Schools for Colorado’s “most vulnerable” students are disappearing

Erin Schneiderman used to get calls in the middle of the day two or three times a week to pick her son up from his Denver elementary school. 

The third-grader had run away or was standing in the hallway screaming. Meltdowns could last for hours. School was just too loud and crowded, with too much unpredictability, for a child with autism who craved routine. 

Denver Public Schools decided Schneiderman’s son should go to a privately run school that specializes in serving children with intense behavioral, mental health or special education needs. But when it came time to start fourth grade, he still didn’t have a spot. The boy spent two months at home, most of that time getting no education at all.

Today, nearly five years later, the few options for Colorado…