BellaOnline Forums Family Special Needs Children Dual Enrollment - Preschool through College?

Are there opportunities in your community for students who qualify for special education services in high school to be dually enrolled in community college classes? My son could have done so because he attended his local high school as a homeschooled student, but I have heard that there are different opportunities available today for students with developmental disabilities.

He did start out with a dual enrollment during early intervention and preschool years.

Preschool Dual Enrollment

"Families of 3- and 4-year-olds in Texas have an option available to them called �Dual Enrollment.� In Texas, children ages 3 and 4 can go to a private preschool and still receive services, such as speech therapy, through the public school. As another option, preschoolers may stay home (like many children this age do) and receive needed public school services. Recognizing that many PPCD programs are designed only for students with disabilities, Texas made the decision to allow 3- and 4-year-olds to be dually enrolled to give them more opportunities to interact with their typically developing peers."

Pam W
SE of Seattle

Teens with Disabilities - Transition to Adulthood
http://www.bellaonline.com/articles/art33519.asp

Yes, but when the homeschoold child turns age 5, the public schools in Texas are no longer required to offer dual-enrollment in public funded special ed. programs. Some districts opt to do so, but its rare.

Children enrolled in accredited private schools in Texas can still qualify for special ed. services through the public school, should the ARD committee agree its necessary.

Homeschooled students aren't prevented from dual-enrolling in community college or university as long as they meet the institutions stated admissions criteria. Allowances are made in admissions on topics such as testing based on ADA criteria.

Actually, the Fed law passed late last year said that public schools were not allowed to use Fed funding to provide SpEd services to homeschooled children. But most of that funding comes from the state level--not Fed. NY decided to cut off SpEd services to homeschooled kids and lost that case in court earlier this year.

And in TX, school is not mandatory until age 6 at first grade. See question #7 from TEA's document:

www.tea.state.tx.us/curriculum/early/kfaq.pdf

State funding is public funding--our local sales tax, property tax, and other tax dollars at work. So the statement re TX holds.

Compulsory school attendance has little to do with provision of spec. ed. services. Public schools here typically provide early intervention services for ages 3-4, its supported in state legislation. Upon reaching age 5, if parents want continued special ed. services through the public school system, the child has to be enrolled in a public school program or an accredited private school program.

Information for families of students with developmental disabilities who want to attend college:

[url=BellaOnline ALERT: For anti-spam reasons, we restrict the number of URLs allowed in a given post. You have exceeded our maximum number of URLs.