Vermont: Enrollment down, SPED up; autism driving the increase
- The end of childhood
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Feb 5, 2026, VT Digger: Vermont’s school enrollment is declining. Students needing special education are on the rise
Vermont’s special educators have a unique problem. Students with individualized education programs, or IEPs, are spending more time in regular classroom settings than the national average — a positive for the state’s public education system.
But concurrently, Vermont sends those students to out-of-district schools at a rate more than double the national average, a practice that’s costly and generally not ideal for students.
“What do you think is driving that gap?” asked Rep. Bridget Marie Burkhardt, D-South Burlington.
Erin Davis, the Agency of Education’s chief academic officer, said that was “an area of further inquiry, and it’s a reason we’ve identified this finding as a critical one in our analysis here.”
During a joint meeting of the House Education and House Ways and Means committees on Thursday, officials with the Agency of Education presented the findings of a report published in September on the state’s special education delivery system.
The report found that while overall student enrollment in Vermont’s schools has decreased, the number of students on IEPs has increased at a rate outpacing the national average since the 2019-20 school year.
Students with autism, and students who are labeled as having emotional disturbances, are driving much of that increase, the report found.
And more of these students are now qualifying for the state’s extraordinary cost reimbursement, a program that provides financial assistance to districts and supervisory unions serving students with disabilities that are more expensive to address.
Since fiscal year 2018, Vermont’s total special education costs have increased by more than $76 million, to $473 million in fiscal year 2024, according to Agency of Education data. . . .
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