Special education enrollment edges up; board OKs third year of Changing Perspectives support

Janet Horowitz, Robla School District director of special services, told the board the district’s current enrollment is 2,008 students and that 351 students (17.4 percent) receive special education services.

Horowitz said the district has seen a substantial increase in students eligible under the category of autism — “a 34 percent increase in students eligible under autism” over the last two years — which she attributed to a mix of better identification practices and cohort effects from the pandemic. She described program distribution (speech and language impairment is the largest primary category, early-childhood cohorts account for a substantial portion of identified students) and explained that inclusion and specialized academic instruction options are expanding so more students can participate meaningfully in general-education settings.

Horowitz highlighted the district’s multi-year partnership with Changing Perspectives, which provides coaching and in-person support and has helped sites build inclusion leadership teams, shared classroom strategies, and individual coaching cycles. She cited an anecdote in which a student who previously attended a nonpublic special education school moved into full inclusion at a Robla site and is now reading at grade level.

Following the presentation, trustees voted to approve a third-year contract with Changing Perspectives to continue inclusion coaching and professional development across sites.

What’s next: staff will implement the contracted coaching work and report progress to the board; trustees asked for future briefings on contract costs and the district’s special-education spending mix.