Residential Treatment Facilities
Fair School Funding
Residential Treatment Facilities
Equal Access
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Students in hospital programs, including partial hospitalization programs (PHPs), inpatient hospitalization programs, and day treatment programs maintain their right to a free public education.
Learn more about student rights in hospitals here.
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The School District of Philadelphia issued a new protocol on August 6, 2024, consistent with state and federal law, which outlines the steps that the district will take to identify students in hospital settings and ensure they receive legally required educational services, including special education services. When a student is in an inpatient hospital, the school district in which the inpatient hospital is located is responsible for providing educational services, including special education services, and for communicating about the student’s needs and progress with the student’s district of residence. The District’s new protocol outlines how it will ensure that students in inpatient hospitals receive the education services to which they are entitled.
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This report by Children’s Rights and the Education Law Center-PA, entitled Unsafe and Uneducated: Indifference to Dangers in Pennsylvania’s Residential Child Welfare Facilities, raises serious concerns about the safety of Pennsylvania’s residential placements for youth in foster care – and about the quality of education provided there.
In 2017, more than 3,700 youth in Pennsylvania foster care were in residential facilities, so that 47% of youth aged 14-21 in Pennsylvania foster care lived in these facilities, compared to 34% nationwide. Because of a lack of adequate oversight by the Pennsylvania Department of Human Services, these facilities expose children to harmful treatment, including verbal, physical, and sexual abuse and mistreatment from staff and other children.
The report highlights that the “on-grounds” schools that most children in these residential facilities attend similarly lack proper oversight from the Pennsylvania Department of Education. These schools typically offer inferior education with curriculum far below grade level, largely ignoring the heightened learning needs of these students. Read our joint release summarizing the report.
Read this December 2018 report.
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In 2009, Stoneleigh Foundation Junior Fellow Arley Styer joined with the Education Law Center to explore the educational experiences of children placed in Pennsylvania group homes and residential treatment facilities. These children, many of whom tend to suffer from behavior disorders, often encounter educational barriers such as lack of needed special education services or too few hours of schooling while in placement.