Defend Special Education
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join with the community of Oakland to defend our students. They need
fully-staffed, well-funded, high-quality special education programs to advance in school and succeed in life. Three years after the Oakland Unified School District was taken over by the state, meager budgets and district-wide administrative chaos have created a crisis in special education.The promise of intensive services for the students who need them the most -- won out of the Civil Rights Movement -- was a crucial gain for the entire public education system and for equality in this nation. We stand together in defending these programs now. We demand the following changes for the benefit of our students:
1. SMALL CLASS SIZES in both Special Day Classes and Resource Specialist
classrooms. This is key to meeting the needs of the students we serve.
2. FULL STAFFING for every Special Education classroom. Recruitment and
training programs for paraprofessionals (aides) must be expedited and working
conditions and pay improved to fill the many vacancies.
3. LIMIT CASELOADS for psychologists, nurses, other support staff and
teachers. Some nurses are assigned nearly 20 sites! Student services suffer from this overload. Teachers and special education support staff must be hired, and working conditions improved so they can be retained.
4. EQUAL FACILITIES FOR SPECIAL EDUCATION PROGRAMS! No teaching in
illegal settings such as storage rooms, cafeterias, and other noisy
environments.
5. PROVIDE ADEQUATE CURRICULUM MATERIALS as well as supplies, telephones, file cabinets that lock, and functioning computers for IEP documentation.
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