By Carol Stiffler
At Monday’s regular meeting of the Tahquamenon Area Schools Board of Education, two mothers spoke about the loss of the early special education programming for students younger than kindergarten age.
They were referring to a recent decision made by Superintendent Shawn Tebo and Special Education Director Dan Thornton. Thornton has just a handful – 6 or 7 – of early education students in his special education classroom lately, and after viewing the special education instruction available at the EUPISD Learning Center in Kincheloe, he felt his students deserved the advantages they’d have there.
“I have come here tonight to ask what the plan is for the future,” said one mother with a non-verbal three-year-old son that currently receives special education lessons at TAS. “I am curious what my options will be when my child is kindergarten age. If my child is not appropriate for general education classrooms, is my only option to place him on a bus instead of an hour away? Or do I need to move school districts because I’m not comfortable enough to allow my nonverbal child to be over an hour away from me?”
Nicole McDaniel, another parent with a child in special education, also spoke.
“I was very disappointed to hear that TAS will be closing the early childhood education room in Dan Thornton’s room,” she said. “This decision will result in multiple student referrals to the Learning Center in Kincheloe for this upcoming school year and will affect many TAS students and their families going forward.”
McDaniel questioned the cost, travel time, and feasibility of the adjustment.
Thornton and Tebo met with families of very young special education students on May 28 to discuss the move, which only impacts students younger than kindergarten age at this time. Three families have already decided to opt in to send their young child to the Learning Center, and two more have not yet decided, Tebo said.
Many special education services will continue at TAS.
“Because we still have a big population of cognitively impaired students here,” Tebo said. “So we’re still going to have a program, just not for everybody. Well, they’re cognitively impaired inclusion students. They’re not self-contained in one classroom.“
Tebo estimates just less than one third of TAS students receive special education services of one kind or another – from speech therapy to reading intervention. That will not change, and some special education students not previously integrated into general education classes might join those classrooms if their parents opt to. “We do have non-verbal students in the school that will remain here,” Tebo said. “It’s a decision that has to be made by the IEP [Individualized Education Program] team.”
“This decision wasn’t made lightly,” Tebo said at the meeting. “I visited the Learning Center because we sent a kindergartener over there earlier this year. That is the best option for these students. They have the facility. They have the staffing, which we just don’t have here.
And they have the expertise to teach these children life skills…. I’’m not looking at it as ‘I’m losing these kids.’ I’m looking at it as ‘They’re getting the education they deserve.’”
Thornton visited the ISD’s Learning Center before agreeing to suggest parents send their children there, Tebo said.
“When he went there…he came into my office and said ‘Yes, this is the best thing for these kids,’” she recalled.
The bus ride to Kincheloe would take an hour and 20 minutes without additional stops for pick-ups – a duration that concerned the mothers who spoke on Monday.
Tebo said the district will try to keep children on the bus for as short a ride as possible, even if it means making two trips to and from the Learning Center each day.
“Unfortunately, because we’re in the U.P., it’s a good hour bus ride,” Tebo said.
