Parents tell Stafford MSD board special-education services are delayed, say district asked them to sign NDAs

Beatrice Valdez, speaking during public comment at the Stafford Municipal School District board meeting, said students with disabilities in the district have not been receiving required services and that parents are being treated disrespectfully when they press the district for legally required supports.

Valdez, who identified herself as representing the Stafford Special Education Parent Engagement Committee, said delays and omissions are pervasive and that parents have been asked to sign nondisclosure-style forms. “Out of sight, out of mind,” she said, repeating a phrase she said an administrator once told her. “Speech therapy alone is far behind. Here we are in February and still no speech services.”

Valdez said compensatory services — the make-up time owed to students when required services were missed — have accumulated and that parents are forced to hire advocates or attorneys to secure services she said are legally required. She told trustees the district’s motto of being a “family friendly school district” does not match her experience. “No parent should ever be asked to sign anything like that from any school district,” she said of the form she described as an NDA.

Valdez asked the board to treat special-education families with urgency, to stop asking parents to accept less than what the students are owed and to…