July 15--Some members of the Kendall County Special Education Cooperative are working to form a new co-op, after the current organization dissolves next year.
School districts in Plano, Lisbon and Newark have expressed interest in the new co-op, and Plano Community Unit School District 88 officials are taking the lead on drafting an agreement between the districts, said current cooperative board chairwoman Diane Cepela. District officials expect to have a new organization ready to serve students by the 2016-2017 school year.
Officials in Yorkville Community Unit School District 115, which is the second-largest member of the current co-op, will likely offer some special education services themselves, but are interested in seeing what the new co-op can provide, Superintendent Tim Shimp said.
"Regardless of the dissolution of the current cooperative, the individual school districts will work to ascertain that students involved will see as little disruption to their educational experience as possible," Cepela, who is also superintendent of Newark Community Consolidated School District 66, said.
Last year, Community Unit School District 308 in Oswego -- the largest of the six school districts in the current cooperative, with almost two-thirds of the organization's students -- moved to withdraw by the end of June 2016. The remaining members later voted to dissolve the co-op in its current form.
Those remaining districts -- Plano, Yorkville, Lisbon Grade School District 90, Newark Community High School District 18 and Newark Community Consolidated District 66 -- then had to decide whether to form a new cooperative, join another co-op or offer the services themselves. Many officials said their districts were too small to offer services on their own.
Shimp said he is interested in being part of the conversation about the new cooperative, and figuring out whether it makes sense to join the new organization. The district is large enough to take care of some special education programs itself, he said, but it could also work with other districts through the new co-op or intergovernmental agreements to provide some services.
"We want to look to see...does it make sense for us immediately or long term to be involved in that," he said.
Current co-op director Lynda Shanks is helping with planning for the new co-op, which is still in the early stages, Cepela said.
The new co-op would likely partner with the Oswego school district to provide some services, particularly when fewer, high-need students require the services, Cepela said.
Those could include the Opportunity School, a therapeutic school, or services for nonverbal students with autism or some mental health issues, she said.
The new organization is also likely to hire the current co-op's remaining staff, Cepela said. District 308 plans to hire almost 200 current staff members, but other staffers will not move to Oswego.
Many students get attached to the staff members they work with, and the districts would like to keep students' services consistent, Cepela said.
The new organization is not likely to take over the current co-op building, Cepela sad. When the current cooperative dissolves, the organization must also dissolve its assets, she said. It is also more than what the new organization is likely to need, she said.
sfreishtat@tribpub.com
