Mom's Complaints stand up to probe
Mom's Warning pass the test
Complaints trouble state autism fund
Although there were many factual points in the stories, I found it to be very shallow, one-sided and slanted.
- Why didn't the reporter help people really understand what Autism is?
- Where were the interviews of the successful and compliant centers to balance the story of the few abuses?
- Why were only the school districts and individuals who had issues with the program interviewed and quoted?
- Why not seek out the many successful and compliant centers and showcase them?
- Why not try to understand why there are reporting and compliance issues?
- Why are school districts so opposed to the scholarship?
Autism?
There are many misconceptions about Autism Spectrum Disorder (Autism), the greatest of which is that it is a disease. Autism is not a disease. I'm not really even a fan of calling it a disorder. Spend a little time with children and adults with Autism and they will rock your world. They see and understand the world in ways that the "typical" learner completely misses. They hear sounds, they see colors, they understand dimensions, numbers, words, and shapes in ways that you and I cannot comprehend. These people just need some help relating to our world and, quite frankly, we need some help relating to theirs. Due to the movie "Rain Man", most people think that's Autism, but that is the most severe. You would be hard-pressed to pick out someone with PDD-NOS, Asperger's or Autism in a crowd. I highly recommend Temple Grandin's HBO movie or one of her books if you really want to understand more.
Ohio Autism Scholarship Program (ASP)
As the article pointed out, seven years ago, the ASP was created to give parents a choice when their child has a diagnosis of PDD-NOS, Asperger's Syndrome, or Autism. To qualify for the scholarship, the child, ages 6-21, must have one of these diagnoses and have an IEP (Individualized Education Program). They remain enrolled in their school district of residence, but must receive all of their educational and therapeutic needs from private providers. The ASP will only pay for services that are associated with goals stated on the child's IEP and it is the responsibility of the school district to evaluate the child's progress and update the IEP at least annually. If the child complete's the goals, the IEP can be reviewed and updated more often. It is the responsibility of the private provider(s) to provide data to the parents and school districts on a quarterly basis. In addition, we, at SUPER, provide report cards to the parents. The Ohio Department of Education (ODE) also receives a statement on a quarterly basis. The total scholarship available is $20,000 per year. The year runs from July to June and the first quarter disbursement may not exceed $4,000. The remaining quarters may not exceed $7000, Just like a college scholarship, the ASP is not necessarily going to cover all of the services a child needs and anything above the scholarship amount is the responsibility of the parent.
A lot of money?
You may think that $20,000 is a lot of money, but the reality is that it is about half of what most school districts receive for the same child. According to our research, and this is a closely guarded number for obvious reasons, school districts in Ohio average $39,000 for each special needs child. Does it now make sense why school districts have been against private providers? When a parent elects the ASP, the funds that the school would have received are re-directed to the ASP. However, the school district still receives some amount of funds (I haven't been able to determine the amount), to track the child and maintain the IEP, but it is considerably less than they would have received had the child stayed in their classroom. On the other hand, they have freed up resources for other children.
So Private Providers are required to provide services up to 120 days without pay, must report quarterly to the parent, ODE and the school district for half the money the school district would have received. By the way, each school district has different reporting requirements so the private provider is accommodating each different school district. In our case, we currently have children from 16 different school districts.
Who are we?
We have a daughter with a developmental delay due to a birth trauma. The cord was around her neck and it restricted oxygen to her brain during birth. Subsequently, she also had severe acid reflux which caused her to stop breathing for periods of time. Through the grace of God, she lived and we moved on, but as she became school age, we found she had trouble reading, writing and learning. This baffled us because verbally she was and still is quite a talker. So ten years ago, my wife and I started a little tutoring center called S.U.P.E.R Learning Center to allow my wife to home-school her and provide a little extra income.
However, as we began to learn what drummer our daughter marched to the beat of, we began to research and learn a lot about the brain and also about autism since many of her learning issues parallel autism. Six years ago, we took on our first student with Autism and saw that what we had learned could truly benefit the autistic learner.
What do we do?
Today we have nearly 40 students with IEPs, many also receive the scholarship. We employ or contract with certified teachers, intervention specialists, doctors, therapists and physical specialists. We maintain no greater than a 9:1 student-staff ratio with a target of 5:1. We have a 16 classroom school building on five acres with a playground, ball field and gym. Our philosophy of education includes integrating physical exercise, technology and hands-on learning. We create an environment that challenges them, but let's them succeed. We support the parents of our children and help them to cope with the challenges of have such a unique family member. We teach our children that they were born on purpose, for a purpose and we are here to help them find that purpose.
We regularly invite superintendents, intervention specialists, doctors, therapists and other specialists to meet with us and tour our facility. I have to admit, unfortunately, very few have taken us up on our offers.
We also do our best to accommodate the requests of the parent, the school district and the State.
Finally, we welcome traditional learners and siblings of scholarship recipients by providing a small, private school environment for them as well. We invite you to learn about the good that the ASP is doing and learn more about SUPER Learning Center.
