The Mount Pleasant Area School District offers special education services to students with disabilities in a variety of service delivery options.  These services are described below.

Speech and Language Support:  Provides support to students who have difficulty with articulation, fluency, voice or language.

The District operates resource rooms, supplemental, and itinerant level classes in a variety of settings.  The designation of a classroom is dependent on the average amount of time most students spend in the special education setting (separated from their non-disabled peers).  The student’s IEP, and not the type of classroom, determines the amount of time a student is seen by a special education teacher.  The following words and terms have the following meanings with respect to interventions provided in the various classrooms that are operated by the Mount Pleasant Area School District, unless the context clearly indicates otherwise.

Itinerant Level:  Special education supports and services provided by special education personnel for 20% or less of the school day.

Supplemental Level:  Special education supports and services provided by special education personnel for more than 20%, but less than 80% of the school day.

Full-Time Level:  80% or more of school day in a special education setting.

LOCATION OF SPECIAL EDUCATION SERVICES

Senior High School

§  Inclusive Academic Classes

§  Learning Support Classes (Itinerant and Supplemental)

§  Vocational Training through Central Westmoreland Career & Technology Center (CWCTC)

§  ITES Emotional Support (operated by Westmoreland Intermediate Unit #7)

§  Speech and Language Support

§  Vision Support

§  Hearing Support

Junior High School

§  Inclusive Academic Classes

§  Hearing Support (operated by Westmoreland Intermediate Unit #7)

§  Learning Support Classes (Itinerant and Supplemental)

§  Speech and Language Support

Donegal Elementary School

§  Inclusive Academic Classes

§  Learning Support Classes (Itinerant and Supplemental)

§  Speech and Language Support

Norvelt Elementary

§  Inclusive Academic Classes (Grades 5-6)

§  Learning Support Classes (Itinerant and Supplemental)

§  Speech and Language Support

§  Elementary Life Skills Classrooms (operated by Westmoreland Intermediate Unit #7)

§  Emotional Support Classroom (Grades K-6)

§  ESL Itinerant

§  Inclusive Academic Classes (Grades 5-6)

§  Learning Support Classes (Itinerant and Supplemental)

§  Hearing Support

§  ESL Itinerant

§  Learning Support Classes (Itinerant and Supplemental)

§  Hearing Support

§  Speech and Language Support

Intermediate units are regional educational service agencies created by the Pennsylvania State Legislature in 1970 to provide support to local school districts, to expand educational services, and to provide cost savings to tax payers by eliminating duplication of services and taking advantage of economy of scale.

Westmoreland Intermediate Unit #7 serves students from Westmoreland County’s seventeen school districts in a variety of settings including, but not limited to, Clairview School, three Westmoreland County Career and Technology Centers, and Greensburg Partial Hospitalization Program, under the direct supervision of its Board of Directors and central Administration.  The Intermediate Unit also operates a variety of classrooms in school district buildings throughout the county.

The Mount Pleasant Area School District utilizes the services of the Westmoreland Intermediate Unit to provide services to students with severe disabilities.  The classes operated by the Intermediate Unit are located in school districts throughout the county, as well as at the center-based program at Clairview School.  The Intermediate Unit operates two life skills classrooms and two emotional support classrooms at Norvelt Elementary.  An emotional support/partial hospitalization classroom, also sponsored by the Intermediate Unit, is located in the Mount Pleasant Area Junior/Senior High School.  Mount Pleasant students also attend a variety of classes operated by the Intermediate Unit in nearby districts.  Occasionally, a student may be placed in a classroom operated by a neighboring Intermediate Unit as well.

Multi-Handicapped Support:  For children with more than one disability, the combination of which results in needs requiring many services and much support.

Blind and Vision Services:  For children with limited or no vision.

Occupational Therapy:  Therapy to improve fine motor skills.

Physical Therapy:  Therapy to improve gross motor skills.

ESL:  Instructional services for students who need English as a second language.

LICENSED PRIVATE ACADEMIC SCHOOLS, PARTIAL HOSPITALIZATION PROGRAMS, RESIDENTIAL TREATMENT FACILITIES, OTHER DISTRICT OPERATED CLASSROOMS AND DAY-TREATMENT PROGRAMS.

The Mount Pleasant Area School District utilizes a variety of licensed private academic schools, partial hospitalization programs, and day-treatment programs for students whose educational, emotional, or behavioral needs cannot be met in programs run by the District or the Intermediate Unit.  The Mount Pleasant Area School District has access to programs operated at the following facilities:

Ø  Clelian Heights School

Ø  Holy Family

Ø  Crossroads

Ø  Agape Day Treatment

Ø  Robert Ketterer Charter School

Ø  Northwest Human Services School

Ø  Outside-In Day Treatment

Ø  Greensburg Partial Hospitalization

Ø  Adelphoi Alternative Education Program

Ø  Baggaley Elementary

Ø  New Directions Partial Hospitalization

Ø  Hutchinson Elementary School

Ø  Mars Home for Youth

Ø  Pressley Ridge Day School

Ø  Southwood Residential Treatment Facility

APPROVED PRIVATE SCHOOLS (APS)

The Approved Private Schools are private schools, licensed by the State Board of Private Academic Schools.  Approved Private Schools are approved by the Secretary of Education to provide a free and appropriate education to students with severe disabilities.  The schools are eligible to receive funds from the school districts and/or the Commonwealth for the education of these students.  Pennsylvania currently has 29 Approved Private Schools for which the Department approved funding.  These schools provide a program of special education for over 4,000 day and residential students.

Approved Private Schools are an important and necessary part of the Mount Pleasant Area School District’s special education delivery system.  These schools provide some students with what may be the only appropriate educational program available.  In the Western Pennsylvania area, the School District has access to the following Approved Private School sites.

Ø  Western Pennsylvania School for the Blind

Ø  Pace School

Ø  Wesley Highlands School

Ø  Western Pennsylvania School for the Deaf

To make progress in school, a child may need special help that is not required by other children in the classroom.  Your child may be exceptional if he or she has a physical, sensory, mental or emotional disability and is in need of special education services as determined by a multi-disciplinary team (MDT).  Children who are eligible for classification as disabled students have a right to a free and appropriate public education (FAPE). 

Some indicators that your child may have a disability include:

§  Difficulty in academic subjects 

§  Repeatedly receiving failing grades 

§  Repeating a grade 

§  Exhibition of a serious emotional disturbance over a long period of time which affects your child’s ability to learn 

§  Consistent problems in getting along with others 

§  Difficulty communicating 

§  Lack of interest in age-appropriate activities 

§  Resistance to change 

§  Difficulty seeing or hearing that interferes with the ability to communicate or learn 

§  Health problems that interfere with educational performance

HOW TO MAKE A REFERRAL

If you believe that your child is in need of special help in order to make progress in school, contact your child’s Principal, Guidance Counselor, Teacher or the Director of Education at 724.547.4100.

All requests for evaluation must be made in writing.  District forms are available through the Office of the Supervisor of Special Education.  Office hours are Monday through Friday, 8:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m., during the school term.  All information will be kept confidential.  Upon request, evaluations and/or tests will be given in your child’s native language or mode of communication unless it is clearly not feasible to do so.

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