By Kathy Olson
Despite a school board decision to put $4 million back into special education, parents and supporters say students with special needs will suffer unless major changes are made to protect the programs.
The Ottawa Carleton District School Board decided last month to put $3 million from a one-time reserve fund and an additional $1 million back into special education for the next school year.
The announcement was bittersweet for parents and former students who say the board failed to address how cuts will affect students in years to come.
Pat Erb says she is scared for her 11-year-old daughter, Anastasia, who has cerebral palsy. She is in an orthopedic classroom at Centennial public school where she receives a combination of physical therapy and one-on-one instruction.
Erb says her initial excitement quickly turned to frustration when she found out the money is unlikely to change an earlier recommendation to reduce the role of physical therapists and occupational therapists in orthopedic classrooms.
A revised list of recommendations that will go before the board proposes eliminating teaching and support staff in almost all areas of special education despite the added funds.
Erb stresses the important role therapists play in helping her daughter function and learn.
“My daughter is very bright but she needs to know that she will have people there who will help her to relax her feet when she is working on a computer so her toes don’t curl, so one hand doesn’t work separately from the other hand, so she can swim in a pool,”
Erb has witnessed an incredible improvement in her daughter since September but she says if the level of physical therapy decreases she won’t continue to improve next year.
Board chair Albert Chambers admits the reserve fund does not represent a long term solution for special education and says the board will be faced with the difficult task of having to reduce the budget by millions again next year.
He says the added funds should cushion the transition in the coming years.
Students with other special needs are also facing uncertainty. Ruth Cooper has a daughter in the gifted program at McNabb Park public school, she and other parents still have no idea where the program will be next year after a February decision to close the school. Cooper is more optimistic than Erb but she says she realizes she will face the same battle to maintain the program come next year.
Jennifer Eastham says cuts to special education are going to mean more troubled adults in the future.
She knows the importance of the programs. Eastham has attention deficit disorder and she says without the individual attention she received in school she would probably be on the streets today, maybe even in jail.
Instead she works part-time as a teacher’s assistant helping special needs students and is an active volunteer for the Learning Disability Association.
She says improvements to special education in the last decade have kept some students from “falling through the cracks” but she says more, not less, needs to be done to ensure a continuing level of success.
“They want to bring in a system where they have more kids in the classroom and a teacher’s aid and an assistant to one class, so you have maybe five or six special needs children and you’ve got two extra bodies. You’re not going to have the time to work with them all. Somebody is going to suffer and that’s not good,” says Eastham.
The board is expected to vote on recommendations for special education on April 12.