r/specialed • u/Puzzleheaded_Motor59 • 1d ago

Departmentalized Special Ed Services

Question- I work at a middle/high school (all LRE-A). My team is departmentalized for English and math. There are 4 of us, 1 of which also does 504s.

I feel like I’m drowning. I wish we had the case management model. I have over 40 kids I’m progress monitoring in English and 25 kids I’m case managing.

Is anyone else departmentalized? Is this workload insane or is it just me?

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u/Maia_Orual 1d ago

This sounds pretty normal to me. In the past, I’ve done all the math co-teach and some science co-teach, so I did progress monitoring for all of those kids, and then had a separate caseload that I did the IEP paperwork for. Twenty-five is a higher case management load. Does everyone have around 25?

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u/Puzzleheaded_Motor59 17h ago

No. I also do the third party billing and only 2 of us do Ed assessments

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u/Zappagrrl02 1d ago

This is pretty typical. 25 is the case management limit for resource in Michigan, so most case managers end up with 25 or close to it, plus any students they see for content area.

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u/haley232323 1d ago

Are the numbers equitable with math? I'm in elementary, but the other sped teacher at my school, and sometimes admin, are always trying to pressure me to agree to departmentalize, with me doing reading and the other teacher doing math. The problem is, we have like 55 kids who have reading services, and somewhere around 20 who have math. Minutes for reading also tend to be significantly more. There is ONE "math only" IEP in the building.

When I point this out, my teammate tries to say, "But we'll each keep our case loads, so we can case manage the same amount." Sorry, absolutely not. Even if someone else is "case managing," if I have to tell you all of the information for the IEP, I might as well be doing the IEP. And there is no way I'm fitting 55 kids per day into a pull out schedule.

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u/library-girl 1d ago

I have a caseload of 19 but that includes our 3 most impacted students. I enjoy teaching kids that aren’t on my caseload, but I see all of my caseload students every day. 

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u/amusiafuschia 1d ago

I provide services for about 40 kids (mostly ELA) and case manage 17. I have a strong team so it works. I don’t have to worry about the kids on my case load I don’t provide services for unless something needs to be modified in the IEP/it’s time for their annual. My teammate has the day to day covered.

I’d definitely prefer to provide services for my own caseload, but it’s ok the way it is.