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Getting moved from one school to another can be jarring for any kid trying to make friends and get used to a new learning environment. For special education students in the Mountain View Whisman School District, it happens all the time.
Earlier this month, parents of special needs students told the school board that their children, like many others enrolled in the district’s special education classes, are often bumped from school to school every year, making it difficult for them to get a foothold in the community and acclimatize to new classrooms.
A recently proposed $2.1 million “fix” that would add permanent classrooms for special education students at all schools could break the trend — provided there’s enough bond money left to fund it.
The problem comes down to the way the district currently houses its special needs students. A number of schools, including Bubb, Monta Loma and Landels Elementary, generally have enough classrooms for special education classes while still accommodating the rest of the student body.
But when enrollment fluctuates, special education students are forced to move to another school to make space for general education students, said Christine Case-Lo, chair of the Learning Challenges Committee.
Case-Lo said she is all too familiar with the problem. Her son, Alex, had been sent to three different schools and had six teachers in just four years in the district, eventually causing him to have a breakdown, she said. She eventually pulled her son out of the district.
“It was that traumatic,” Case-Lo said.
Other parents came to the May 7 school board meeting with similar stories. Sarah Sun, who said her son is autistic, said she currently has to cross the city to take her son to Monta Loma for class, and that it’s been difficult getting used to a new community.
She said the teacher there is “awesome,” but the classroom is not suited for special education — it’s essentially a makeshift class environment with no bathrooms and areas partitioned off for cubicles. Even so, she now has roots in the area and fears she will have to move her son to Landels next year, she told the board.
Case-Lo said she is advocating for permanent classrooms, to the tune of $2.1 million, that would allow special education students to go to the same school from kindergarten through fifth grade, and could be split up into separate “strands” for students with different types of disabilities. She said this has already been done with great success in the nearby Los Altos School District for the past decade.
At the May 7 board meeting, Case-Lo explained that both the current and the incoming special education directors for the school district support the proposed buildings, and that it would give students their own bathrooms, better access to therapy, and make them feel like they are part of the rest of the school’s campus.
“They don’t need to be shoved off to a portable on the edge of campus. They can be part of the school community,” Case-Lo said.
After making an appeal to the District Facilities Committee, the $2.1 million in permanent special education buildings was put on the top of the committee’s “wish list” for any available funds left over in Measure G bond money once other site improvements have been made.
At the May 21 district board meeting, there was some back-and-forth over whether the committee should drop one of the currently-funded improvements to the district’s schools to get the special education buildings off the unfunded list, trading one school site upgrade for another. Board president Chris Chiang pointed out the $2.5 million committed to kitchen upgrades could be de-funded in favor of the new classrooms, which he said makes more sense from an “equity and justice” standpoint.
“While I support upgrades to our kitchen facilities, the fact that we could leave out our most vulnerable students over kitchens … I just can’t consciously support that,” Chiang said.
Thida Cornes, a member of the District Facilities Committee, told the board the proposed facilities improvement for special education would create “permanent homes” for students so they would not have to move to different schools. By placing special education students wherever there is “excess capacity” at a school, she said, the district is creating a situation where the most vulnerable students are most susceptible to being moved.
“One year you’re in Landels, the next you’re in Monta Loma and the third year you’re at a different school,” Cornes said. “We had special education parents come and tell us that this was very traumatic for their kids.”
Committee member Peter Darrah, on the other hand, said keeping special education students at the same school from kindergarten through fifth grade can be done with current facilities, and that creating a “dichotomy” between kitchen upgrades and special education classrooms may not be the best way to look at it.
“It’s not like special education kids are out in a trailer if they don’t get that,” Darrah said.
The committee will review feedback from the board and public comments, and will return to the board on June 4 with its final recommendations.
Glad they are waning to stop the “musical chairs” version of school. Now they need to do it for ALL the kids.
For those who say, “Well, how can we deal with the change in district numbers?” there is a simple answer. Plan ahead! Why should the kids suffer because the adults don’t plan ahead?
It can be done. When I was growing up, when a new school was built or capacity changed, they left the kids alone who were already there. They asked for volunteers who wanted to go. New kids moving in went to the new school. After a few years, the numbers balance out AND the kids don’t have to leave their friends, adjust to new teachers or learn a new routine for the benefit of the adults.
