Fresh Ideas Urgently Needed To Address Special Education Woes
The mishandling of abuse allegations highlights a worsening problem that threatens the future of our most vulnerable students.
Special education students in Hawaii鈥檚 public schools persevere under challenging circumstances. In addition to the physical, emotional and mental obstacles they might face, they are increasingly taught by educators who are inadequately prepared.
A statewide teacher shortage is most profoundly felt in special education. Earlier this year, the Department of Education had for special education teachers and educational assistants, and that鈥檚 only part of the problem. It doesn鈥檛 account for special education classrooms where emergency hires have been put in place, a practice that allows teachers who are not 鈥渉ighly qualified鈥 in a specific area to work there anyway.
Special education students pay the price 鈥斅爉ost visibly, in academic achievement.
For several years now, Hawaii has been ranked as one of a number of states that 鈥渘eed assistance鈥 in implementing the federal . Over the past decade, the achievement gap between special ed and other students has widened dramatically in Hawaii, more than doubling in mathematics alone.
And in two recent, troubling reports by Civil Beat Investigations Editor John Hill, we learned that academic achievement may not be the only casualty in this environment 鈥斅爏tudent safety and dignity may be at risk, too. Hill detailed the stories of two educational assistants working in separate schools who were fired or banned from school after reporting abuse of special education students by other staff members.
The abuse included allegations of a special education student being forced or coerced to give a staff member massages, iced coffee being poured over another student鈥檚 head聽by a staffer and staff members taunting a student who was banging her head on a door and railing.
In both instances, the education paraprofessionals were provided to the schools through private agencies. When they reported what they witnessed to those companies 鈥斅燼nd in one case, the school where the individual was assigned 鈥斅爐heir whistleblowing ended up costing them their positions. One was fired, the other transferred to a different job, which she left in despair weeks later.
Representatives of both companies and the state Department of Education contend their inquiries into both cases showed nothing like what the educational assistants described ever happened.
It鈥檚 important to recognize that the financial success of those companies depends in part on a good working relationship with the DOE. In one case, the company official who looked into the allegations was the spouse of the on-site supervisor for one of the whistleblowers. At minimum, that should have prompted company officials at Hawaii Behavioral Health to assign a different manager to look into the matter.
The DOE, already woefully behind in hiring highly qualified teachers, has little motivation to open a time- and resource-consuming investigation that might further complicate its challenges in special education.
Student privacy laws prevent the department from discussing such matters in detail, but a DOE spokesperson would not even confirm to Civil Beat that an investigation had taken place in one instance. In the other, DOE correspondence shows it banned the paraprofessional from working in Hawaii schools because he had tried to use his cellphone camera to document the abuse he alleges, in apparent violation of department rules.
Not Enough Qualified Instructors
The truth in the two abuse cases may still be in doubt, but the greater issue is not: The DOE is failing in its efforts to get highly qualified special education teachers into Hawaii classrooms.
Fresh solutions must be put on the table, and that will require innovation from lawmakers, department and school leaders and teachers.
The state needs to provide greater support for special education teacher preparation programs not only at the University of Hawaii, but also at Chaminade University and Brigham Young University Hawaii.
One option to explore is the idea of free or reduced tuition for students who pursue a special education teaching degree in exchange for their commitment to working for a minimum of five years in Hawaii special education classrooms.
Such an approach has been successful in other professions, notably in attracting medical doctors for underserved rural areas.
With programs struggling to attract more students, alleviating costs to attend might make a significant difference for a profession whose wage scale leaves most teachers struggling financially in Hawaii.
The federal TEACH Grant program, at several Hawaii campuses, already provides up to $4,000 in grant funding per year for students who agree to teach in high-need areas after graduation; 244 Hawaii schools qualified in 2015-16 as campuses where TEACH Grant graduates could work within the program鈥檚 service requirement
Special education is considered a high-need area by TEACH Grant, so a state effort that builds on what it provides might achieve greater university program enrollments.
Other ideas and innovation ought to be on the table, too 鈥斅燼s should a greater collective sense of urgency.
