Reply To: School Board Monitors in Lakewood & East Ramapo

Many people fault the board for not fighting the special ed. parents who want private placement for their child. The reason the board doesn’t is because they don’t think it’s cost effective. Public school special ed cost between $30K – 35K while private placement cost between $60K-$75K. It cost $15K – $30K to fight the parent and if the board loses it must pay the parent’s legal expense. So in order, to fight private placement, It will cost the board $45K if they win $30K for the public school special ed and $15K. If the board loses it cost $90K $60K for private placement and $15K for both their legal expenses and the parents. Please note that these law suits will have to be fought every year until the student ages out at 22 or the parent gives up.

The Board’s philosophy is to design a public school special ed program that the frum community would want to use. This way you have the saving of the public school special ed without the legal expense. The board has been successful in convincing parent to use the program. The problem is that the public school supporters want the program to be integrated with the rest of the public school which the frum parent don’t want. Which is a change which the parent can appeal to a judge and until the case is resolved they can’t integrate especially since it’s going to be a class action suit for private placement.