Schools adapting for special ed students
Faculty working to ensure students have resources they need
While parents of special education students say their children have struggled since returning to the classroom or online learning, Niagara’s school boards have made adjustments to help the students cope with COVID-19 restrictions.
Michael St. John, District School Board of Niagara’s superintendent of special education and mental health and well-being, said faculty have worked to ensure special education students have the resources they need whether they’re attending classes in person or online.
“Ensuring our students with special learning needs have the supports and resources they need to succeed is a priority for us, and that has not changed due to COVID-19,” he said. “While we’ve had to adjust with this year’s new circumstances, many of the supports students normally have access to in a typical school year are available.”
St. John was responding to preliminary results of a survey conducted by Autism Advocacy Ontario, an organization run by Niagara Falls resident Christine Levesque, asking parents of special needs students if they have had any concerns since classes resumed. As of Friday, more than 600 people had completed the survey sharing concerns about access to resources their children need.
St. John said students who opted to return to the classrooms continue to have access to resource teachers and educational assistants, as well as equipment they may need and support from outside agencies.
“For our virtual students, while we’ve had to adapt to bring resources online, they are available,” St. John added in an email. “For example, programming for online learners continues to be supported by resource teachers, specialized equipment is available as required, and in certain circumstances, based on their learning needs, we work to provide students with individualized program supports.”
He said the board has also worked to ensure technology is available for students and families that need it, such as Chromebooks and ipads.
For Niagara Catholic District School Board, family of schools superintendent Gino Pizzoferrato, who oversees special education programs, said faculty have been working with families of special education students who have been attending online classes, while also ensuring that copies of each student’s latest individual education plan were immediately available.
“Best practice for all Niagara Catholic staff is to foster a collaborative partnership between staff at a student’s home school and the virtual school that includes the parent’s input into all aspects of program development,” Pizzoferrato said in an email.
“As always, parents are the strongest advocates for their child and should maintain the relationship with the home school while developing new partnerships with the virtual school staff.”
Although access to individual education plans were a concern for some of the parents that completed the Autism Advocacy Ontario survey, Pizzoferrato said copies of the documents were created and distributed to teaching staff as soon as students were assigned to their classes.
The documents were used to create student learning profiles for each virtual secondary student, he added.