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August 11, 2004

Roles for deaf, blind schools would be expanded

From: WKRN, TN - Aug 11, 2004

FRANKFORT, Ky. A plan before the state Board of Education would require Kentucky's schools for the deaf and blind to provide more services to sight- and hearing-impaired students state-wide. The proposal would require the two schools to raise test scores, but would allow them to keep their kindergarten-through-12th-grade programs.

The state board is expected to take up the proposal tomorrow.

The plan is partly a response to criticism of the schools' academic achievement and a demand by some officials that the state get a better return on its investment. It requires some 16 (m) million dollars a year to operate both schools.

Officials at the state Department of Education say it is no longer efficient or effective for the money to be spent solely at the two schools. They say 80 percent of the state's eleven-hundred, 50 deaf and blind students are being educated in their home districts.

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