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Hillsborough to pilot three fully inclusive elementary schools, district ESE director says
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Summary
Hillsborough County Public Schools plans to pilot three fully inclusive elementary schools next year that will serve neighborhood students regardless of disability; the district says the effort tests sustainability and aims to expand inclusive neighborhood placement and services from birth through age 22.
Hillsborough County Public Schools will pilot three fully inclusive elementary schools next year that will serve neighborhood students "regardless of disability, program, amount of time," Shannon Lesperance, the district's director of exceptional student education, said in the district podcast More to the Story.
Lesperance told host Deborah Bellanti the pilot will concentrate resources at three elementary schools to test whether fully inclusive neighborhood models can be sustained and replicated across the large district. "So we are gonna provide the resources for those 3 schools and see if it can be sustained, there, and how could we replicate that into more schools," she said.
District officials framed the plan as a response to family requests for neighborhood placement. Lesperance said families want children with disabilities to attend their neighborhood schools so siblings can attend the same building and students can participate with neighborhood peers.
The pilot is part of a broader explanation of how the district provides Exceptional Student Education, Florida's term for special education. Lesperance described services that span birth through age 22, saying ESE provides individualized supports to allow students to access a free and appropriate public education at no cost to parents. She noted the district also writes service plans and contracts services for eligible students in nonprofit private schools and charter schools.
Early identification is a key element in the district's approach. Lesperance described coordination with Early Steps for birth–3 interventions, district "child find" teams that evaluate students approaching age 3, and a district-run screening project called Fiddlers that screens 3- to 5-year-olds in the community and funnels referrals for evaluation and services.
Lesperance also outlined how services change by grade level: elementary work focuses on identification and foundational interventions, middle school emphasizes self-advocacy, and high school centers on transition planning for postsecondary life. The district holds twice-yearly transition events (CAP events) with vendors and presentations to help families plan for employment or further education.
On outcomes, Lesperance said the district "exceed[s] the state target for students with disabilities graduating from high school," citing a state target of about 86 percent and saying Hillsborough is "at almost 89 percent" for students with disabilities. She added that "over 70 percent of our students with disabilities leave us either employed, going to postsecondary schools, going to preparation programs, or enrolled in something within 1 year of graduation." Those figures, she said, are reasons the district highlights ESE successes in communications such as its Points of Pride.
Lesperance emphasized a common misconception: "a lot of people believe that ESE is a place and not a service," she said, adding that most students are served in general-education settings for the majority of the day and that the district's goal is to bring services to students where they learn.
Funding for services, she said, comes in part from the state through full-time-equivalent (FTE) counts and a post-IEP "matrix of services" that assigns points to services; more points result in more state funding to support those services.
Lesperance urged parents to partner with schools, to pursue evaluation when they have concerns, and to be their child's advocate. She framed early intervention as easier but maintained it is never too late to support a student. Reflecting on her teaching career, she shared a story about a nonverbal student who unexpectedly spoke, a memory she said shaped her practice of "presuming competence" for all students.
The district did not announce specific school names, timelines beyond "next year," or budget figures for the pilot on the podcast. For additional information on ESE services and district resources, the host directed listeners to hillsboroughschools.org.
The podcast episode featured host Deborah Bellanti and Shannon Lesperance, and it focused on operational details, early-identification programs, funding basics, and outcomes rather than formal board actions or votes. The district characterized the three-school pilot as a trial to test sustainability and replication.
