NHP-GCP Board Discusses Special Education Placements

Dr. Raymond Brodeur, New Hyde Park-Garden City Park school district's new director of pupil personnel services, prepared a statistical review on Monday night at the board of education's work session meeting discussing the special education placement by breaking down the number of special education students in each school and the locations of where the students will be placed district-wide.

This presentation was part of an annual district review and tied into regarding space for special education classes in the schools. At the end of the 2010-2011 school year, several parents of special education children asked the district to try to align programs so that the students wouldn't have to be moved around.

Based on the research, explained the difficulty of having special education classes in one building.

"It's a tough situation with the space allocations and budgetary ramifications," he said. "There are no classrooms left; we are already using literally one-tenth of the room for these classes now."

For this year’s special education placement, there are 138 students in total who have been placed both in and out of the district.

The breakdown is as follows:

• At , there are 18 students that receive ICS, an additional 10 students in a special class (grades three and four) and nine students in a special class (grades five and six).
• has 16 students that receive ICS, 10 students are in a special class (grades five and six) and a total of four PINC students.
• has 18 students in ICS, nine students in a special class (kindergarten and first), 10 students (grades one and two) and a total of five SINC students.
• has 20 students in ICS.

Special education students who have needs that cannot be realistically met within the district have been “tuitioned out” to other schools conducive to their disabilities. Katulak explained the difficulty the district has when a child is medically fragile. Arrangements at other schools "provide a more soothing environment to suit their needs."

He says the goal is to educate students in the least restrictive environment possible.

In reference to a question asked over the summer regarding why gifted teachers move to different schools while special education students move, Katulak explained, "A teacher for the gifted is in all four buildings and only services group of students for one hour a week and will utilize whatever space is available that day. The special education population needs to be in the same environment five days a week, six hours a day."

Within the upcoming weeks, Dr. Brodeur hopes to visit all of the schools outside the district where the students have been placed. He will be giving a report about the special education program including the services in the coming months.

*ICS classes are in every building; these students are in the mainstream all day and receive extra support.

*Dr. Brodeur defines a special class as one with students that have relatively intensive needs based on physical, social and management skills that will allow him to know how much individualized attention a student needs and whether he or she needs to be taught by a special education teacher and assisted by aides if needed. The students performance is reported to the parents in addition to report cards, three times a year.

*PINC is a primary intensive needs class - this is the class that was moved from Hillside Grade to GCP to allow mainstreaming from the intensive needs class to a lesser restrictive environment.

*SINC is a secondary intensive needs class - this is for older students.