Bob Coleman, director of ANW Cooperative, painted a dire picture of the special education program’s finances to members of the Humboldt Board of Education Monday night.
The state is supposed to fund 92 percent of the program, Coleman said, but the number has been dropping each year and is currently down to about 79 percent.
“Each year it’s pretty much taken a nose dive,” he said.
This has added to several already growing problems. First, there is an increase of medically fragile students who need special care. There has also been an increase in children diagnosed with autism, or with emotional problems that also require specialized care. This ties into another issue that the budget is affecting: hiring and keeping employees.
“It’s getting really difficult to recruit teachers,” Coleman said.
Many states pay better, Coleman said, drawing teachers away.
Recently, Coleman said, they had four openings and no applicants. They had to call colleges across the state and actively seek new graduates in order to fill those slots.
There are also medical needs to consider. Several districts have no nurses, although Humboldt does have one, Coleman said. Nurses are needed to dispense medication for medically fragile children, such as asthma medication, he said. But hiring specialists is also difficult because there is no way to compete with their salary. For example, if they want to hire a physical therapist, they can only offer a salary somewhere in the $50,000 per year range. This would mean a substantial pay cut, as many make $90,000 working in a hospital. When the per-hour pay is calculated, the two positions are about equal because the program is in effect only during the school year, but many are not willing to sacrifice time off for less pay.
Finding secondary teachers who can teach subjects to special education students, or teachers who can work with emotionally disturbed or severely physically disabled children is also a challenge. As older teachers who were “grandfathered” in are retiring, it will become even more difficult to replace them.
One member of the board asked if there was any possible help from state or federal aid, and Coleman flatly said no.
“Unless we can get people in the Legislature who want to make changes, I don’t think it’s gonna happen,” he said.
The next meeting on June 23 has been canceled. The board will meet again in July.
