Columnist Bill O’Hanlon: Special education auditors overstepped their bounds

Saturday, Feb. 8, 1997 | 11:59 a.m.

DEALING with special education issues results, more often than not, in no-win situations. The federal government mandates extensive programs and services for these kids, but fails to provide funding. Local school districts are then forced to try to balance mandates of special populations with the needs of regular and gifted children.

The Clark County School District continues to take a lot of heat over the special education audit. But there is a lot more going on than meets the eye.

The school district, like any other employer, is not allowed to discuss or disclose personnel matters. The audit alleges conduct that would result in disciplinary action. Whether you agree or not, the district correctly requested those names be separated from the audit report and be placed in a separate report.

The district has bungled this whole audit process from the very beginning. The idea behind the independent audit was to determine if the district was providing appropriate services to this population. To say there is controversy over philosophies in special education would be an understatement. There are legitimate disagreements without solutions that will make everyone pleased.

These auditors were known to be "inclusionists." That is, they lean heavily toward mainstreaming all special education students into the regular classroom. This philosophy alone causes major dissension in the special education community as well as in regular classrooms.

While hiring a person who was clearly not impartial was bad enough on the district's part, the auditors' actions were less than professional.

The charge of the auditors was to conduct a special education audit, report their findings to the School Board and make recommendations for the board to act on. It's the board members' obligation and responsibility to determine which, if any, of their recommendations would be implemented.

What happened? These guys went out to the schools and immediately began making recommendations to administrators and teachers based on their own philosophical tendencies. In other words, they were taking the elected School Board out of the equation. That was a breach of their professional conduct. When school personnel correctly resisted their little edicts, the auditors were incensed. They began making claims that district personnel were interfering with and resisting in the audit process. These auditors actually physically separated school personnel by special education philosophy, then made derogatory statements about the other group. How did they justify that? They wanted to establish dialogue.

Had they been more objective, rather than zealously attempting to impose their own special education philosophy, this audit would have resulted in an improved educational environment for these kids.

They should not have been making recommendations to staff in the first place; that is the responsibility of the board.

You might also remember these people coming before the School Board with their report last year. Horse manure might be the best way to describe the quality of their work. To say it was opinionated, misleading and not thorough would be an understatement. Indicative of this is their failing to meet with the Nevada Department of Education, which had just completed a compliance report.

Adding insult, parts of the audit report contained exactly the same material (findings) as reports submitted in other states where their work was also met with resistance. That could also be seen locally in a 1994 report submitted by one of the auditors.

It appears they make many of the same findings wherever they go. That's interesting in and of itself. But even more telling was that when they were asked to provide backup and documentation for their findings, they indicated at a public meeting of the School Board that it would cost the district an additional $30,000 to put that together. Hello! How can they have presented findings in the first place if they had not already put that documentation together?

The district was effectively blackmailed into paying the additional fee. Otherwise it would look like a cover-up.

Because the district has to act responsibly and not discuss personnel issues, it was effectively muzzled in commenting about alleged abuses by personnel in special education. Knowing that some of these alleged abuses were accommodations that parents requested and the district agreed to might make one wonder about the motives of these auditors.

So what do we have? A couple of auditors who did not do as contracted. Auditors who immediately began making recommendations to staff without having the authority to do so. Auditors whose report was biased, opinionated and undocumented. Auditors whose report was not based on fact, whose report was essentially copied from other reports they have done in different parts of the nation. Auditors who were not thorough and did not provide backup for their findings. Auditors who were essentially trying to force the district to adopt their controversial philosophy, and auditors who were able to make an additional $30,000 to supply backup that should have been provided in the original report.

While the auditors have done nothing to improve the services rendered to special education students, they have made headlines for themselves and walked away with more than $100,000 in fees. Money that would have been much better spent on actual services to children.