Too Little Done for Disabled Students? : Schools: A federal investigation concludes that a county office failed to provide an adequate education for the handicapped in at least 10 districts.

The Los Angeles County Office of Education has violated federal law by not providing an adequate education for some handicapped students in at least 10 school districts, a federal investigation has found.

The U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights determined that some school days were shortened, some extracurricular activities were inadequate, and extra services, such as speech and language therapy, were not always provided.

“Handicapped students by law must receive a free and appropriate education,” said John E. Palomino, regional civil rights director for the OCR. “The children, in effect, are being shortchanged.”

Violations were found in the Arcadia, Bellflower, Compton, Downey, Lynwood, Montebello, Paramount, Pomona, San Marino and Torrance unified school districts.

Another 20 districts are still under investigation, Palomino said. Although the county runs the program, the OCR contends that it is up to the districts to ensure that handicapped students receive an education that is equal to that given other students.

The county has submitted a plan that could cost more than $4 million to correct the problems, said Marilyn Armstrong, the county’s director of special education. The OCR is still reviewing the plan, which officials hope to implement countywide by the time school starts in September, Palomino said this week. If the violations are not corrected, the county and districts could lose federal funding for education, Palomino said.

Armstrong acknowledged that county education officials initially decided to make changes only when the violations were discovered. “Sometimes, in some instances, the response has been wait until we’re told we have to do it,” she said.

A barrage of complaints from Downey parents during the 1989-90 school year sparked the federal probe.

Investigators reviewed county classes at just four schools in the Downey and Bellflower districts before local educators acknowledged that similar scheduling and staffing practices occurred countywide.

About 11,000 students from 61 districts attend the special classes or receive therapy from the county. Many of the students are autistic, mentally retarded or deaf.

Some districts, such as the Los Angeles Unified and Long Beach Unified school districts, do not contract with the county for the classes and are not affected by the investigation.

Frank J. Alderete, president of the County Board of Education, declined to be interviewed, but released a statement through a spokesman. “Our office will move forward to carry out the remedial plan. We will do what we need to do to come into compliance with the OCR regulations,” the statement said.

Armstrong said some handicapped students have had shortened school days because officials were juggling bus schedules to save money.

The OCR found that school days in Downey and Bellflower were as much as 50 minutes shorter for handicapped students than for other students.

The federal probe also found that handicapped students in Bellflower missed school assemblies, holiday parties, field trips and music and library activities. Such “mainstreaming” can be crucial to a handicapped child’s development, educators say.

In addition, handicapped students in Bellflower did not receive speech and language therapy and adaptive physical education for several weeks at the beginning of the 1989-90 school year, or when their county teachers were absent, according to the investigation.

Inadequate speech, language therapy and other such services were not provided in Arcadia, San Marino, Torrance, Montebello, Compton, Lynwood, Paramount and Pomona, the OCR found.

A nationwide shortage of special-education teachers left the county without enough instructors to provide speech therapy and other services countywide, Armstrong said. Poor coordination between county and district educators caused handicapped students to miss assemblies and activities where they could have mixed with regular students, she added.

The effect on the students is hard to determine, according to county officials and an expert on education for handicapped children.

“Usually we consider more better, but it depends on the kid, the age,” said Nita Ferjo, a top educational psychologist at the Neuropsychiatric Institute at UCLA.

But a parent who filed a complaint with the OCR said the effect goes beyond simple learning. “It makes the kids feel they’re worthless,” said Karen Acedo of Downey. “It’s very serious.” Acedo’s 12-year-old son is autistic.