Published: Friday, April 17, 2009
Press of Atlantic City

As we've noted several times recently, every budget cut causes pain. So it is with the proposed closing of 18 state-run schools for seriously disabled children.

The state Department of Children and Families expects to save $4 million by closing the schools. Some, including one DCF school in Egg Harbor Township, would close this June, under the proposal. All the schools would be phased out by 2010.

Parents are understandably upset. So are the pregnant teens and new teen mothers who attend six of the DCF schools that offer nursery care while the teen moms attend classes.

We won't quibble with the decision to close the schools, as painful as that decision is. We doubt it was made lightly. And state officials say the children will be placed in other programs in regular schools, county special-services schools or private facilities.

But we will quibble with how the closing of these schools has been handled so far.



Some of the students at DCF schools are so disabled that they must wear diapers and cannot feed themselves. Parenting such severely disabled children must be one of the more wrenching and trying experiences imaginable. And the uncertainty created by the announcement that the DCF schools would close unnecessarily added to the parents' anxiety.

This budget cut may be a sound one - but the state needs to be working more closely with the parents to come up with alternative placements and, quite frankly, to provide emotional support during the transition.

Some counties, including Atlantic and Cape May counties, have special-services school districts specifically created to accommodate disabled students. In fact, the DCF cited the presence of these county-run schools as one reason why the state-run DCF schools are not needed any longer.

But the DCF schools serve almost 560 students, and it is not clear how many can be accommodated at the special-services schools. Those schools will be the first choice for many parents. And while the superintendents of both the Atlantic County and Cape May County special-services schools say they are willing to help, the state made no effort to reach out to these superintendents before announcing the closings - so they have no idea what will be expected of them.

Better planning and better communication could be making this difficult process easier for the parents of these disabled students.

As for the pregnant teens and new teen mothers enrolled in the Teen Education and Child Health program at the DCF schools, the state or counties or individual districts need to keep that program alive.

It may irk many New Jersey residents that they must pay to provide nurseries and infant-care instruction for teen mothers trying to finish high school. But education and a shot at a productive life is better than a life on welfare - for both the young mothers and for the taxpayers, who pay either way.