State wants review of special ed
Recommends district reevaluate tailored programs after complaints
GREENWICH — When parent Jennifer Kutai filed a complaint with the state over the Greenwich Public Schools’ handling of her child’s special education program, she did not imagine she would trigger a districtwide review of its policies.
But she did.
In addition to requiring the schools to correct violations specific to the education of Kutai’s daughter, the state Department of Education’s Bureau of Special Education is recommending that Greenwich review how it writes and updates individualized education programs for special education students, and how they are distributed to parents. Kutai’s was one of three complaints filed by parents in which the bureau identified violations and outlined corrective actions.
Parents and attorneys interpret the state’s districtwide recommendation as a promising change in approach that could mean more attention from the state toward Greenwich’s
Department of Special Education.
“When we filed our violations with the Connecticut State Department of Education, we were looking for justice for our daughter,” Kutai said. “We never expected that her case would help scores of other children throughout the Greenwich Public Schools.”
The state is taking a more assertive role for the first time, according to special education attorney Andrew Feinstein.
“In the Kutai complaint, they order districtwide remedies, and that is something previously unheard of,” Feinstein said. “We’re seeing a pretty substantial change in what state is willing to do.”
In a statement in response to the case, Pupil Personnel Services Mary Forde said, “We take every question, concern, formal complaint and general inquiry from parents seriously. Although we cannot comment on individual complaints, we respond to all required Corrective Actions and we review and incorporate recommendations as needed.”
The recommendation seems to indicate a change in policy that Feinstein said he is seeing in other Connecticut towns and cities. In Norwalk, he said, the state investigated the public schools in response to a complaint filed on behalf of 14 Norwalk students, by two specialeducation lawyers and one advocate. After parents complained about that the handbook used by the Oxford Public School district for evaluating students was unclear, inaccessible and incomplete, the state created a template handbook for districts to use.
“There is this change that is taking place,” he said. “The change may not be Greenwich-specific; however, with these last three complaints, I don’t think there is any other way to read this than that the state is taking a close look at what is happening in Greenwich Public Schools, and is concerned about that.”
But according to a spokesperson for the state education department, the state is not taking a new approach.
“Where it is appropriate, complaint reports include recommendations that are designed to improve practices in a school district, whether broad or narrow in scope,” spokesperson Peter Yazbak said.
Filing a complaint, with the state education department or the federal Office of Civil Rights, is one option parents can take if they believe their district is not providing their child with a free and appropriate public education. The other option is due process, a lengthy and expensive experience that involves hiring a lawyer and attending hearings with state officers, the district and its lawyers.
Parents can spend upwards of $100,000 for due process, especially if they end up losing and paying the district’s legal fees. They also sign nondisclosure agreements, meaning that parents risk losing the services their child was awarded if they speak openly about their cases.
Over the last 15 years, Greenwich parents and attorneys have filed at least 16 complaints with the state education department, but staff who searched for every complaint pertaining to Greenwich could not locate all of them, state education department attorney Laura Anastasio said in response to an FOI request.
These complaints, dating to 2009, reference similar problems that parents currently in the district included in their letters to the state.
Daniel Eddelstein, a parent in the district a decade ago, whose son is a graduate of Greenwich High School, filed a complaint with the Office of Civil Rights and with the state Department of Education.
When he read about the concerns current parents have, he told Board of Education members in a meeting on Thursday, “I felt like I was in a time warp.”
“These issues are not new,” he continued.
More recently, Greenwich parent Kristin Zisson filed a complaint with the OCR because she found discrepancies in a handbook for determining students’ eligibility for accommodations for students with disabilities. The office investigated the district, which had to update its handbook in response.
A handful of parents of Speducated Greenwich, a local support group for parents of children with special needs that banded together this summer, decided to take the route of filing state complaints, which is free and does not forbid them from talking. They submitted them collectively in August, and decisions on these letters are trickling in.
In the case of Kutai’s daughter, the bureau found that the district did not use data to make informed decisions about her IEP and wrote weak educational goals for her to achieve.
These findings cast into doubt the appropriateness of the services she was receiving, and the bureau told the district to design a new program, with input from an independent evaluator. It mandated training for the teacher in the case of Kutai’s daughter, and the bureau said it reserves the right to order services to compensate for the district’s inappropriate IEP.
Kutai said she did not ask for financial compensation, but the fact that the state reserved the right to order compensatory services, such as tutoring, reveals the magnitude of the violations.
Kutai said she is glad her complaint drew attention to more than violations of her daughter’s civil rights.
“It is a tremendous victory not just for our family, but for all special education families in this district,” she said.