Special-education programs draw from district M&O levy dollars

Like her fellow administrators around the Issaquah School District, Michelle Caponigro is concerned about providing resources for her special-education students.

For Caponigro, the principal at Pine Lake Middle School, that means having teachers in two learning resource centers — an LRC I class for students with specific learning disabilities who spend much of their day in a general classroom setting and an LRC II class for students with “significant challenges” who are more difficult to manage.

Of Pine Lake’s 847 students, about 60 are served by a special-education program, Caponigro said. There are three full-time LRC teachers at the school, a fraction of its certificated teaching staff of 40.

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