Continuously serving Kosciusko County since 1854
It was significant that the North Central Indiana Special Education Cooperative moved into its new building in March.
March is Disabilities Awareness Month.
And disabilities are what the NCI Co-op does best - or, more specifically, helping students with disabilities in five school districts stay in school, learn and be successful.
NCI's new building, the former Color Tile building near Marketplace of Warsaw, gives the co-op a centralized base from which to help its member school districts - Bremen, Tippecanoe Valley, Warsaw, Wawasee and Whitko.
The co-op's nine full-time and 29 traveling staff members (including psychologists, educators, diagnosticians and consultants) work with more than 1,800 students between the ages of 3 and 21 in 30 public schools, six private schools and approximately a dozen preschools, said Tamra Ummel, director.
Formerly based in a renovated farmhouse near Warsaw Community High School, the co-op outgrew its 1,200-square-foot headquarters and moved to its current home in March. There are more than 8,920 square feet in the new building, Ummel said, with ample space for storage, offices, meeting and training rooms, and space for future growth.
"We just feel very, very fortunate," she said.
The co-op is a little-known entity that works quietly with schools, families and students to help kids with disabilities.
"Our purpose is to support and assist public schools in delivering special education to students with disabilities," Ummel said.
Those students fall in 13 categories, she said, from those with obvious disabilities, such as hearing and visual impairments, to "hidden handicaps," like learning and emotional disabilities. The co-op also has students with autism, mental disabilities, orthopedic and health impairments, multiple disabilities and communications disorders.
Each school corporation has its own special education staff members, Ummel said. The NCI staff members offer more specialized skills and services.
The co-op is guided by a board made up of superintendents of all five corporations and Ummel.
She said a federal mandate was passed in 1975 and amended in 1997 that says public schools have a responsibility to educate all children, including children with disabilities. A state law deals with the same mandate, and specifies how that is to be done.
The co-op, therefore, deals with both public and private schools in its five districts, and Ummel said the services offered to private schools are determined by the NCI board.
"The law says we have an obligation to find and serve all the kids in the area," she said.
Co-op staff can act as consultants or provide occupational, physical and mental health therapies. They also can provide "assistive technologies," which include anything from wheelchairs and walkers to specialized computer software.
The only requirement, Ummel said, is that "it all has to relate to learning - it has to be educationally relevant."
Originally, special education students were removed from public schools and taken elsewhere to be educated. Now, Ummel said, approximately 99 percent of the students served by the co-op are back in their neighborhood schools or school districts, and about 76 percent of all students with disabilities spend at least part of their day in a general education classroom.
The co-op is funded by federal and state funding that targets students with disabilities and by a local preschool tax. Also, each member school district is assessed a proportionate annual amount based on the total number of students in the school corporation and the number of students who use the co-op's services.
Ummel said the number of special education students has been rising. Whether that means there are more kids with disabilities or that technology is helping schools identify those students better and faster is anyone's guess.
However, she is especially proud that students served by the co-op have a 76 percent high school graduation rate, even with the state's ISTEP Graduation Qualifying Exam.
"It's hard," she said, "but when you raise the bar, kids will rise to the occasion."
