Top 5 Ways Charter Schools are Vulnerable When it comes to Special Education
1. Come One, Come All As public schools, charter schools must provide a free and appropriate education to any student who chooses to enroll, regardless of the severity of the student’s needs. In other words, charter schools cannot deny admission to any student based on their disability or whether or not the school is equipped to handle that disability. If that means building a program and hiring specialized staff for an individual student, so be it. This leaves charter schools vulnerable to incurring huge costs and liability.
2. Size Does Matter Charter schools are typically small and recently established. That means they do not have many of the benefits experienced by large school districts that have been around for 30 or more years. Charter schools are like toddlers in terms of development, still wobbly on their feet; whereas a school district is more like a wise grandparent. However, with an increasingly litigious educational climate, mounting pressure from parents, and students who have needs now, charters have little time to figure it out and little room to get it wrong.
3. Free at Last Further, many charter schools are choosing to emancipate themselves from their parent school districts in favor of becoming an independent LEA (local education agency). When schools do this, they gain the luxuries of autonomy, but they also forgo the protections of an established system, with its protocols and procedures. So now when IEPs go bad, there is no help forthcoming in the form of seasoned program specialists and district representatives. Instead, it is the charter’s key team members, often the Education Specialist and School Psychologist, on the front lines.
4. Here Today, Gone Next Year All of these issues threaten to overwhelm a burgeoning special education department. Which leads to another common problem: turn over. A study by Miron and Applegate at Western Michigan University cited teacher attrition rates as high as 40% in charter schools (2007). Not only can a lack of consistency within school teams shake parents’ trust and faith, it can also threaten quality and delivery of services. While the important, and at times complex, process of getting to know students and their needs must begin again with each new staff member.
5. Who’s On First? It is more common in the charter school world than it is in traditional public schools to have relatively young and inexperienced administrators. Reporting on data obtained from the National Charter School Research Project as well as the National Center for Education Statistics, a 2008 article in Education Week reported that, “30 percent of charter school leaders have led a school for two years or less, compared with only 16 percent of traditional public school principals. Moreover, as many as 12 percent of charter school leaders were under the age of 35—young professionals who, in many cases, jumped straight from teaching into the school leader’s role” (The High Wire Job of School Leadership, 2008). Although these administrators are often well intentioned, intelligent, and diligent people, their lack of experience and knowledge of special education law and procedures can leave the schools they lead vulnerable.
The question comes down to where are the knowledgeable & competent professionals who understand what it takes to help children with disabilities learn? Who can support the implementation of educational services and supports in Charter Schools?
Angela Aiello & Rienzi Haytasingh
Brain Learning Psychological Corporation
