Drastic moves: Some special ed students to leave state to graduate

Nick Mackey has the beginnings of a solid college application: He plays baseball at Galt High School, shows prize-winning pigs, is active in his church youth group and has excelled in computer courses - the field he hopes to work in someday.

But what the high school senior doesn't have is assurance he'll get a diploma in California, the state where he has received his education. That's because Nick, who is deaf and struggles with written and spoken language, hasn't passed the English portion of the California High School Exit Exam. For the first time, passing the math and English test is a state graduation requirement this school year.

So his parents have devised a plan: They will send him to another state for his last semester of high school.

"I'm going to do whatever I have to do to get his diploma," said Nick's mother, Nancy Mackey.

She said she already has sent his transcripts to a school in Helena, Mont., where her sister lives. Because Montana doesn't have an exit exam, Mackey believes her son will be able to earn a diploma.

"I really don't want to have to move him," she said. "But what other choice do I have?"

While no exact figures are available, anecdotal evidence and court documents filed in a lawsuit by advocates of special education suggest that other California families who have children with disabilities also are planning moves out of state:

* In Long Beach, the family of a 12th-grader with cerebral palsy is thinking of relocating to Oregon.

* A Ventura County 12th-grader with a rare liver disease may move to Tennessee.

* A San Jose-area senior with attention deficit disorder is planning to move to Arizona.

"She has to have a diploma, there's no ifs, ands or buts about it," said Rebecca Serafin, who may take her daughter to Tempe, Ariz., next month. "That's what gets you a job."

The parents believe their children will become successful, self-supporting adults even though they can't pass the exam. Mackey says Nick is talented in math and computers and could thrive as a programmer or engineer. Serafin says her daughter is gifted artistically and is interested in becoming an animator.

But they say their children will be unable to advance to good jobs or technical training programs without a high school diploma. They believe the exit exam - which tests students on middle-school math and algebra, as well as reading and writing at ninth-and 10th-grade levels - is an unfair measure of their children's skills.

Students who don't graduate from high school in California can still attend community college. But for some parents, that's not enough.

"(They are) realizing that if they stay in California, they're not going to be able to get a diploma," said Stephen Tollafield, an attorney with Disability Rights Advocates.

The Oakland-based group has sued the state for imposing the exit exam requirement on students with disabilities. Advocates argue that these students have not been taught the material on the test and cannot be responsible for passing an exam for which they were not prepared.

They are asking the courts to order the Department of Education to waive the exam requirement for about 25,000 students in the class of 2006 who have disabilities and have not passed the test.

For future classes, advocates urge the state to create exam alternatives that allow other ways for students with disabilities to show they have mastered the information tested.

The case will be heard in Alameda Superior Court on Jan. 10.

California officials say they agree that students with disabilities in the class of 2006 should be exempt from passing the test. But they disagree on how the waiver should be granted. State officials want the Legislature, not the courts, to set the terms.

So even while lawyers for the Department of Education are asking the court to reject the advocates' request, the head of the agency - Superintendent of Public Instruction Jack O'Connell - is working with the Legislature on a bill that would achieve the same end for the class of 2006, said Hilary McLean, O'Connell's spokeswoman.

In August, the parties agreed to waive the exam requirement for special ed students in the class of 2006. But the deal required the Legislature's approval, and the bill approved was broader than the settlement terms. Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger vetoed it.

The protracted political and legal process has left families in a bind. At a public meeting earlier this month, parents blasted state officials for the delay.

"I'm very disappointed that my children's future is at risk because of the politicization of education," said Diane Singer, an Orange County mother of two special education students. She said later she may leave the state because of the exam requirement.

At that meeting, Nancy Mackey handed officials a framed picture of Nick dressed in a tuxedo for his senior portrait. She said her son deserves a diploma because he has earned good grades and met all the requirements in his special education plan.

"We have worked very hard to get Nick this close to graduation, and now it looks like he won't graduate," Mackey said, her voice quivering.

"I beg you, as a parent, to look at the kids. It's more than just politics. There's real live kids out there."

Experts in special education say those "real live kids" have a variety of conditions that can make it difficult to pass a test that should be easy for their non-disabled peers. In some cases, disabilities mean students have a hard time with one section of the exam - either math or English. In other cases, learning troubles can make both portions an unsolvable puzzle.

In declarations filed as part of the class-action suit over the exam, students describe the range of disabilities that have led some to struggle with the test.

Courtney Kidd, a Long Beach high school senior, has cerebral palsy, which makes it hard for her to understand abstract math concepts such as algebra. She could not be reached for comment, but in the court documents she says her family has arranged for her to transfer to an Oregon high school because of the test.

Edward Haney, a senior in Ventura County, has both a rare kidney disease that exhausts him and a cognitive learning disorder that makes it difficult to communicate through reading and writing. His court papers say the stress of the exit exam has caused nosebleeds, stomachaches and loss of sleep. He may move to Tennessee to escape the test.

"I do not want to leave my home and family," Haney said in the document. "Unfortunately, my parents are forced to seriously consider this option."

Nick Mackey's strengths and difficulties are common among the deaf, say those who work with deaf students. He likes math and computer drafting. His welding teacher, Mark Feuerbach, says he is one of the best welders at Galt High, a student who excels at hands-on tasks. Nick passed the math part of the exam the first time he took it as a sophomore.

But reading and writing always have been difficult - even though four years ago Nick received an implant that allows him to hear and has improved his ability to speak.

"It's hard to understand the words," Nick, 19, said of the English exam. "I try to read it, but I can't very clearly in my head."

Because people learn to read by associating letters with sounds, many deaf children struggle with reading, said Jennifer Kennison, a deaf educator at the Redwood City school Nick attended as a child.

"For the most part, they're extremely visual, great problem solvers, cognitively right up there," Kennison said. "But they can't always demonstrate that through the channel of language."

Nick's family has gone to great lengths to assure he gets the education they feel is best. As a child, he enrolled in the Redwood City school for deaf children. His father stayed in Sacramento with two of his siblings. Monday through Friday, his mother took Nick and his younger sister to the Bay Area. Nancy Mackey cleaned and cooked for a family there in exchange for room and board.

As a teenager, Nick received the cochlear implant that has given him the ability to hear. Though sounds register in a robotic tone, Nick says the device has changed his life, allowing him to make more friends. While his reading has improved, it's still far below grade level.

Most states with exit exams allow students with disabilities to demonstrate their knowledge in other ways, such as presenting a portfolio of school work, taking a different test or through good grades in their classes. Rebecca Serafin, the San Jose-area mother, said she has been told her daughter will be exempt from Arizona's exit exam because of her disability.

In California, students who don't pass the exam are at the mercy of their school boards. Some will offer certificates of completion - documents that are not diplomas - showing students have attended school but not met the graduation requirements.

That's an affront to some parents. "I don't want a certificate that says he sat in school for 12 years," Nancy Mackey said. "They're really messing with kids' opportunities in life."

For many families, leaving the state is not an option. Even those with the means worry about the emotional difficulty of uprooting a teenager for the last semester of high school.

Nick says he will miss his friends if he moves to Montana. But he will do it if he has to, he says, because he must have a diploma to get the kind of job that someday will allow him to support a family.

About the writer:

• The Bee's Laurel Rosenhall can be reached at (916) 321-1083 or lrosenhall@sacbee.com.