Middle school letters delayed for special ed 5th graders

Alexandria Devonish is graduating on Monday from elementary school but neither Alexandria nor any of her 11 classmates in a District 14 special education class have been told where they are going to middle school.

Parents of special education students at The Children's School (PS 372) in Park Slope, who celebrate their children's elementary school graduation today, are incensed that their young graduates also have yet to receive their middle school placements, especially because the general education students received placements two weeks ago. Many of the parents chose PS 372 for its well-developed collaborative team-teaching program, which allows special education students and general education students to be in the same classroom with appropriate support. Educators are not supposed to highlight which students are classified as special education and which students are not, but the Department of Education's delay in placing special education fifth graders in middle schools this year threatens the carefully constructed relationship, parents claim.

"Unfortunately, everything we've worked for is in jeopardy because our students do not have their middle school placements," parents at PS 372 wrote in a collective letter to Sandy Ferguson, executive director of middle school enrollment at the Department of Education. "We're seeing the consequences right now. These students are missing the transitional steps, such as orientations and auditions, that make the move to middle school successful. Their peers on the general education track are participating and making plans for activities in September."

In an emailed response to parents at PS 372, Ferguson wrote that since "districts in the past had different approaches for the assignment of special education students, the Office of Student Enrollment sought to take a different, more comprehensive approach...Unfortunately, this is a time and labor intensive task." He told the parents to expect news "soon."

Ferguson told Insideschools that each special education student's middle school application was being individually reviewed. This is the first year that middle school placement has been handled by the central Office of Student Enrollment, Planning and Operations (OSEPO). In the past, community school districts handled middle school placement. Parent coordinators report that in prior years, special education students in some districts received middle school placements later than general education students but that this year the delay is even longer than usual.

While all middle school placement letters were sent later than usual this year, parents of special education students remain upset that all of the placements weren't sent at the same time and earlier in the spring. They also worry that they have already missed the June 12 deadline to appeal middle school placements in districts where there is an appeals process.

"If she's sent to a school I don't like, will I have time to appeal it?" questions Pamela Graham, parent to District 14 student Alexandria Devonish. She noted that she had listed three schools on her child's middle school application, but she hadn't heard back from any of them. (In districts where there is middle school choice it is customary for students to be interviewed by school officials as part of the application process.)

DOE spokesman Andrew Jacob said that this year the appeal deadline would be extended for special education families and vowed that the entire middle school placement process would happen earlier next year.

Parents at PS 372 say the Department of Education's explanation is offering too little, too late.

"Please tell us what factors lead to this situation?" the PS 372 parents asked in their letter to Ferguson. "How can we explain to our children when we pick them up from after-school programs, music lessons, sports practice and take them home after their June 18th graduation why they were left behind?"

Lindsey Whitton, June 18, 2008

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