Georgia BOE orders Oak Tree students moved immediately to another facility

ALBANY — The Albany Herald has obtained a copy of a letter dated July 22 from State Board of Education Chair Michael Royal instructing the Dougherty County School System to move Oak Tree Psychoeducational Program students to another facility before the start of the new school year on Aug. 2.

Citing “unsafe and unhealthful conditions” at the center on 1150 Cordell Ave. (site of the former Sylvandale School), the State Board letter said the facility “has been identified as a facility where children cannot continue to be served. Therefore, students receiving services at this facility must immediately be transitioned out of this site before the beginning of the school year.”

The letter, however, did not mention the DCSS Pre-K center that is located in another wing of the facility.

Oak Tree is a GNETS (Georgia Network for Educational and Therapeutic Support) school and comprises 24 programs that support the local school system’s continuum of services for students ages 3-21 with disabilities. The programs provide comprehensive educational and therapeutic support services to students who might otherwise require residential or other more restrictive placements due to the severity of one or more of the characteristics of the disability category of emotional and behavioral disorders.

Sources said Thursday eight other GNETS schools statewide had received similar letters from the State School Board.

On Tuesday, DCSS Superintendent Butch Mosely fired off a strongly worded email to State School Superintendent Richard Woods.

“It is physically impossible to meet this request with such short notice,” Mosely wrote “Surely the powers-to-be understand the dilemma this mandate places us in. We will appeal this to the highest levels of government. Stay tuned for breaking news. I talked with a state senator yesterday who will work our case up the food chain. With a reasonable time frame we can meet the mandate, but not within a week of the children arriving.”

Mosely said his staff is working with the state for a possible extension.

State officials inspected the school in January, then followed up with another inspection earlier this month. Included in the second inspection were an architect and three engineers. The second report is what led to the BOE issuance of the transition letter. However, DCSS officials say they have not seen a copy of this report, which The Herald is attempting to obtain from the state.

“I’m surprised at the DOE by the the way this is all coming down,” Oak Tree Director Kerri Miller said. “The reason I am saying this is when a Department of Justice inspection was done over a year ago, they came back with results that were given to the Department of Education, the governor and the attorney general. So those groups knew there were concerns that far back. We are just now getting that type of information.

“When the second inspection team came around, they told us what we needed to do and the whys. Now we are getting nothing but ‘shut it down.’ Right now, we don’t know what to do.”