It’s bad enough that the city council doesn’t think far enough ahead to consider infrastructure when they allow massive amounts of building. We don’t need to visit the effects of their lack of planning on our children.
I was appalled by how many times the special ed kids were moved around when my (regular Ed) kid went to school in Mtn View. How can they become part of the school community if they are treated like an “afterthought”? Where I work in another district, the special Ed students are a major part of the community and the parents are invested in their kid’s school as well. ALL kids should be treated as valuable members of the school community. EVERYONE has something they contribute but if you are moved around too much this sense of belonging is lost (by all).
I would like to thank the Voice for covering this issue! I’m happy to answer questions
It’s worth mentioning that at the May 28th District Facilities Committee meeting (after this article went to press), the DFC was presented with a new approach to providing permanent space for special needs students, which entailed smarter use of the space in the multi-use rooms at Bubb, Huff, and Landels, without compromising what’s already being proposed for those buildings.
Without going into all the details, the result is that we could add 2 classrooms of additional space for special needs at each of these sites (in addition to the already-available permanent capacity at schools like Monta Loma) for no additional cost… which should be enough to address the need.
Speaking for myself, I was thrilled to hear this proposal, and was glad to see the District thinking creatively about how to solve a challenging problem – I wasn’t looking forward to hearing the debate on the merits of proper nutrition for SED kids vs. permanent rooms for special needs kids, which is sort of one of those debates where no one wins.
With the area being flooded with Google employees and other expanding businesses. One would think that there would be an influx of money from business and property tax increases to end this problem. Is MV officials mishandling this money. Building more exotic civic centers and government buildings.
Stability is critical for special Ed children as many live with heightened anxiety and sensory sensitivities. Transition and change are SO hard on these kids. Advocating for permanent placement for these students will create a better community for us all. You do not need to be a special Ed parent to become involved. Let the Mountain View Whisman District board know that you expect them to prioritize permanence in placement of special education classes. Thanks!
I’m a special educator working with moderate to severely disabled students. My school district is doing the same, bumping us out of our classrooms because they want the bathroom for transitional kindergarten. Meanwhile our children with disabilities are placed in general education classrooms at different school sites. This is such an injustice done to our most vulnerable population.
10.9% of the students in the district are enrolled in Special Education. This article is very misleading. The district does not flop around all 10.9% of the students in Special Ed from year to year. Probably this lumping of all Special Ed together really means to focus on a small subset of the 500 or so students receiving Special Ed services, but it doesn’t refine that.
To Special Ed Defined: Though the article does not specify which special education population of students, it’s evident the writers are referring to Special Day Classes which typically house the district’s most vulnerable students, those who are identified as moderate to severely disabled (sometimes mild to moderate), those who require a higher teacher to student ratio and fewer students in the class than general education, and those who struggle the most with change to their environment and routine. My district once had “permanent facilities” for these children, but I’ve since learned nothing is permanent, and a classroom with a bathroom is prime real estate. Special education students who have specially designed classrooms meant for their educational benefit are being evicted. Watch out Mountain View special education proponents! You may be promised special buildings, but when there’s a shortage of bathrooms, your special students will be the first to go…again!
I suspected that SDC classes were involved, but even that aspect doesn’t line up with standard practice. They speak of just $2.1 Million being enough to build “dedicated classrooms at every school” in the district. Well, that’s 8 different elementary schools and 2 Middle Schools, or 10 schools total. The MVWSD construction budgets are no better than other district’s. Building a 1000 sq ft standard clasroom costs about $1 Million. So how can $2.1 Million solve this problem? It seems unlikely that they would have enough SDC population to justify one SDC class per school, or be able to deliver an adequate program for different types of student through that model.
Also, the one parent complains of being in 4 different schools and having 6 different teachers for her SDC child. If classrooms physically were the only issue, you’d expect the teacher and the child to have moved together to the school which had the room.
The article paints a very misleading and incomplete picture. The district has 500 Special Ed students who haven’t been being shuffled from school to school due to their special needs. The best I can figure is that at some particular site or sites, they are building 1 or 2 classrooms for SDC uses. That’s not the picture described by the article. Also, what about the Special Ed program at the currently-closed Slater School? Is that pre-school special-ed only? No mention of how that program is housed in portable buildings on the back end of a currently-leased-out former school site.
To Special Ed Defined:
I am one of the parents who spoke that night, over a year ago, about the damage done to our child in special day classes by having them moved yearly. The article was pretty damn close to accurate, but there were statements that could have been clearer.
