NORTHAMPTON — Despite more talks slated for next week to address problems at Bridge Street School, school union officials say there is only one solution — more staffing for the elementary school.
“We need additional resources,” said Andrea Egitto, a chapter coordinator for the Northampton Association of School Employees.
Egitto said the union does not believe that collaboration alone is enough to solve the issues surrounding a new special education model at Bridge Street School.
She also said that NASE and the Bridge Street teachers were not informed of the letter announcing a Wednesday meeting of administrators and staff, which also contained statistical information about Bridge Street and other Northampton schools, prior to it being sent to parents Thursday.
NASE is the union that represents school employees in Northampton. It has filed a grievance against the School Committee alleging an unsafe work environment at Bridge Street School as a result of the new special education model’s rollout. The grievance also demands that additional staff be hired immediately.
Both parents and staff have alleged that a chaotic environment exists at Bridge Street, and that injuries have occurred as a result.
The model being deployed is a version of the inclusion model, which involves special needs students being educated alongside their non-special needs peers. It was introduced districtwide this year.
As part of the model, 19 educational support positions were eliminated from the district, while 5.5 special education teachers and one general education teacher were added. Superintendent John Provost noted, however, that no layoffs occurred, as the high turnover in ESP positions made it so that anyone who wanted to remain in an ESP position in the district was able to, although not necessarily in one they previously occupied.
Egitto does not teach at Bridge Street, but was invited by the Bridge Street teachers to an emergency faculty meeting at the school Thursday.
Egitto described the atmosphere of the meeting, which Bridge Street School Principal Beth Choquette also attended, as quite positive.
“Everybody was being heard,” she said.
Sadie Cora, a NASE officer who teaches at another school, also attended the meeting.
Egitto said that the crux of the meeting was that more resources were needed for Bridge Street.
She also said that faculty lamented not having a full-time behaviorist, which Bridge Street School does not have this school year, but did last year. She also noted that staff expressed a desire for a full-time school psychologist at Bridge Street, and for staffed de-escalation space that students could go to and do their work if they were not ready to return to class.
Cora expressed a preference for behavioral and psychological services coming from in-house staff, as opposed to contractors.
“They have relationships within the school,” she said, saying that in-house staff are more invested.
Bridge Street has the highest number of students with disabilities among the four Northampton elementary schools, although Leeds School does have comparable numbers. It also receives the most special education expenditures.
Asked why Bridge Street is having such difficulties with the new model, given the statistical situation, Egitto said that she did not know, but that the numbers don’t tell the full story.
“Kids aren’t numbers,” said Egitto.
She also said that the teachers at Bridge Street had determined that the children under their care need more resources.
“Our teaching staff are experts,” she said.
As such, she said that the focus should be on getting the mayor to allocate more funding to the school budget.
“The right people have been at the table,” Egitto said. “They just don’t have the right resources.”
In a statement delivered via text to the Gazette, Mayor David Narkewicz, who also leads the school committee, defended his administration’s allocation of funds to the schools, noting consistent annual increases. He also took a shot at NASE for its dispute with the committee over the full-time release of its president.
“It is ironic that NASE would suggest that we have allocated insufficient funding resources to Bridge Street School classrooms at the very same time it has filed labor charges against the School Committee for its unwillingness to divert precious school dollars from those same classrooms to subsidize its full-time release union president,” said Narkewicz.
Bera Dunau can be reached at bdunau@gazettenet.com.