SALEM — Students with disabilities aren’t receiving adequate support from Oregon schools due to limited funding, rising caseloads, difficulty hiring and retaining special education teachers and other factors, a state-led audit found.

The audit, led by the Oregon Secretary of State Audits Division mainly using data from the 2018-19 school year, had a damning view of the state of special education in Oregon.

“Children in some parts of the state are not receiving adequate services or experience gaps in services, in part, because (the state) lacks a strategic plan to guide decision-making around the use of special education resources,” stated the audit report. “Children with disabilities who do not receive adequate services may have difficulties realizing their educational and life potential.”

According to the audit, most Oregon school districts and early childhood education providers have a hard time properly taking care of and educating students in special education classes. Part of this is due to rising caseloads, the report states.

The number of children from birth to pre-kindergarten in special education programs rose from about 9,000 students in 2014 to more than 11,000 in 2018, according to the report. Students with disabilities in Oregon’s K-12 schools rose from more than 78,000 to more than 80,000 between the 2018-19 and 2019-20 school years, the report states. That latter number comprises 13.8% of all K-12 students in Oregon.

Joel Greenberg, a staff attorney for Portland-based advocate group Disability Rights Oregon, said some people theorize that the rise in caseloads is due to children being identified as having special needs at younger and younger ages.

Many of these Oregon students aren’t receiving the amount time and support they need, the audit report states. Only 6.2% of early childhood students who are delayed in three or four types of development receive an adequate level of service, the report states. For students delayed in most or all development areas, that number falls to 0.7%.

Meanwhile, K-12 schools have had difficulty retaining special education staff. The turnover rate for Oregon special education teachers in the 2018-19 school year was 20.4%, compared to 13.7% for all teachers, the report states.

This problem is even more dire for smaller, rural Oregon school districts, as its harder for them to attract and retain young teachers, according to the audit report. Larger urban school districts can pay teachers more money and will have more staff to lower an individual teacher’s caseload, the report stated.

Barbara Garland, director of special programs for Jefferson County School District, confirmed that hiring young special education teachers was challenging due to the lack of housing in the Madras area. But she said the district has difficulty retaining and hiring staff across the board, not just for special education.

“Because you have a rural area, you don’t have as many amenities, apartments, houses,” Garland said. “I think that might play into it.”

Federal funding has also shrunk for special education, resulting in a $267 million funding gap for the 2019-20 school year, the audit report stated. Many early childhood education providers and school districts said a lack of funding created a barrier for properly serving students with disabilities.

Sean Reinhart, director of special programs for Bend-La Pine Schools, agreed that funding for special education has always been lacking.

“The federal and state obligation to fund special education has not been met since the advent of special education,” he said. “The money’s just not there.”

The audit does not take into account the incoming financial impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on school budgets.

The audit gave the Oregon Department of Education a series of recommendations for improving outcomes for students with disabilities. Many of them ask the state to create stronger strategic plans to better help these students, and to have better data reporting.

An education department response letter attached to the audit report — signed by Colt Gill, head of the Oregon Department of Education — agreed with some of the audit’s recommendations. But Gill also pointed out that COVID-19 will likely limit the state’s ability to provide additional resources, due to expected budget cuts.

Greenberg, the attorney from Disability Rights Oregon, said although it depends on the individual student, COVID-19 will have a negative educational and social impact on many students with disabilities.

“It’s certainly going to make it worse,” he said of schools closing in the spring. “Particularly children who are behind academically and have serious behavioral issues and were already in a difficult situation before COVID hit, they’re going through a minimum of three months without really useful services for them.”