DENTON – Parents gathered outside the Denton ISD headquarters to make their voices heard because they believe their children with disabilities are being discriminated against at school.
“It’s definitely been difficult,” Delia Sandoval said. “We’ve lost hours of sleep. It’s affecting us mentally.”
Sandoval, the mother of a 5-year-old daughter with learning disabilities, said other parents in attendance expressed similar concerns.
“We didn’t have a single certified special education teacher the whole year, mainly the whole year,” she said. “She’s regressing in certain areas and not making progress in many others.”
Safety is another issue, she says.
“This goes back to the big issue of not having adequate staff to move around the classroom and support the kids on a daily basis,” Sandoval said.
Federal law prohibits disability discrimination and guarantees that students with disabilities have equal access to educational opportunities, including free appropriate public education (FAPE) in public elementary and secondary schools.
Parents have asked special education advocate Karen Mayer Cunningham to file a complaint with the Department of Education’s Office of Civil Rights, which currently has two undisclosed cases related to Denton ISD’s FAPE. The survey is posted on the website.
“The Texas Education Agency needs to audit this district from top to bottom, so we are currently in the process of gathering family information for a statewide systematic complaint,” Cunningham said. said.
In a statement to CBS News Texas, a Denton ISD spokesperson said, “Denton ISD does not discriminate. We continue to work with parents to meet the needs of all students.”
“Out of the 33,348 students we serve, we are aware of two complaints filed with the Department of Education Office for Civil Rights.
“One concerns a general education student regarding football, and that individual is not enrolled in Denton ISD.
“We are aware of one special education complaint out of the more than 5,400 students served by the Denton ISD Special Education Department. Includes preschool students who are receiving “Before Submitting” Parents agreed with Denton ISD at each ARD meeting and were cooperative until hiring the consultants mentioned.
“Please note that OCR complaints can take up to five years to resolve.
“Denton ISD is committed to serving students of all abilities.”
“It’s very disappointing that the school district isn’t taking this seriously,” parent Tanya East said. “As Karen said, we have some great staff here and some great teachers. But unfortunately, that’s not the case across the district.”
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