School board distracted from needs of Special Ed students, parents say

The Special Education Advisory Council was created in 2018 by parents of students with special ed needs, to inform and advise the Sonoma Valley Unified School District. The District welcomed the input; it formally approved the SEAC by-laws, and appointed two teachers to serve on the council. It posted the council’s logo, meeting minutes, and agendas on the District website.

But after months of tension, the relationship reached a breaking point in January of 2022 when the SEAC withdrew its affiliation with the District. 

As a group, the SEAC had become increasingly frustrated with the District’s failure to address identified problems. “It is sad to see that again SVUSD does not value the voices and labor of parents and our special education community as a whole.” 

“Our (special ed identified) children are a protected class,” said Celeste Winders, a co-founder of SEAC. “When they are unable to actually learn and make progress, it is a fundamental violation of their civil rights.” 

Several parents interviewed noted that their special ed children didn’t receive services, and often didn’t have adequate curriculum or support. “The failure of providing services is currently blamed on Covid, but that is not an excuse.”

A complaint that SEAC created a “hostile work environment” was part of the recent trustee discussion. Co-founder of SEAC Mindy Luby responds, “Our community has literally had enough.”  

She explained that special ed parents have endured a revolving door at the District – a Special Education department with four different directors, plus an interim, in the past five years. “Our kids can’t be asked to wait while yet another new Special Ed director gets up to speed. They can’t wait till they’re thirty.”

This is an old issue, she said, that pre-dates Covid. Several parents affirmed that in IEP meetings, which are attended by the Special Ed Director, they literally get told every year by that person whose job is to run the Special Ed program, “I don’t know; I’ll have to find out, let me look into that.”

District trustees are currently in a high-profile fight over a disputed labor contract and an alleged Brown Act violation. To SEAC members, it’s just the latest distraction from what the District should be focused on: improving direly low literacy levels through all grades, and addressing a crisis in the delivery of special education services.

Luby finds it ironic that so much money is going to hiring a consultant to report on the disputed labor contract, since she and other special ed parents have often heard the complaint that their children are so expensive to the District. “Those are our children’s educational dollars being spent on reports and lawyers.”

One important recommendation by SEAC, which was adopted, was for the District to provide a Spanish interpreter as needed to explain Individual Education Plans to parents, and for translation of all documents. 

Still, a Latina interviewed recently who requested anonymity for fear of reprisal, commented that there has been no follow-up from her IEP meetings, and no commitment to helping her child achieve the planned goals. She said it has always fallen to her to advocate, to even bring the teacher’s attention to the needs of her child, who is well-behaved so does not draw attention. She also mentioned the lack of Spanish-speaking speech therapists and counselors.

Emily Raaka is a SEAC parent of a sophomore who left Sonoma Valley High to receive education through a non-public school. “I tried to make it work for my son to be at Sonoma Valley High School,” she said. “At Altimira they made it work. Mr Deitz (then principal) was amazing. My son, who is autistic, was really part of school, even ran for student government. But at SVHS, even though we were participants in every possible way, and I tried to make it work for our son, it didn’t work. His sister, who by the way was the 2020 SVHS Valedictorian, was a student rep to SEAC and brought up the chain-link fence separating Special Ed kids from the rest of the students.” The District said they would remove it, but Raaka said it is still up. 

Raaka said SEAC’s existence was critical for parents to have a forum, a voice, and a support system. She observed that it was always hard for her – a white, college-educated person savvy as to how to navigate the system – to understand IEPs, and to get the support her child needed. 

“Imagine trying to do that if English is your second language, don’t have lots of formal education, if you are undocumented, any number of obstacles to your advocating for what your child needs.”