A stumble on First Steps? Try cost-cutting in program, but don’t shortchange children needing help.
Source: By Bob Caylor, whose daughter was in First Steps, for the editorial board, Knight Ridder Tribune,
May. 12, 2006
Parents, teachers and children make a better team with service coordinators. By outsourcing the management of its program to help infants and toddlers who are disabled or developmentally delayed, the state has embarked on a risky experiment. The cost of its failure would be children losing precious months or years of intensive help when that help would do the most good. In Allen County, the experiment means that a Muncie company, Achieva Inc., will take over the administration of the state’s First Steps program. In this, as in many other social services, the administration of Gov. Mitch Daniels is trying to save money by privatizing work formerly done by state employees. Hoosiers should be willing to see whether this approach works, but they ought to be cautious and quick to call for improvements if these children younger than 3 aren’t getting the early intervention and therapy they should. ….. The problem: Service coordinators, who oversee the services provided to each child, are expected to take on a much larger caseload – perhaps 80 children per coordinator, instead of 40 or 50, as The News-Sentinel’s Jennifer Boen reported this week.