Lee's Summit Tribune Article

Lee's Summit families start autism support group

Group bonds together in time of funding shortfall for special education

By Chase Jordan
Tribune Staff


Sherri Tucker and her family moved to Lee's Summit because she believed her son would receive the best education here.

Jacob was diagnosed with autism 11 years ago. He is now 14 years old.

"I chose where we moved in Kansas City, solely on my son. I didn't care about location. I wanted to live where Jacob had the best opportunity," Tucker said. "We moved here when he was in kindergarten."

The family is not pleased with the R-7 School District.

"We can be living in Raytown or Independence and pay less tax and pay less for the water bill and still not get any worse of an education," Tucker said.

In November 1006, Tucker and Debra Shaumeyer created the Lee's Summit Autism Support Group. Shaumeyer is the mother of a 5-year-old autistic son.

"What we want to do is get the school district to work with us to give the best education they can. In the sate of Missouri that's not an easy thing to do," Tucker said. "Most of the time we talk about what goes on in the school district."

Tucker described Individualized Education Plan meetings, which are attended by seven to 15 school officials.

"So you sit there and these people tell you that your child is never going to be normal, which is a very hard thing to handle," Tucker said. "You assume that these people are giving you all the right information and you believe them and you sign on the dotted line. What you never find out is that those people are never going to give you what you need until you're smart enough to know what you need and you fight for it."

Tucker said Missouri is 48th in the country for special education funding.

"In the state of Missouri, when your kid gets diagnosed with autism, the doctor ways go forth, you're done, and you're on your own," she said. "We're working on legislative issues and trying to work with the school district."

Senator Matt Bartle, of Lee's Summit, said Missourians are not interested in raising taxes. He said Missourians rejected the last seven ballot proposals to raise taxes. (I've read that there is a surplus. This issue has nothing to do with raising taxes)

"We're ranked 48 or 49 in a lot of things," Bartle said. "We're a low spending state because we're a low taxing state." Bartle said autism is a problem that Missouri is going to have to deal with.

"Autism is a growing problem in Missouri and in the United States, and it's putting a strain on social services and the school system," he said. "We have to figure out what's causing autism. It's a major cost drainer in Medicaid and the education budget."

According to the Lee's Summit group, there are more than 210 students diagnosed with autism in the district. They believe that the teachers in the district should be trained in autism.

"A lot of these kids with autism are in special education, so their teacher would be trained in autism," Tucker said. "But my son is not in special ed, he's in regular ed. So he has seven teachers everyday that don't have a clue and they're going to educate my son."

Tucker said there have been times when her son became sick or had "meltdowns" because of the different expectations of teachers.

Jerry Keimig, R-7 director of special services, said that it is not possible to train every teacher in the district.

"We provide the most comprehensive autism training than any other school district that I'm aware of," Keimig said. "It's not feasible to train every teacher for every disorder. There are 50 to 60 different medical or emotional diagnoses."

The district hosted a four-day workshop in June.

"We try to make autism a priority. I don't know any other disability that we do four-day workshops on," Keimig said.

Stacey Martin, autism specialist, said about 75 people participated in the workshop. (I would say that at least half of those were not employees of the district. Five or six were members of our group)

"We try to target those teachers who have not had training before. We do our very best to make sure they have the training they need to meet the needs of students," Martin said. "We are always looking for new things to learn about autism. We're always eager to help these kids."

Superintendent Dr. David McGehee said it would be difficult to make every teacher an expert, but believes they should have some basic knowledge of autism if they are teaching a diagnosed child.

"There are opportunities for the teachers to be trained," McGehee said. "You can't deal with all students the same because they have different needs. It's a challenge in today's education system."

McGehee said the support group does a good job dealing with autism.
"I appreciate Mrs. Tucker's approach in the group. I don't look at them as antagonist or anything because we need to find a common ground," McGehee said. "Sometimes people perceive it as a fight. I perceive it as continuing dialog."

Tucker said she wants to work with the school district to improve in this area. "I don't want to be negative, but I want to let people know there're other people with the same issues," Tucker said. "I want people to know that we need to progress in this area."

LSR-7 AMONG 166 MISSOURI DISTRICTS RECEIVING CONFUSING DESIGNATION BASED ON NCLB

The Lee's Summit R-7 School District is among 166 Missouri districts being designated as "District Improvement Level 1," based on requirements of the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) of 2001. Although the goals of No Child Left Behind to ensure success for each child and to provide for school district accountability are worthwhile, the law has several flaws, especially in its accountability mechanism.

Like a number of the school districts receiving this designation, the R-7 School District has earned the state's coveted Distinction In Performance Award all six years it has been offered. In fact, the district is one of a handful of Missouri districts to earn this honor all six years with a perfect score each year. This year again, R-7 students scored above the state average in all areas on the 2007 Missouri Assessment Program (MAP) tests.

The R-7 School District's designation as "District Improvement Level 1" was based on the scores of a very small number of students in two small sub-groups – special-education and English language learners (students who speak English as a second language) in the area of communication arts. These special-needs sub-groups are required to meet the same high standards on the Missouri Assessment Program communication-arts tests with no exam modifications that would take the students' disabilities or special language challenges into account. A misleading aspect of this legislation is that only districts with a large enough sub-group population can be identified, thus holding harmless smaller districts with similar or lower levels of achievement.

While the intent of No Child Left Behind is admirable, this particular component does not pass the "common sense" standard when the test scores of a small number of students – less than 2 percent for Lee's Summit R-7 – cause a successful school district to be placed in this category. Fortunately, the United States Congress plans to consider revisions to No Child Left Behind this fall, and it is possible that this aspect of the law may change. In the meantime, R-7 School District staff will continue to work tirelessly to meet the needs of each child.

To read a letter with additional information about this federal requirement from Dr. David McGehee, Lee's Summit R-7 School District superintendent, please visit the following web address: http://www.leesummit.k12.mo.us/pdf/parentinfo/ParentNotificationAug07.pdf.