Months after the state found widespread problems with Worthington schools' treatment of disabled students, parents say the district is still failing its most vulnerable children.

 

Worthington officials consider the issues "procedural in nature and say the schools continue to work hard to improve. The district has held training sessions, following the state's order. The Ohio Department of Education imposed sanctions in March after its investigators found repeated violations of state and federal laws.

School districts are required to find the best ways to help disabled students learn; individual plans with specific goals for their education are to be written each year. The state found that, in Worthington, those plans often either aren't followed or aren't well-written in the first place.

"You have a few situations where things weren't handled as they should be. That doesn't mean the program is bad. Do we need to improve? Absolutely," said Shirley Hamilton, who now oversees special education in the district.

The special-education director in charge during the state audit kept her title but has a reduced role.

Some parents say the problems persist.

"Their hearts are in the right place, and they want to help these children, but they don't know how," said parent Brenda Louisin, who also works as a special-education advocate. "We really want to partner with our district."

More official special-education complaints have come from parents in Worthington than from Columbus in the past three school years. Columbus is the state's largest school district, with about 51,000 students. Worthington has about 9,400.

Since 2006, Worthington parents have made 19 complaints to the state Education Department. Last school year, the department investigated 13. More than 12 percent of Worthington students are considered disabled.

As the state investigated complaints, it also found that problems with education plans were not isolated.

Some disabled students had the same goals in their plans year after year, long after they had met the goals. Teachers made no official plans for them to keep learning. For some students, teachers set goals, but there was no way to measure students' progress.

Frustrated parents formed a group. Some go to extreme measures to track their children's progress because they think the district does not.

For example, Gretchen Adams, whose 10-year-old son has Asperger's syndrome, photocopies every homework assignment so she can see where he struggles. She passes her findings along to the teacher.

"Children, including ours, with disabilities are not receiving the support they need," she said.

Adams and other parents in the group have offered to help pursue grants to fund training and bring in experts.

Before the state investigation, the district recognized its struggles in teaching reading to special-needs students. Last fall, Worthington commissioned a $10,000 study from a team at Bowling Green State University.

"We know we are not being successful with every student, and we know that is not acceptable," district spokeswoman Vicki Gnezda said.

While researchers said the district had a "positive classroom atmosphere" and that teachers were aware of and attentive to students' special needs, they also found that few special-education teachers understood the district's method of teaching reading. Some borrowed or bought other materials.

The Bowling Green researchers, who focused on students with mild to moderate disabilities, said that these children often spent "support time" doing worksheets or reading silently instead of interacting with a teacher. In high school, students were placed in a study hall-like setting.

The district is training teachers in the reading method now.

"There is an urgency and an immediacy and (teachers) know it," Hamilton said.