GRAND FORKS, N.D. (KFGO-KNOX) – At Monday’s school board meeting, Grand Forks School District administrators and School Board members discussed how they recognize students who need special education services.
This discussion was not on the meeting agenda, but School Board Vice President Allyse Dunnigan added it through a motion. She says she wanted to address this issue amid a Facebook post from Grand Forks City Council President Dana Sande.
“We don’t want to bring up everything that happens on social media, we’d be a very busy board, but there were a few big claims made about the district and about special ed, one of the claims was that the school decides which students have special needs.” said Dunnigan.
Sande commented on a post by the Grand Forks Public Schools Accountability Project that there being 20 percent of Grand Forks Public Schools students identified as special needs is the most “alarming statistic” he has heard in years. He also said that “the district decides which students have special needs and one can only assume they are inflating the numbers.”
He also wrote that the school district “can’t control their expenses and therefore has the need for additional funds, and thus likely is motivated to have more special needs students. Having your child considered special needs takes pressure off parents from doing their job of helping their kids learn. The special needs easy button is in fact easier than taking the time to help your kids.” Sande’s comments have since been deleted.
Grand Forks Public Schools special education director Elisa Diederich explained the process for how students are considered to have special needs after receiving a referral from either a parent or faculty member.
North Dakota districts do not receive more funding from the state because of the number of special needs students that are in the district. A multiplier of 0.88 is added to every per pupil payment the district gets and Grand Forks Public Schools would receive the same amount of funding regardless of how many students are considered to be special needs students.
Sande ended up apologizing for his comments at Monday’s City Council Committee of the Whole Meeting.
Comments