Published Sunday, August 15, 2010
NATCHEZ — The Natchez-Adams School District spends $1,413.64 more per pupil than other districts its size, but the added cost is explained by a high number of special education students in Natchez, administrators say.
Numbers available on the Mississippi Department of Education Web site support the administration’s claims.
Disability services for a higher-than-average number of special education students will cost the Natchez-Adams School District approximately $3.96 million, or nearly 9 percent of its $45.8 million projected budget, for the 2010 to 2011 school year.
The cost-per-student issue comes up each summer, when the district shares its budget with the public. A July public hearing that drew a packed house of citizens arguing against a tax increase was no different.
Higher than average numbers
Based on numbers published by the state in 2008-2009, the Natchez schools had 143 students in self-contained special education classes. These students have disabilities so severe that they cannot take regular classes.
The average number of self-contained special education students among schools with a similar enrollment size, between 3,500 and 4,500 students, was 61.6.
The state listed the 2008-2009 Natchez enrollment at 3,988.
The district served a total of 463 students with disabilities, according to the 08-09 state statistics. Students with disabilities include, not only those in special education classes, but those with Attention Deficit Disorder, those in need of speech therapy or those with a variety of other disabilities that do not require placement in a special class.
Superintendent Anthony Morris said one factor explaining the high number of special education students is demographics, such as poverty.
“In the case of poverty, prenatal care is not given as it should be, and there are various other issues,” Morris said.
Data recently published by the district’s business office reports a higher number of disabled students than the state numbers — 591 in 2008-2009. But Natchez Special Services Director Adrienne Lacey-Bushell said the state and the school district calculate students differently.
The state counts each child under the age of 5 with special needs as 70 percent of a whole. The local district counts those children as a whole, she said.
The state qualifies children as special education students based on standards from the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act.
The IDEA was created in 1975 to ensure children with disabilities receive a “free and appropriate education.”
District budget
While this year’s overall proposed budget is higher than in 2008-2009, partially due to federal American Recovery and Reinvestment Act dollars, the new budget indicates less money will be spent on special education.
The Natchez-Adams School Board approved a $45.8 million budget in July, pending $300,000 in cuts, which were made and announced last week.
The cuts did include $15,000 from the special education budget. The number of special education students allowed to participate in a locally-funded work experience program was cut in half from 22 to 11. The program pairs disabled children with employers and funds minimum-wage payments to participating special education students.
The average cost per pupil as listed in this year’s proposed budget is $10,263.
It is the cost of educating special education students that inflates that number, Morris has said throughout the budgeting process.
But calculating the cost per special education student is not as easy. Each special needs student has an Individual Education Plan, known as an IEP. The cost of each plan varies from the next.
Mississippi Department of Education Associate State Superintendent Ann Moore said data about the cost per pupil based on specific disabilities is not published.
The disabilities
The large majority of students receiving disability services in the Natchez schools do not have severe disabilities.
“When you talk about the other (approximately) 400 kids in our district, 197 kids are speech (disability) only,” Lacey-Bushell said.
Students are screened every spring, based requirements outlined by a federal program called Child Find.
Child Find is a component of Individuals with Disabilities Education Act that requires states to identify, locate and evaluate all children with disabilities, ages birth to 21, who are in need of early intervention or special education services.
Child Find screens children for 13 categories of disabilities.
Categories include autism, deaf-blind, developmentally delayed, emotional disability, hearing impaired, language/speech impaired, multiple disabilities (minimum of two), mental retardation, other health impairment (such as Attention Deficit Disorder), orthopedic impairment, specific learning disability (such as basic reading, reading fluency), traumatic brain injury and visually impairment.
Lacey-Bushell said students ages 3 to 5 who qualify as developmentally delayed often pass the screening years later. Once they pass the screening, they are no longer counted as special education students and do not receive an IEP.
Morris said this tends to happen because the district receives children at every level of development.
Lacey-Bushell said the younger children make up a large portion of the number of the special education students.
Because private schools qualify for federally funded disability services, such as speech therapy, the Natchez public schools send counselors and instructors to Trinity Episcopal Day School, Adams County Christian School, Holy Family and Cathedral, as well as several area day cares.
The federal funding for these services is filtered through the school district, Morris said.
Lacey-Bushell said the school district tries to integrate students with disabilities with students without disabilities. This is a trend mandated by the Least Restrictive Environment requirement, which is part of IDEA.
Least Restrictive Environment requires children with disabilities to be integrated with non-disabled children to “the maximum extent appropriate.”
Lacey-Bushell said integration is also important because every child takes the same standardized tests.
For instance, some students who are counted as disabled might receive an IEP to take math in a specialized environment, but they join their peers for other courses.
Self-contained special education students join their non-disabled peers for certain classes such as physical education.
Students also benefit socially from the integration of students with different needs, Lacey-Bushell said.
