Assistant Superintendent Martha Raymond told the Swampscott School Committee on Thursday that the district’s special‑education services remain compliant with state review standards but face growing cost and funding pressures.

“Federal law requires that we provide a free and appropriate public education in the least restrictive setting,” Raymond said, summarizing the legal framework that guides services. She told the committee the district’s recent tiered‑focus monitoring from the Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education closed with “no corrective actions,” meaning the state found no compliance failures during the review period.

Raymond said the district’s percentage of students identified with disabilities rose after the pandemic and now slightly exceeds the statewide rate. She said that trend reflects multiple factors: pandemic learning loss, increased referrals that are now easing, and more sensitive diagnostic tools. “Our referral process has dropped in half in the last two years,” she said, attributing that improvement to strengthened school‑level problem‑solving and multi‑tiered systems of support (MTSS).

But she warned the committee that several grant streams that previously helped pay for early interventions and multilingual supports are shrinking. Raymond said Title I funding will drop and that Title 3 and Title 4 allocations are also uncertain; she cited an approximate $17,000 annual Title‑3 award that previously funded an ELL tutor and said IDEA federal special‑education funds amount to about $600,000 annually.

Those federal uncertainties come alongside rising program costs. Raymond said collaborative and private‑day tuition increased, with out‑of‑district tuition rising sharply in one recent year and a subsequent 14% collaborative tuition bump that arrived after the district filed its budget. She also flagged volatile transportation costs for out‑of‑district students and pupils in foster care or experiencing homelessness; shared routing and vendor grouping can cause monthly swings in bus invoices.

Raymond described several district responses: expanding MTSS to reduce inappropriate special‑education identifications; consolidating some middle‑school referral and support teams; piloting new in‑district programs such as a middle‑school “Lighthouse” small‑group classroom for students who need more targeted instruction; and using collaborative arrangements with neighboring districts to share specialists and reduce private‑placement costs.

Committee members pressed Raymond on budget implications. The committee’s budget memo, read later in the meeting, referenced planned program consolidations and staff restructuring proposals intended to free up funds for critical services; Raymond acknowledged those conversations but urged that program quality and family communication be preserved.

Raymond recommended continued investments in early interventions and in data systems to monitor progress, and she said the district would continue to present financial details to the finance committee and the public as budgets are refined over the summer.

Ending paragraph: The district’s leaders said they will bring updated budget scenarios to the School Committee and to town fiscal partners this spring and summer as federal and state grant decisions firm up.