Cary Byrge began noticing something frustrating towards the end of her son’s second-grade year in school.
Byrge’s son was supposed to receive regular speech therapy through Knox County Schools, but that assistance became less reliable.
“The first two years went great. Then all of a sudden, towards the end of second grade, he began to receive speech services less and less and less and I would call, and I would email, and we would have meetings and we would put a band aid on it for the end of the year and then say they would try to do better next year. But it never got any better, it actually got a lot worse,” said Byrge.
That was especially true when her son entered the sixth-grade.
Byrge received her son’s speech progress report and learned his school didn’t have anyone on staff to provide services like speech therapy. After complaining to the central office, Byrge says the district provided her son with virtual speech therapy for a few weeks before the therapist transferred.
That experience convinced the Knoxville mother to join eight other parents and a teacher on the newly formed Knox County Special Education task force. Superintendent Rysewyk created the task force to conduct a top to bottom review of the district’s special education department.
“When I was approached about this task force specifically, I couldn’t sign up fast enough. Because the problem that I have been experiencing in my personal life blows my mind, and because for the last 20 years, ironically, every day I wake up and I have been part of that very solution of therapies. I see it every day,” said Byrge. “So, my purpose of joining this task force was to be the voice of all the vacant schools in Knox County because they deserve better.”
Earlier this month, the task force provided the Knox County School district with a list of recommendations to improve special education and address cultural problems.
Byrge wasn’t the only member of the task force who experienced those problems firsthand.
Before joining the task force, Cortney Piper was part of a parent group that formed to advocate for the district to provide classroom therapists to autistic students. Piper was told that it was against policy to have a classroom therapist. When she asked for the policy, it took five months before she received an answer.
Members of that parent group spoke monthly at school board meetings before the board finally passed the policy.
“I didn’t want another parent to experience what I had been through. I was misled by central office staff, there were delays, I was met with this culture of resistance, and I don’t want any other parent to have to go through that,” said Piper. “You feel like you’re crazy cause you think, life is tough enough having a child that has special needs. You know you’re constantly trying to navigate and figure out different ways to sort of work with them and help them. And you think the school system should be there to help you, not to resist you at every step of the way. And it’s just so frustrating. So that’s why I jumped at the opportunity to serve on this task force.”
Byrge and Piper both say at the local school level, teachers, principals, and case managers were very accommodating. The problems they faced and the resistance occurred higher up the ladder.
Members of the special education task force joined met every week to talk about their experiences.
Both mothers say they found relief listening to people with similar struggles with Knox County Schools’ special education system, but that relief created further frustration.
“Hearing other parents share their stories (that) this was also happening to them, with just different kinds of special needs, it felt good. I felt like there was a camaraderie, but it also made me incredibly more frustrated,” said Piper. “And one day I just blurted out, ‘there’s a cultural problem here and I really don’t know how to explain that to Knox County Schools and tell them how to fix it.’ I can just see that it exists.”
The task force worked to find actionable solutions to present to the board. They divided the key problems into categories and researched what different school districts were doing along with legal actions that have been taken against Knox County.
Eventually the task force made five recommendations to improve special education in the district.
“It’s very easy to complain and say when people are doing things bad without giving a solution. I could sit here and list 15 different things that they’re doing wrong, but I need to think about realistically what does it look like to fix it,” said Byrge.
The hard work appears to be paying off.
Neither Byrge nor Piper expected all of their recommendations to be followed, but Board Vice Chair Betsy Henderson posted on social media that she intends to recommend doing just that by filing a formal resolution at the board’s September meeting.
“The task force has found what we all know is true and what the courts have ruled- that for far too long our most vulnerable students have lacked access to the full benefits of being a Knox County student. The culture of resistance that has festered is totally unacceptable. I believe this Board needs to clearly state our expectations going forward: we demand a culture of excellence for every single student and especially our most vulnerable students. All of our students are children made in the image of God and we need to treat them and their parents with the utmost respect and love,” wrote Henderson in the post.
