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As Special Education teachers, paraprofessionals, and related service providers, we recognize that many families of children with disabilities are eager for the return to school buildings, and we want nothing more than to serve our students in the classroom. But we fear that the Department of Education’s hybrid learning model will not only fail to meet the needs of Special Education students; it will inflict greater harm on them and their families. All too often, students with disabilities remain an afterthought in education, and unfortunately, de Blasio and Carranza have again neglected these students in their reopening plan. Below, we outline several issues unique to the needs of our Special Education students, families, and staff. Although the DOE has delayed school opening for students until September 21st, this ten-day delay does nothing to address the needs of students with disabilities, and schools remain unsafe for students with disabilities.
Busing
We are concerned about the ability of the DOE to get special education students to and from school safely. The current reopening plan states that all students with mandated busing on their IEP will continue to receive those services, but does not detail how to make busing accessible and safe for all. Firstly, bus drivers and matrons will not screen passengers or take temperature checks prior to students boarding the bus, meaning that a student could travel all the way to school before being placed in isolation. This process places undue stress on the parent who has to travel to school to pick them up, and undue risk to the other students and adults riding the bus. In addition, windows will be open on busses at all times to increase air circulation, violating the IEPs of numerous students with serious medical conditions who require air conditioning and/or heating on the bus. Finally, the current plan provides no accessibility for students who cannot wear a face covering due to the nature of their disability: these are students with the highest level of need, who may not be able to use public transportation or travel independently.
Health & Safety
Social distancing requirements will pose significant challenges for many students with disabilities. Current guidelines state that each person in a classroom should have 65 square feet of space, and should be spaced at least 6 feet from each other. If a student moves from their designated area, it is impossible to maintain the appropriate six feet of distance unless all other staff and students shift. Special Education students may have an exceptionally difficult time staying within this small designated area due to the nature of their disabilities.
According to the Department of Education plan that was submitted to the New York State Department of Health on July 31, 2020, it is recommended but not required that students wear masks within schools. The plan states that a student does not have to wear a face mask if it is not “developmentally appropriate.” The plan does not define what developmentally appropriate means and states that it will be determined on a case by case basis, but it seems likely that students with cognitive disabilities will be exempt from the mask rule.
Social-Emotional Concerns
For so many of New York’s students with disabilities, a hybrid model will pose particular obstacles to providing a trauma-responsive environment and is likely to create further trauma for students. Students with disabilities need and deserve individual supports to receive an equitable education, and many of these supports will be impossible to provide while maintaining safety regulations. For example, students with receptive and expressive communication deficits will face major hurdles in a classroom where all parties are masked.
The DOE’s programming guidance suggests that students will receive uninterrupted instruction in a single classroom from 8:30-1:59, including during lunch. It is deeply inequitable to expect students with disabilities — many of whom receive IEP-mandated breaks during testing — to remain in a small area within one classroom for the entire day. Students with disabilities already face a higher rate of discipline than general education students, and social distancing and mask requirements will exacerbate this inequity. In addition, we are concerned that paraprofessionals, who are invaluable in providing social-emotional support for students with disabilities, may be unavailable to students due to social distancing guidelines or repurposed for temperature-taking, hallway-monitoring, and other non-instructional duties.
Instructional Concerns
We know that remote learning is inferior to traditional face-to-face learning for students with disabilities, but we believe it will be more effective than the DOE’s blended learning model. Many of the research-driven best practices we learned as special educators will be impossible or prohibitively difficult to implement in a hybrid model. Social distancing regulations will prevent teachers and paraprofessionals from providing one-on-one or small group instruction and from utilizing management techniques including proximity and touch. Students’ ability to collaborate and communicate with peers will be curtailed by masks and social distancing. For those working in District 75, hand-over-hand support and direction will be impossible under current safety guidelines; tools for hands-on learning (like picture schedules, manipulatives, sensory items, and picture communication boards) will be difficult to use because of deep-cleaning requirements and restrictions on students sharing materials. And finally, classroom routines for students who require structure will be upended by changing schedules and unpredictable classroom and school shutdowns.
Related Services
Within a week of schools closing due to the novel coronavirus, occupational therapists, physical therapists, and speech providers began providing synchronous live therapy sessions to their students. For the health and safety of students, their families, and related service providers, services should continue to be delivered remotely until it is safe to return to school. A safe return includes adequate PPE and cleaning supplies, physical space for therapy sessions, therapeutic supplies for sessions, less travel for itinerant therapists, and reduced session requirements for cleaning and communicating with parents and co-workers. Both push-in and pull-out models currently pose unacceptable risks of exposure due to therapists working with multiple students in multiple classrooms, and often multiple buildings within the same day. Please see Related Service Provider Statement.
