Some Parents Push For Alternative to D.C.'s Special-Ed

Other parents and their legal advocates have raised similar complaints about the school on 13th Street NW. In one case, the city faces a lawsuit stemming from the death of a 13-year-old girl.

Cindy Alvarado was sent home from Sharpe in September 2003 with a note from a nurse saying that she needed urgent medical care. She died soon afterward from an intestinal blockage that could have been treated successfully, according to a review by University Legal Services, a watchdog group.

At any given time, Sharpe must tend to students who use a ventilator, for example, or who have other medical or physical needs, such as speech or occupational therapy. How those demands fit into a child's education is a point of disagreement among educators, advocates and parents.

The most recent description of the city's special-education services, published in 2003, describes Sharpe as a "therapeutic environment" where medical and educational goals "are fully integrated on a daily basis."

But Sharpe's principal, LaGrande Lewis, said in an interview that the school had evolved into something else. "This is not a therapeutic center," she said.

Sharpe struggles with such students as Shawn, who need more attention than the school is structured to provide, said Lewis, adding, "I'm not saying I agree with it, but at the school level, I can't change that."

Phelps said schools work from an "educational model" while parents, doctors, therapists and attorneys often come at these questions from a "medical model."

"That's where some of the conflict and differences of opinion come in," Phelps said.

Shawn's attorneys said it is impossible to separate his educational needs from his physical and medical needs. For a child like Shawn, whose mental development is on par with an infant's, education is teaching him how to signal that he's hungry by pointing to an image of food, or his developing the dexterity and flexibility to move himself around in his wheelchair and, perhaps, some day on his feet without constant assistance.

But for seven years at Sharpe, according to court records, he received no physical therapy. And for five years, he received no speech and language therapy.

At St. Coletta, therapy is an essential part of Shawn's education, said Sharon B. Raimo, the school's executive director.

"No one says he's going to be able to do reading, writing and arithmetic," Raimo said. "That's not what we're teaching. We're teaching functional skills."