A school psychologist assigned to Canarsie's Public School 276 has been arrested and the case turned over to [in Brooklyn, NY] Kings County District Attorney Charles Hynes after she allegedly falsified records involving services for children with special needs.more on this as news becomes available
And here's the update:
A Canarsie school psychologist is facing seven years in prison after she allegedly admitted to doctoring records of special education students, prosecutors charge.
Officials said that Shari Lovenheim of P.S. 276, located at 1070 East 83rd Street, was taken into custody and charged with falsifying business records and forgery for signing the names of a special education teacher and a general education teacher who were responsible for reviewing and approving Individual Education Programs (IEP) of special education students.
The IEP reports are individualized written evaluations that describe the education programs designed to meet the needs of students with disabilities or those enrolled in special education classes.
By Department of Education (DOE) mandate, these IEP reports are supposed to be “developed and revised in a conference which includes parents, both general education and special educations teachers, school staff and often the students.”
Educational professionals attending the meetings are supposed to sign the IEP report to show that they were there, according to DOE rules.
But a recent evaluation of the IEP reports conducted by school administrators allegedly showed that several of these evaluations didn’t take place, although the reports sported the signatures of both the special education teacher and the general education teacher.
According to police and published reports, Lovenheim admits that she forged the signatures on at least 20 of these reports because she was “overwhelmed with work” and had to cut corners.
Investigators charge that some of the forged IEP reports ensured that students received services that they did not necessarily need.
Administrators of P.S. 276 forwarded their findings to Special Schools Investigator Richard Condon, who brought the case to the Kings County District Attorney’s office.
Lovenheim, who had worked at P.S. 276 from September 2005 to April 2006 and has since resigned her position with the DOE, was released on her own recognizance following her arraignment Tuesday.
She is expected to come back to court to face the charges in October.
“We expect our employees to follow the law, especially when it comes to services for our children,” said DOE General Counsel Michael Best. “This is unacceptable behavior, and we hope the District Attorney will prosecute this case vigorously.”
Robert Ryba, Lovenheim’s attorney, declined to comment about the case when called by this paper.
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