Class Grouping
In the DOE reopening plan, there was no guidance given to principals on how to maintain and effectively operate ICT, SETSS, and 12:1+1/15:1 classrooms in community schools. The legal ratio of 40% students with IEPs in an ICT setting may be ignored in favor of creating a more standardized schedule for the school, pushing students into self-contained special education settings, or general education classrooms without a teacher trained to meet their needs. There is no guidance on how SETSS can be administered safely in the hybrid model: if in person, both push-in and pull-out instruction will increase contact between staff and different groups of students, heightening transmission risk. If SETSS is administered remote-only, students will lack those IEP-mandated services when they are in the school building. Finally, no details have been provided to address the unique needs of special classes (12:1+1 or 15:1) in a NYC DOE non-specialized school. We have major concerns about the ability of the DOE and individual schools to provide students’ legally mandated special education services without clear guidance on class grouping and staffing.
Conclusion
We believe the DOE has created a hybrid plan that is logistically impossible, does not adequately protect the safety of students with disabilities, and fails to address our students’ social, emotional, and instructional needs. The current reopening plan does a disservice to special education students and their families, and they deserve better.
Signed,
| Magda Korewa | Special Education Teacher |
| Emma Pelosi | Special education teacher |
| Jessica Smith | teacher, parent |
| Travis Malekpour | Special Education Teacher |
| Lily Lamb-Atkinson | District 75 Special Education Teacher |
| Sam Jaffe | Special Education Teacher |
| Jenna Weinberg | Teacher |
| Naomi Sharlin | Special Education Teacher |
| Judith Loebl | physical therapist |
| Ilan Desai-Geller | General Education Teacher |
| Tiesha Groover | District 75 Parent |
| Philip Gagnon | Special Education Teacher |
| Madi Mornhinweg | Special Education Teacher |
| Jessica Hartman | Occupational therapist |
| Julienne Krause | special education teacher |
| Jillian Fletcher | NYC Public School Teacher |
| Sasha Shlyamberg | Special Education Teacher |
| Liza Trinkle | speech therapist |
| Rebekah McAlister | Teacher |
| Jennifer Finn | Special Education Teacher |
| Tracy LaGrassa | fellow teacher signing in solidarity |
| Jacqueline Caballero | School social worker |
| Matthew Driscoll | Special Education Teacher and Parent |
| Beth Bernett | Paraprofessional |
| Jill Ebeling | special education teacher |
| Sydney Ezratty | Speech Therapist |
| Katie Giberson | Special Education Teacher |
| Maddie McCabe | Special Education Teacher, NYCDOE |
| Courtney England | Special education teacher |
| Melissa Williams | Occupational therapist |
| Aideen Dela Cruz | Physical therapist |
| Ava Wand | Occupational Therapist |
| Liv Dillon | Manhattan Early College School For Advertising |
| Nancy Ohrenstein | Physical Therapist |
| Miriam Greenberg | Occupational therapist |
| Leni Abraham | Physical Therapist |
| Alexandra Gordon | Special education teacher |
| Jessica Haas | Special Education Teacher |
| Jennifer Clavin | Occupational Therapist |
| Stephen Ianiere | Special Education teacher |
| Madelyne Todd | SPED teacher |
| Melissa Carlin | Special education teacher |
| Bridget Apap | Physical Therapist |
| Ashley Tucker | Special education teacher |
| Meghan Ryan | Teacher |
| Alison Loebel | Physical Therapist |
| Osvaldo Claudio Jr. | Special Education Teacher |
| Elaine Linsangan | Physical Therapist |
| Julia, Heymann | D75 Special Education Teacher |
| William Johnson | Special education teacher |
| Linda Tirado | Parent |
| Lisnett Medina | Paraprofessional |
| Jessica Walker | Parent |
| Irma Rucker | Teacher |
| Brienne Tricoche | Parent |
| Meg Jones | Teacher |
| Noah Beigelmacher | Special Education Teacher |
| Philip, Andrews | Special Education Teacher |
| Natalie Patrizio-Tully | Math Teacher |
