents \u00a0have examples of other school districts doing everything they can to offer more complete services to wherever a special needs child lives. \u201cMy fear is like wraparound servies, people are going to lose accessibility to the services needed.\u201d (Under Superintendent Mike Miles\u2019 administration the school-based wraparound services providing clothes and social services to students and their parents have been moved to Sunrise Centers distributed through the district.)<\/p>\n
\u201cWhere are they planning to deliver his services?\u00a0 Are they in line with his IEP (individualized education program). If they are now taking kids from all sorts of schools and putting them together, will they be able to achieve a small group setting?\u201d<\/p>\n
Dugan is also concerned about the possibility of instruction being delivered by a livestreamed virtual teacher. She questioned whether such a teacher would be credentialed and whether that was the best way to teach these students.<\/p>\n
Dugan said she and her husband have decided to leave the state at the end of the school year because of HISD\u2019s special ed approach and what she terms the general lack of support for special needs kids from any state agency.<\/p>\n