Public Advocate Sues City over Special Education

Photo: Stephanie Snyder for Chalkbeat

The public advocate is suing the city over what’s happening in special education for NYC students.  The problems, according to the advocate, are both that too many students aren’t getting the services that are written into their I.E.P.s (Individualized Education Plans) and that the city is failing to collect Federal Medicaid money that is owed for a variety of services rendered to these children.

What’s at the center of this controversy is a fancy new system that cost $130 million and supposedly hasn’t worked well since it first appeared in 2011.  The system’s inadequacy, the law suit alleges, has cost the city $356 million to date.

The UFT actually passed a resolution opposing the implementation of the system back in 2011. Read more about it here: http://www.uft.org/union-resolutions/resolution-special-education-student-information-system-sesis-and-new-individualiz

The system was designed by a company called Maximus who apparently simply modified an existing system and had a strong inside contact in the Bloomberg administration. More on that here: http://ny.chalkbeat.org/2011/11/29/report-links-sesis-struggles-and-does-contracting-practices/#.VrfaFbIrK00

This is, no duh, a lot of money. This is a lot of money wasted.

Here’s the link to the article in the always excellent Chalkbeat, about the lawsuit.   http://ny.chalkbeat.org/2016/02/01/james-sues-city-for-not-properly-tracking-services-for-students-with-disabilities/#.VrDgQbIrK01

Jared Gellert is the Executive Director for CITE. 

CITE is the Center for Integrated Training and Education . For over 25 years, CITE has and continues to train TEACHERS (Early Childhood, Professional Certification, Special Ed, Grad Courses, DASA); COUNSELORS (School, Mental Health Masters, Advanced Certificate); and ADMINISTRATORS (SBL, SDL, Public Admin, Doctorate) in all five boroughs of NYC, Yonkers, and Long Island.

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