Senate advances special ed funding Collins co-sponsors federal measure

WASHINGTON – Full federal funding for special education has leaped over one of several hurdles with an amendment co-sponsored by Sen. Susan Collins winning approval in the U.S. Senate.

The Maine Republican was successful late last week in getting lawmakers to support increasing federal funding for the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, or IDEA, by increments of $2.5 billion per year until the full share of federal funding is reached in fiscal year 2007. The amendment is attached to a bill reauthorizing the Elementary and Secondary Education Act.

When IDEA was launched in 1975, the federal government was committed to reaching a goal of providing states 40 percent of the cost of special education programs, but has continually fallen short of that.

Money for these programs is vital to Maine, which has a higher than average percentage of students enrolled in special education. Maine has 35,140 enrollees in kindergarten through grade 12, which represents 16 percent of the student population. The national average is 12 percent. The Bangor School Department counted 540 students in special education out of a total of 4,475 students, or 12 percent of the student population, as of last December.

“I think any additional dollars that can be used to support what I think is a growing demand for serving more severely handicapped kids would be to our benefit,” John Kierstead, coordinator of federal programs for Maine’s Office of Special Education, said Tuesday. “We haven’t seen a decline in the [special education] population even though general student enrollment has declined.”

Each student in special education has an estimated $10,000 price tag, according to state officials. Despite the federal government’s promise to provide 40 percent of that funding, states have seen only 10 to 14 percent. Maine gets about $32 million for special education, but the full 40 percent would allocate an additional $57 million.

Because IDEA is a federal mandate, school districts are forced to shell out special education money from their annual budgets regardless of federal funding shortfalls. Maine’s expenses for special education have increased about 9 percent a year, while regular education costs have gone up about 5 percent per year, Kierstead said.

“Fundamentally the issue of federal funding at 40 percent will relieve a lot of pressure in the decision-making process for districts doing these programs in good faith,” Dr. Murray Shulman, director of pupil services for the Bangor School Department, said Tuesday. “Full funding should reduce budgetary tension between regular education and special education.”

Federal officials are confident that some form of Collins’ amendment to increase funding for IDEA will stay intact in both the Senate and House.

“IDEA has got a good shot because of the nature of it,” said Randall Moody, a lobbyist with the National Education Association. “And the fact that there’s some Republicans regularly talking to the White House is a good sign.”

However the true test will be when lawmakers start the process of actually doling out money to each of the federal agencies later this summer. IDEA has never received full funding during the appropriations process and Democrats are wary that the money will not be there this year if President Bush’s tax-cut plan gets passed.

“Remember these appropriations bills are done on an annual basis,” said U.S. Rep. Tom Allen, D-Portland, who has been working on full funding for special education in the House. “There’s no vote they can take today that can assure full funding of special education in 2007.”

But congressional aides said there’s growing momentum in both parties to increase funding for special education in the House and Senate. However, the fate of IDEA funding likely won’t be clear until the House deals with the issue later this summer.

Collins also garnered support for an amendment she worked on with Sen. Christopher Dodd, D-Conn., that would authorize the federal government to fund Title I at nearly $300 billion over the next 10 years. Maine potentially could see $1.2 billion of that amount.

Title I provides funds to schools with high populations of disadvantaged children of low-income families. Some of Maine’s education officials blame Maine’s higher than average number of students in special education on the 1990 U.S. Census which redistributed Title I funds. Because Southwestern and Western states counted a higher percentage of low-income areas, Maine lost a significant portion of their share.

“Here are these Title I students that don’t have the funding and are not getting the help they need,” said Idella Harter, president of the Maine Education Association. “When you don’t do early intervention, you wind up with more students that qualify for special education.”

The authorization for Title I expired last year, but the Collins-Dodd amendment would authorize $15 billion each year beginning in fiscal year 2002 and increase it to $44 billion each year starting in fiscal year 2011.

“Just as we are challenging schools, parents, teachers, administrators and students all over this great nation to increase their standards, to set high standards for our children, to hold schools accountable for improving student achievement, shouldn’t we challenge ourselves to meet the goal of fully funding Title I?” Collins said.