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New Hanover County Schools details rising costs of special education services
Summary
District officials told the Finance, Capital and Bond Committee that a growing number of students with intensive special education needs is driving contracts and personnel costs; federal IDEA funding covers far less than required.
Julie Varnum, assistant superintendent for student support at New Hanover County Schools, and Jahaina Souza, the district’s Exceptional Children (EC) director, told the Finance, Capital and Bond Committee that the district is serving a large and growing population of students who require intensive, high-cost special education services.
Varnum said the district operates 108 “maximum service” classrooms—self-contained settings where students receive most instruction from special education staff—and that many students in those classrooms require related therapies and specialized equipment. “This school year, we have 15 students across the district that require 1 on 1 nursing services,” Varnum said, adding that those registered nurses are assigned to a single child and cannot serve other students. She gave the district’s cost range for contract 1-to-1 nursing as “$60,000 to $80,000 per student,” and summarized the district-wide cost as “right off the bat, just 1 to 1 nursing is $900,000 a year.”
Varnum described other contract costs: four students require certified nursing assistant (CNA) support at roughly $37,000 per student (about $150,000 total), and the district contracts for specialized hearing supports—language facilitators, educational interpreters and cued speech transliterators—that typically operate on a one-to-one basis. She also described a local contract with the Center for Pediatric Behavior Health, which serves three to four students at a clinic location, and estimated that contract can run “250 to $300,000 a year.”
Varnum said the district increasingly must rely on contracted providers because the applicant pool for certified special education roles is shrinking. “Contract services are significantly more expensive,” she said, noting that some positions—physical therapists, for example—now typically require advanced credentials.
On federal funding, Varnum reviewed the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) funding promise and reality: “When Congress enacted IDEA, Congress determined that 40% of the funds... will be provided by the federal government. The federal government has consistently provided around 15% of the funds required, not 40.” The district’s current receipt of IDEA funds averaged about 13 percent in recent years, committee members said during the discussion.
Committee members and school staff said the scale of these costs helps explain requests for additional local funding and for advocacy to change state and federal funding formulas. The discussion included a brief explanation of how local maintenance-of-effort reports show “on top of” per-pupil funding and why EC per-pupil supplements may appear low when presented as a standalone figure.
The committee did not take action on policy changes at the meeting; members heard the presentation and asked clarifying questions about contract practices, staffing shortages and the district’s efforts to advocate for formula changes.
