American Samoa call for more special education effort

Transcript

An American Samoa lawmaker says more must be done to ensure children with special education needs get the education they are entitled to.

Parents have long complained about the services their children have received from the territory's special education division.

Leilani Momoisea reports.

An independent review of the division was undertaken last year, finding a division lacking in qualified staff and services needed to teach children with special needs.

A member of the House of Representatives, Larry Sanitoa, says several parents have voiced serious concerns over the years about the quality of service that the special education department is providing.  

LARRY SANITOA: So there's been frustrations from a lot of parents that they are not getting the necessary help as required under the law. There are parents that because they are so frustrated with the system, they have filed complaints with the United States Department of Education.

There are almost 900 children who qualify for special education, ranging from children with speech problems to children with severe disabilities.

Our correspondent Monica Miller says the independent review published last year found some children were unable to attend school because of a lack of services, like wheelchairs, and transportation was not equipped to take them to school.  

MONICA MILLER: There was also a lack of trained personnel to teach the kids and also to take care of their health. Because of what was found in the review, the director of education tried to make some changes. She started to move some of the programme directors that had been working in the central office out to the schools. She felt that this is where the services were needed.

The special education division recieves more than 6 million US dollars in federal funding, and last week education officials were asked to explain why 90 percent of the budget is spent on personnel.

The Assistant director of the special education division, Jeanette Vasai Tilo, says a major cost for the department is hiring overseas specialists on short term contracts.

She says they aren't able to offer professionals a comparable salary to stay on-island, so the people they hire not only asseses students but also provide teacher training.

JEANETTE VASAI TILO: So that we still have teachers who provide those services until the next time the consultant comes. So a lot of that money that goes to personnel is looking at our teachers, because they are the supports, they are services for all of our students around the schools.

However, the director of the Education Department, Vaitinasa Dr. Salu Hunkin-Finau, says 80 percent of the students identified with a speech development problem may have been wrongly assessed.

She says they may just have difficulty in expressing themselves in English.

Vaitinasa says these students will need to be reassessed to determine whether they even need to be in special education.  

Representative Larry Sanitoa says long term contracts for special education professionals must be pursued so the children's needs are better understood and met.

LARRY SANITOA: I would think that by making every effort to have people here on a long term contract, whether it's two or three or four years,  one would think that that's a lot better than people coming here for three months to assess the kids and then just leave.

Larry Sanitoa says says this would also mean the children have some continuity in their teaching.