When it comes to serving students with disabilities, superintendents who are working with other organizations to meet these children’s needs are finding that coordination of services:

• improves student outcomes;
• expands schools’ access to resources;
• increases efficiency, effectiveness and flexibility; and
• by engaging students and families, builds stronger schools and communities.

These "key messages," and one other—urging superintendents to advocate for changes in state and local policy to support coordination of services—were developed at a recent AASA/IDEA Partnerships Forum on "Well Being and School Achievement: Improving Lives Through Coordinated Services."

The forum was co-hosted by the National Association of State Directors of Special Education and AASA. It is part of a continuing initiative to explore how provisions in the 1997 reauthorization of the Individuals With Disabilities Education Act can contribute to existing efforts and expand cooperative arrangements at the federal, state and local levels. These provisions:

• require state-level interagency agreements;
• allow flexible use of 1 percent of the total state IDEA allocation to the building of a coordinated services system; and
• allow flexible use of 5 percent of the total local IDEA allocation to the building of a coordinated service system.

"How do you put together the services children need to learn and grow? My assumption has always been that if you could coordinate services, you could achieve better outcomes for children and save taxpayer money too," said AASA Director of Public Policy Bruce Hunter.

Sounds simple, right?

Not so, says (John) Mick Moore, executive director of the Puget Sound Education Service District in Seattle, Wash. "In my 28 years in education, this was the hardest thing I’ve ever done," says Moore of moving from a communitywide "silo" mentality to a "blended funding model" that is wrapping services around disabled students--reducing costs and litigation in the process. "It took us 22 months to sign an agreement to blend funding," Moore said of the district and its other partners in education, government, health and social services. "But the vision was so strong that nobody wanted to back away from it." Was the pain worth it? Emphatically, yes, says Moore.

One of the beneficiaries of a coordinated system is Criss Fournier, who recounted at the forum an excruciating fight to get help for her daughter, adopted from a Romanian orphanage. The battle cost Fournier $250,000, her home and the support of family and friends, who urged her to give up the fight. In one three-month period, she recalled consulting with 60 professionals. Begging for assistance became a full-time job, she said. She was wary, she admitted, when after threatening to sue the local school district, she was asked to become one of the first participants in the King County Blended Funding Project. Ultimately, she did agree to participate, however, and said it positively changed her life and that of her daughter. For the first time, she said, she felt supported in her role as caregiver of a child with special needs.

"What she got was an integrated approach from mental health and the schools, instead of everyone pointing the finger and saying it’s your problem," explains Joanne Cashman of the National Association of State Directors of Special Education. The project empowers parents like Fournier by placing them on a child and family team, which includes both professionals and non-professionals the parent selects. The team includes one "care manager" responsible to the child and family. Regular and special education funding flows to the team, which develops plans that include a broad range of supports for children beyond mental health care or a school-based Individualized Educational Plan. For example, Fournier’s team helped her reach out to families, friends and neighbors for assistance while providing more formalized supports to allow her daughter access to enrichment opportunities outside of the school day as part of a comprehensive plan to improve her educational and social outcomes.

A 12-month follow-up study of the 25 participants in the first year of the Blended Funding Project found that expenditures decreased by $1,166 per month overall, with the cost of care for 15 of the children, including Fournier’s, decreasing, and the cost of serving others rising.

A more striking testament to the project’s success, Moore said, is a dramatic reduction—from 84 to 48 percent—in the percentage of students who were institutionalized or placed in another setting outside of the community. This doesn’t necessarily mean that the children served "get better," but that families and communities "get better" at caring for the most challenging children, according to the follow-up evaluation.

"There is tremendous value in communities learning how to care for their toughest to care for kids," the report says.

Moore added that school districts cannot underestimate the value of placing parents, educators and others in a position to help children on the same team—with a wide array of options to choose from in building a supportive system. A school district can spend $30,000 to defend itself against a legal claim under IDEA, he said—a cost that might be avoided in a less adversarial system focused on building relationships to help children.