LORI'S LETTER TO THE LSC

Good Afternoon,

I was reading over the final CPR report and the following findings were concerning:

• The district is operating an unapproved day program (T.E.A.M.S) for middle school students with severe multiple disabilities.  The district has not applied for or received approval from the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education for this day program.  
• The district currently has 18 unlicensed special education teachers and not all Career Vocational Technical Education teachers are appropriately licensed.  
• A site visit by the Office of Career/Vocational/Technical Education safety specialist revealed that not all instructional facilities used for career/vocational technical education meet current occupational standards and that not all instructional equipment used for career/vocational technical education meets current occupational standards.  
• At Lynn English and Tech all “resource classes,” which are instructional groupings of only students with disabilities, in English Language Arts, math and science exceed the required class size of eight students or less per certified special educator.  Also, at Callahan, the developmentally delayed program’s instructional group includes one-to-one aides in its ratio of staff to students, but when these students and their aides leave the classroom for inclusion or related services, the number of students to staff exceeds the required instructional group size.  
• Two elementary schools (Harrington and Ingalls), two middle schools (Breed and Marshall) and three high schools (English, Classical and LVTI) offer programs with SEI classrooms. the district does not provide English as a Second Language (ESL) instruction to most of the students in program schools or to any of the ELLs assigned to non-program schools. Record review also demonstrated that ELL students consistently receive less than the recommended hours of ESL instruction for their proficiency levels.
• Record review of LEP students indicated that translation of documents into families’ native languages is inconsistent.

The district was not fully compliant in other areas as well, but these were of particular concern to me. I do not understand why the district continues to fail to be in full compliance in all areas. Whose responsibility is it to oversee the district and all schools to ensure they are all in full compliance in all areas?  I thought it was the compliance officer's responsibility, but perhaps I am wrong.  According to the report, an action plan was due on September 22.  I certainly hope the district submitted this action plan and that all necessary changes will be made to bring the district and all schools in full compliance in all areas. 

Thank You

Lori D'Amico

GIVEN ALL OF THESE DISCRETIONSAND CITATIONS BEGS THE QUESTION, HOW COULD CHUCK GIVE SO MANU"EXEMPLERARIES" IN HIS EVALUATION UNLESS.....CAMPAIGN CONTRIBUTIONS CLOUDED HIS JUDGEMENT!