The federal office responsible for overseeing special education took a major hit last month in the mass layoffs at the U.S. Department of Education, leaving questions of how students with disabilities will be affected across the nation.

The Trump administration announced a reduction-in-force in October, which included dozens of staff responsible for ensuring states provide special education services to the country’s 7.5 million children with disabilities, according to NPR.

The staff also was responsible for overseeing about $15 billion in special education funding.

Layoffs in the Department of Education totaled 466, part of a broader slashing of 4,200 federal jobs during the government shutdown, NPR reported.

Fifty years after the passage of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, some educators worry that progress toward inclusion may be taking steps backward.

IDEA ensures children with disabilities receive a free, appropriate public education tailored to their individual needs and mandates schools provide special education in the least-restrictive environment possible; it requires schools to create individualized education plans for each qualifying student.

“I feel like, after 50 years of focusing on the inclusion mindset, we’re just going to go backwards,” said Carrie Ganci-Clodi, director of special education in Kankakee School District 111.

Changing departments

Moving special education oversight to the Department of Health and Human Services has been proposed by President Donald Trump as part of plans to dismantle the Education Department and shift functions to other agencies or to the states.

Ganci-Clodi said this move would be problematic because the Education and HHS departments have different focus areas.

“We [in education] look at what is educationally relevant for a child. That is our standard,” she said. “... It’s just scary to me that now, you’re taking something out of one pod and just arbitrarily putting it into a different area without any time for training.”

Angela Huntington, assistant superintendent for student services in Lockport Township High School District 205, shares the same concern regarding shifting responsibilities to another federal department.

Although it is still unclear how the federal staffing reductions will trickle down to schools, Huntington said the cuts to the Office of Special Education Programs is “a direct attack on the system designed to uphold individuals with disabilities’ educational rights.”

“I’ve been in education for over 30 years, and these are unprecedented times,” Huntington said. “I’ve never seen anything like this where a system as necessary as OSEP is just kind of [taken] out.”

Huntington noted that other federal departments have their own funding struggles, which could mean funding for education takes a hit.

“Especially for programs for adults, my fear is that the co-mingling of funds will lead to a reduction in the funding we vitally need to provide the specialized programs and services,” Huntington said.

Federal funding is relied upon to make sure schools have adequate special education staff, paraprofessionals, supplies and specialized equipment, Huntington said.

Shift from federal to state?

Regarding shifting responsibilities to the states, Ganci-Clodi said that could be a dangerous path that causes education to become a more political issue.

Without federal oversight, the prioritization of education likely would be dependent upon each state leader’s political platform, she said.

“If the states are left to differentiate their priorities, then education could easily have that financial piece pulled,” Ganci-Clodi said.

The Office of Special Education Programs dictates how much funding school districts receive for special education, with the states acting as flow-through agents for the funds.

Federal oversight also is a factor when it comes to equity, Ganci-Clodi said.

“I remember when I was in high school, and I couldn’t even tell you where our special education classrooms were ... because they were in the back of the building,” Ganci-Clodi said. “Now we have our kids integrated – as they should be. There’s that federal oversight through OSEP.”

Huntington said that federal guidance is particularly needed because laws often are written in ways that can have multiple interpretations.

Without the federal oversight, responsibilities likely would shift to the Illinois State Board of Education to provide legal guidance and technical assistance on compliance issues.

“That leads to now we’ve got [50 states] making determinations and providing their own guidance on things,” Huntington said. “It just makes it difficult for those of us who are implementing programs and services.”

Family concerns

Due-process complaints filed by parents when their children’s educational needs are not being met are governed at the state level, but there’s also oversight at the federal level.

“We already have parents that have no idea what the future is going to bring for their children anyway,” Ganci-Clodi said. “Now, if they know that they’re going to be battling a system that potentially is not going to support them at all, it just increases their stress.”

Huntington is likewise concerned about accountability, since federal offices hold school districts accountable to IDEA. She noted that families might feel they need to become more aggressive advocates for their children without the federal support.

“I just worry that there is no kind of place for families to go when there is a disagreement, so to speak, outside of ISBE,” Huntington said.

Randy Fortin, director of special services in Bradley Elementary School District 61, said he has been reassuring parents that their children’s status and services in school haven’t been affected.

There have been no local staffing cuts or changes as a result of the federal situation, he said.

“It’s a challenge,” Fortin said. “Our parents have reached out to us as resources, asking for some guidance and assistance ensuring that their kids are safe and well taken care of here at school.”

‘Doing right by kids’

School leaders say there have not been any major changes to the way they are operating their special education programs, but they continue to monitor what’s happening at the federal level.

“We don’t have control of Washington, D.C., but we do have control of making sure that we’re doing right by our kids,” Ganci-Clodi said. “That’s what we need to focus on right now.”

While unsure how the federal situation will trickle down to the building level, Huntington said her goal remains the same.

“My goal is always to provide supports and services to students in the least-restrictive environment every single time,” Huntington said.

Tim Truesdale, superintendent of Woodland School District 5, said he’s not seen any concrete examples so far of how the cuts in the OSEP will affect students locally.

He said he would be most concerned about possible reductions in special education program funding, but that hasn’t happened.

“So far, knock on wood, it hasn’t created any adverse conditions for us at this school to be able to provide services for our kids,” Truesdale said.

The IDEA legislation remains in effect, so schools have an obligation to continue to meet the needs of students regardless of what is happening at the state and federal levels, he said.

“The fact is, we’re required to perform the services that students’ IEPs say that we’re expected to perform,” Truesdale said. “We’re duty-bound to make sure we provide the services kids need and have the personnel here to do it.”

Fortin also said that, while the federal-level changes affect the district’s future planning for programming, the schools’ immediate focus has remained on serving students.

“My worries at this time are with our individual kiddos and meeting their needs,” Fortin said.

Fortin noted that he’s got his eye on national-level conversations about inclusion in the classroom for special education students.

“It’s one of the things that’s under a microscope right now at the federal level,” Fortin said. “For us, if there were to be a push away from inclusion, we need to be prepared for that.”