RIDE sets meeting to air special ed complaints

After requesting the Department of Education conduct an investigation of the city’s special education program, Councilman Ed Ladouceur said he’s been granted a Dec. 22 meeting with Superintendent Philip Thornton, RIDE, and other education-related individuals who are yet to be named. Email correspondence between Ladouceur and RIDE confirm that he and Thornton will meet on the 22nd with staff from RIDE’s Leadership Team.

The meeting comes after a longstanding conflict over special education. Ladouceur and the Warwick Community Outreach Educational Committee, created by Ladouceur through the City Council in response to a “host” of other issues occurring, hosted a public forum last month at which educators and parents aired their grievances and described “chaotic and unsettling” situations in their classrooms. Since then, Ladouceur said, the complaints have only multiplied.

“We need to impress upon the citizens of Warwick that this isn’t just a little thing. This is significant,” he said.

Ladouceur and Warwick Teachers Union President Darlene Netcoh have a list of 18 allegations that they say are “serious.” They range from removing students from rosters to meet weighting requirements (weighting has currently been eliminated because teachers currently have no contract) and claiming classrooms are co-taught when they are not. The list doesn’t include numerous other allegations from parents and teachers, Netcoh and Ladouceur said.

“[Teachers are] the ones who actually work with the kids. We’re the ones who have to see the kids cry or say ‘I’m stupid’ when they can’t handle the material,” Netcoh said. “I’ve got special ed teachers who are in tears at the end of a class, and the kids are in tears.”

Both Ladouceur and Netcoh said students at all levels are unable to learn because of the high amounts of IEPs (Individualized Education Programs) in classrooms – some teachers report more than half of their students have IEPs and that they have no special educators in their rooms. Some students may require preferential seating or one-on-one attention, and those needs cannot be met in a classroom of 16 with 12 IEPs, 28 with 15 IEPs, or other high ratios of IEP to regular education students, they said. Out of Warwick’s nearly 9,000 students, 1,606 have IEPs.

Netcoh said some classes have been assigned teacher assistants, but that does not solve the problem. Though assistants are very valuable and care about the students, Netcoh said, they cannot serve as replacements for certified special educators needed to work with special education students.

“I’ve had kids where I have to sit down next to them to get them to write. I ask them questions, I have them do graphic organizers, brainstorm, get something on the paper, and help them organize it,” Netcoh said. “A lot of kids with reading disabilities fear writing and putting something on paper because they don’t know where to start. If I have to do that with 28 kids, everyone isn’t going to have their needs met.”

Furthermore, Ladouceur continues to be disturbed by the allegation that school psychologists are directed not to call 911 or the Kent Center when students are in crisis or in danger of hurting themselves.

“The City of Warwick is putting itself into a significantly litigious situation from a liability perspective,” he said. “If this is being condoned…somebody is going to be in a very serious liability situation if something happens to one of these youngsters.”

There aren’t even enough school psychologists as it is, Netcoh said. Not every building has one, so some are being sent to more than one building and are thus getting spread too thin, she claims. Because of these conditions, she added, school psychologists don’t want to work in Warwick, she said.

Ladouceur and his committee’s efforts are not without opposition. Last week, School Committee Vice Chair Eugene Nadeau called Ladouceur an “egotistical bully whose neverending campaign to discredit and bring harm to the Warwick School Department” in a letter to the Beacon. Nadeau said Warwick has “one of the best special education schools in Rhode Island, bar none” and that Connolly is an “expert” and “marvel” when it comes to special education.

“So many people don’t understand the laws we have to meet...There are Rhode Island laws on education and especially special students that we have to follow, and we’re following everything to the T,” he said.

Connolly also offered administration perspective in an op-ed in Thursday’s Beacon.

“RIDE’s independent review found that many of our secondary special education programs did not provide our special education students with access to the general education curriculum or highly qualified teachers. Recent PARCC test results confirmed the Rhode Island Department of Education’s concern, with virtually all of our special education students not achieving proficiency in college and career ready standards, and up to half significantly below standard,” Connolly wrote. “Warwick cannot, and will not, have special education programs that relegate children with disabilities to low expectations. Eventually, all of our students will go out into the real world, and we must start preparing them for that world right now. Consequently, the Warwick Public Schools has shifted the special education service delivery model in order to address these issues.”

Thornton’s office confirmed he would attend the meeting with RIDE on Dec. 22. As for Ladouceur, he said this particular battle is far from over.

“I think in the four years I’ve been on City Council, people realize that I’m not afraid to take on the hard fights,” he said. “I don’t play the political nonsense, I certainly don’t get pushed around and I’m going to dig into the issues when the issues are there. This is something that is serious.”