| Stephanie Nichols | Special Education Teacher |
| Dimary Casillas | Paraprofessional |
| Griselidys Polanco | Paraprofessional |
| Peter Clock | Teacher |
| Arturo Molina | Spanish Teacher; Chapter Leader |
| Rodlyne Gregoire | Occupational Therapist |
| Joyce Harris | Paraprofessional |
| Veronica Plasencia | Bil. School Social Worker |
| Emily Young | Teacher |
| Bill Linville | Teacher |
| Dermott Myrie | Teacher |
| Scott Brower | Classroom Teacher |
| Madi Coyne | Social Studies Teacher |
| Cory Meara-Bainbridge | Student Teacher |
| David M Brent | Special Education Teacher |
| Providence Ryan | teacher |
| Melanie Pflaum | General Ed Teacher and SPED Parent |
| Emma, Corngold | Special Education Teacher, D15 |
| Catherine Stevens | Teacher |
| Clara Bauman | Teacher |
| Karen Bernett | Parent |
| Rodrigo, Schiffino | Special Education Teacher |
| Ejona Bakalli | Special Education Teacher |
| Gail Jaitin | ELA teacher |
| Beth Salzman | occupational therapist |
| Jennifer Dikes | Teacher |
| Andrew Worthington | Teacher |
| Susan McAulay | Special Education Teacher |
| Ariel Bender | Special Education Teacher |
| Shakera Oliver | Parent Connection, Education Consultant |
| Liz Edmund | Special Education Teacher, Parent |
| Dr. Starita Ansari | PRESS, NYC |
| Katie Blouse | Special Education Teacher |
| Stephanie DaRocha | Teacher |
| Jessica Nelson | 8th grade ELA teacher |
| Moskoula Harisiadis | Classroom Teacher |
| Christina Prince | Special Education Teacher |
| John Schmitt | History Teacher |
| Alex Caputo | Math teacher |
| Azeen, Keramati | Social Worker |
| Sine, Bayar | Special Education Teacher |
| Tracy Schaffzin | School Counselor |
| Chris Griffin | Physical Therapist |
| Pearl Ohm | Teacher, parent |
| Lisa Pines | District 75, Special Ed Teacher |
| Reetu Sahni | Teacher |
| Julissa Dilone | New Teacher Induction Coordinator |
| Monica Pasqualino | Public Health Professional |
| Cynthia Vele | Special Education Teacher |
| Belinda Cristobal | PT |
| Lizzie Martin | Parent and Teacher |
| Yamuna Bhaskaran | Teacher and parent |
| Stephanie Rivera | Special Education Teacher |
| Candice Simon | Teacher, Parent |
| Norma D Cullo | Teacher |
| David Choi | Social Studies Teacher |
| Ana Sims | School Secretary |
| John Calero | Special Education Teacher |
| Louis Severson | Teacher. D20 |
| Anais McAllister | Special education teacher |
| Kiegan Munn | Special Education Teacher |
| Lily Wittrock | Special Education Teacher |
| Rebekah Corace | Special Education Teacher |
| Alyssa Glanzer | Special education teacher |
| Heather Maki | Bronx Arena H.S. |
| Jocelyn Benford | Teacher |
| Jen Wang | Special Education Teacher |
| Marsha Salzman | Retired teacher |
| Bryan Mosher | General Education Teacher |
| JD Davids | parent, public health professional |
| Kimberly Hesdra | Special Education Teacher |
| Aaron Venegas | Teacher |
| Dee Anne Anderson | Teacher |
| Teresa Lopez | Special Education Paraprofessional |
| Raka Spoerri | Teacher |
| Rachel Smith | Teacher |
| Lauren Berkovits | Clinical Child Psychologist |
| Cosette Brown | Special Education Teacher |
| Charlotte Vinson | Special Education Teacher |
| Claire Skrivanos | General Ed Math Teacher |
| Abraham Cohen-Garcia | Science Teacher |
| Ruth N Rivera | Special Ed Para |
| Adam Chawansky | Math Teacher |
| Sarah Frank | Special Education Teacher |
| Evan O’Connell | Special Education Teacher |
| Alexander Krenitsky | ENL teacher |
| Ryan Huttick | Special Education Teacher |
| Matt Perloff | Special Education teacher |
| Hannah Fleury | Occupational Therapist |
| petros chalkitis | occupational therapist |
| Julissa Fernandez | Family Assistant |
| Ximena Zambrano | Physical Therapist |
| Fabienne Miot-Ruddy | Physical Therapist |
| Sylvia Diable | Bilingual Speech-Language Therapist |
| Christine Fernandez | Speech-Language Therapist |
| Cynthia Paniagua | teacher |
| Penny Greenfield | Paraprofessional |
| Sabrina Poms | Bilingual Special Education Teacher |
| Valerie | Teacher |
To add your name to this letter please fill out this form: https://forms.gle/gVaSEn7Wpw5pyLQT8
