Problems challenge autism plan

By John Higgins

Akron Beacon Journal

For almost seven years, the state has allowed parents to withdraw their autistic children from public schools and buy private services with taxpayer money.

The legislation that created the Autistic Scholarship Program in 2003 was deliberately written with minimal financial or academic oversight.

Lawmakers wanted to give parents frustrated with public schools the money with few strings attached.

The program swelled almost 500 percent from 300 children in the 2004-05 school year to 1,672 during the last school year.

But since spring 2009, when the Ohio Department of Education started taking formal complaints from parents — who receive up to $20,000 a year — investigators have found problems with three of the providers on the state-approved list.

The first two reports were filed late last year, one about an Akron private school and one about a consulting service in northwestern Ohio.

In those cases, investigators exposed poor record keeping, overbilling, billing for services not delivered, billing for services not required and billing for services provided by unqualified, uncertified staff.

In the Northwest Ohio case, the state found a high school graduate with no qualifications was tutoring an autistic child in math.

The shortcomings shouldn’t surprise anyone.

The state has been warned for years by its own school districts as well as reports from a major newspaper, a public-policy think tank and the Legislature’s own research arm that the private providers need more scrutiny.

But the payments — $86 million to date — have flowed out of Columbus with few questions asked about whether the children and the taxpayers are getting their money’s worth.

Children with autistic disorder, the most severe diagnosis, usually have significant language delays, social and communication challenges and unusual behavior and interests.

Many people with autistic disorder also have intellectual disability, according to definitions provided by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Milder forms, such as Asperger’s syndrome and pervasive developmental disorders, are less severe and may be limited to problems with communication and social interaction.

Ohio doesn’t require insurance companies to pay for autism treatment, which can cost tens of thousands of dollars a year.

Under federal special-education law, parents can sue school districts for those services. That can involve a long and expensive legal fight. Some districts have agreed to pay, but it’s not guaranteed.

In 2003, former Rep. Jon M. Peterson, R-Delaware, a parent of an autistic daughter, championed the creation of the Ohio Autism Scholarship program to avoid the lawyers and put money directly into parents’ hands.

It was one of the first special-education voucher experiments in the nation, modeled after the McKay Scholarship program in Florida, which covers all special-education disabilities.

If parents waive their right to sue districts and withdraw their children, they can take a scholarship and buy their own services.

The state has a list of about 230 approved providers, which vary greatly in expertise. Some are schools, while others are therapists who provide a specific service, which means the parents must either home-school or pay private school tuition, too.

Some providers are well-known autism specialists connected with reputable institutions, such as the Rich Center for Autism at Youngstown State University and the Cleveland Clinic’s Lerner School for Autism.

Others may have met only the minimum requirements and offer no particular expertise in teaching autistic children.

Matters Ohio, an independent study group in Cleveland, also noted problems.

“The state provides minimal oversight of services,” Policy Matters reported.

The report contrasted the Rich Center, “recognized for its autism expertise” because of its comprehensive services and educator training, with Emmanuel Christian Academy, the Akron provider recently investigated by the state.

Policy Matters noted that both institutions charged the same $20,000 tuition, even though Emmanuel Christian Academy charged about $4,000 a year for students who are not disabled and make up the majority of the religious school’s enrollment.

Public school districts have been complaining to the Ohio Department of Education that the autism providers routinely fail to report back to the local district on each child’s progress.

The providers — private enterprises — are required to submit quarterly progress reports to parents and the child’s home school district. The districts are still responsible for updating each child’s Individualized Educational Program each year.

The individual program should include specific, measurable educational goals and is the key document parents need to hold educators accountable.

Yet, state law holds the Akron district accountable for monitoring the students’ individual plans, Assistant Superintendent Ellen McWilliams said.

“You have to be able to monitor progress on those [individual] goals and objectives,” she said. “Otherwise, you really don’t know where to go with the [plan]. You don’t know what’s next in terms of the educational needs of the student.”

McWilliams said that Akron eventually gave up calling the state when previous complaints didn’t resolve the problem.

Cincinnati also has had trouble getting reports, however.

“We struggle in trying to get the quarterly progress reports,” said Markay Winston, director of the Department of Student Services for Cincinnati Public Schools.

“Some of the providers, because we’ve complained to them so much and we’ve complained to ... [the education department] so much, they’re starting to do a better job of getting us the quarterly reports, but it’s still like pulling teeth.”

She, too, has observed the wide range of autism expertise or lack thereof among providers.

The Ohio Department of Education said recently that an additional complaint has been filed against a private religious school in suburban Cincinnati.