Forest Lake schools outline special education services, report 17.7% of students receive support

Forest Lake Area Schools' director of special education presented a districtwide overview of special education services at the Feb. 6 board meeting, reporting that the December 1 child count showed roughly 1,124 students — about 17.67% of the district — receive special education services.

The director said the district supports students from birth through age 22 and described the department's staffing and organization, including two regional coordinators who cover early childhood through sixth grade and seventh grade through the district's STEP program. The director said the district employs evaluation teams and dedicated IEP authors at the high school to reduce classroom teachers' paperwork and to improve compliance with timelines and due-process requirements. "Every student with a disability is general education first," the director said, describing the district's emphasis on providing supports in general-education settings before placing students into more specialized settings.

Nut graf: The presentation laid out how Forest Lake organizes services and staffing to meet federal and state special education requirements while trying to keep students with peers whenever possible. Board members pressed for details about rising counts and how the district handles evaluation and placement decisions.

The director provided additional details about programs and supports. The district uses a tiered approach to placements: most students spend 0–20% of the school day outside general education; smaller groups receive progressively greater shares of specialized instruction. The district operates an 18–22 transition program that attracts students via open enrollment from neighboring districts, and it hosts a Project SEARCH classroom in partnership with Fairview Wyoming Hospital that combines classroom instruction with on-site rotations and internships aimed at competitive employment.

The director described a workload committee and a district evaluation team that conducts initial and triennial evaluations so classroom teachers can prioritize instruction. The district also created IEP authors at the high school so campus special educators can focus on instruction rather than paperwork.

Board members asked about trends. The director said the district's special-education percentage has risen over the past decade — from about 12% when she began as director to roughly 17.67% now — and said that rise mirrors state and national patterns. The director also noted changes in federal and state guidance that could affect identification criteria for specific learning disabilities in coming years.

Board members and the director discussed how the district uses CEIS (coordinated early intervening services) funding. The director said the district reallocates up to 15% of federal special-education dollars to general education interventions — for example, behavior-intervention specialists — to address concerns before pursuing special-education evaluation. "If interventions don't work after a 6–8–12 week period, that would be a time that we would consider, do we need to do a special-ed eval," the director said.

Members of the board acknowledged the complexity of compliance and the value of centralized evaluation work. Several board members thanked the director for establishing evaluation teams and IEP authors, calling those changes useful for maintaining instruction time and improving compliance.

Ending: The board did not take action on the presentation; the director invited board members to request more detailed child-count and trend data and offered to share historical spreadsheets on request.