How the Justice Department Is Trying to Dismantle Georgia's Segregated Special-Education System

A Parent Called the Program "A Warehouse for Kids
the School System Doesn't Want or Know How to Deal With."

By Edwin Rios

Last week, the Justice Department announced it would sue the state of Georgia for running a network of schools that segregated students with disabilities from those without, denying them equal access to services and educational opportunities. The lawsuit, which seeks to desegregate the state's program of so-called psychoeducational schools, could prompt school districts across the country to look closely at whether they are illegally separating students with disabilities from their peers.

The DOJ alleges in the suit that Georgia violated Title II of the Americans With Disabilities Act, which prohibits discrimination against people with disabilities by public entities. "Georgia has relegated thousands of students with behavior-related disabilities to separate, segregated, and unequal settings, and placed other students at serious risk of entering such settings," said Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General Vanita Gupta in a statement.

Emily Suski, an assistant professor at the University of South Carolina School of Law who specializes in education law, told Mother Jones that the challenge under the ADA—as opposed to one under the Individuals With Disabilities Education Act—allows the government to address systemic segregation in the state's program. "If the government's successful, it certainly sends a message," Suski said. Other states and school districts, she added, will have to reexamine their approaches to educating students with disabilities to ensure they are treating them equally under the law.

The state-funded program, known as the Georgia Network for Educational and Therapeutic Support (GNETS), began as an experiment. Bolstered by a $250,000 state grant, University of Georgia special-education professor Mary Wood opened the first center in 1970 for students in rural districts and offered mental-health and therapeutic educational services. Several years later, the program went statewide. It now serves 4,600 students from more than half of Georgia's public schools and receives $72 million in state and federal funding. Over time, the program has focused more on managing students' behavior and on test preparation, rather than therapy, the now-retired Wood told the Atlanta Journal-Constitution in April.

The GNETS program came under scrutiny in July 2015 when the DOJ sent a letter to Gov. Nathan Deal and Georgia Attorney General Sam Olens. The notice claimed that the program allegedly violated the Americans With Disability Act by "unnecessarily segregating students with disabilities from their peers." Federal investigators alleged that in providing services in segregated programs instead of offering them at more integrated, general education settings, the state discriminated against students with behavioral disabilities. 

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Source: Mother Jones