We were asking for a commitment to have SDC classrooms maintained in place, with two classes of related SDCs at three elementary campuses in a “strand” program like that in Los Altos. Only 6-7 classes are needed at the elementary level, with another 2-4 needed in middle school. The district special education administration made a commitment to maintain a continuity for our kids, with classrooms at Bubb, Landels and Theuerkauf. They’ve stuck to that somewhat in the year since this article.
We asked for a financial commitment that as part of the construction plans, that old multi-purpose or office space be remodeled into SDCs, rather than having makeshift classes without bathroom access, therapy space or accessibility for our kids. This would mean retrofitting space, not building from scratch. We didn’t want our kids shuffled around every time a room was needed for more kindergarten space.
Every time we moved schools, my son grew more confused, more distant, until he eventually had a complete breakdown and had to be placed, at considerable district expense, at a non-public school. Many other parents have had the same experience. I saw a lot of money and time going into to jerry-rig unsuitable classroom space for therapy, accessibility and sensory needs, only to have all the expensive changes lost the next year when the classroom was moved yet again across town. Teachers were so frustrated at this is became impossible to retain talented teachers, and we cycled through teacher after teacher. We as a family were unable to participate in the school community.
Retrofitting old multipurpose space into devoted SDC classrooms at 3 campuses and the middle schools will save money. With the insanity of the building plans run amok, I have no idea if this can still be done. But I know from personally experience how important it is for our kids to have a consistent, welcoming environment and not be shoved around like inconvenient afterthoughts all the time.
And yes, the autism preschool is in portables behind the Google daycare that is Slater. They do wonderful things there without enough space or resources. Some of the space there has been used in the past for the Head Start preschool as well.
The article did not make clear that there were 6-7 classrooms of kids, probably about 60-70 children involved in this specific problem, but it is still a big problem, and an expensive one as more kids have to be sent off to non-public schools instead of being educated in the district. If you really don’t think this is important, I encourage you to attend a meeting of the Learning Challenges Committee with the special education administration, subscribe to our newsletter, or attend the SELPA-CAC meeting on the first Monday of the month. Parents there would be happy to related their children’s stories.
It’s is quit fustrating and sad that our children who have special needs are not as important as main streamed kids
My son who has sensory processing disorder, ADHD, and low muscle tone and may now suffer from absent seizures is getting denied an one on one instructional aide to secure his safety. He has had many different issues through out this year that the school should be concerned about but they aren’t
He has zoned out and walked infront of cars on school campus both before and after dismissal before reaching me. Having myself have to run and leave my other child with a friend to get him before he is hit
And from what I understand from my son, he already does work w an aide in the classroom for another student but they are not willing to give him one
It make you scared to send your child to school because they are not equipped or trained to deal w special need kids or parents of special need kids. They make these iep and try to trick you into signing your rights away and advocates are so expensive or not provided to help you understand your child’s iep and get the help needed for them
I need some one like Christine Case Lo on my side to help ensure our kids are safe at Monta Loma and get the same opprunties as other children special Ed or not
Michael is a special kid who just needs extra help and to ensure he doesn’t get hurt
He also deserves like other kids to feel good about himself as he excels in school with the help he needs
Please advocates out there help us help the battle we have
Carrie Castillo-Musante I would be happy to help you! My group, the Learning Challenges Committee, would also be happy to see if we can get your son what he needs. Please send me an email at lcc@lamvptac.org
Christine,
I’m so sorry to hear what your son (I’m sure the whole family) had to go through. It’s appalling that he was moved so many times. As I shared in previous comments, my district has shown a similar pattern of moving our SDC programs from school to school, or from classrooms with bathrooms to classrooms without on the same campus. I addressed our local school board, along with colleagues and parents at the last meeting. As a result, my students who were slated to move to a different school (into a general education classroom) will get to remain in their special classroom…for now. But the writing is on the wall, and I’ve been told it’s only a matter of time before we are told we must move again. I’m sure this is happening in many other districts. Special Ed Defined sounds very much like the administrators in my district who see our rooms as real estate and our children as numbers in a logistics situation. They do not know or understand our program or our children. I will continue to speak up and fight for our students’ right to have a place they can call home. I’m so glad to see parents like you who are doing the same. Our students and parents need you.