The Cumberland County Board of Education on Tuesday unanimously approved more than $1.88 million in purchase agreements and professional service contracts to support students with disabilities.
The $1,884,713.22 in purchases and contracts includes iPads for K-5 Extended Content Standards classrooms, which serve students with significant cognitive disabilities; an online instructional platform for high school Exceptional Children’s students; renewed sign-language interpreter services; and contracts with two outside companies providing psychoeducational evaluations.
The agreements were unanimously approved by the board’s Student Support Services Committee—which consists of board members Delores Bell, Jacquelyn Brown, Greg West, and Susan Williams—on August 4. The full board provided final approval during its meeting on Tuesday.
The funding for the contracts for the district’s Exceptional Children’s Services comes less than two months after the school board approved more than $7.3 million in contracts for therapy providers, staffing agencies, and instructional support services to support students with disabilities for the 2026-27 school year.
The new spending comes as Cumberland County Schools continues to face scrutiny over its special education services. Earlier this year, state investigators found the district failed to consistently implement accommodations for a middle school student, while separate state complaints and a federal lawsuit have raised concerns about delays in evaluating students suspected of having disabilities.
During the committee discussion, administrators also acknowledged persistent vacancies in several specialized Exceptional Children’s positions despite recent hiring progress.
What the $1.88 Million Includes
The board approved the following contracts and purchase agreements for board approval:
- Apple for $148,875.71 to provide 150 replacement iPads and professional learning for K-5 Extended Content Standards classrooms. The devices include accessibility features such as voice over, dictation, speak screen, predictive text, switch control, and assistive touch to help students communicate, participate in instruction, and become more independent.
- Imagine Learning (Edgenuity) for $297,837.51 to provide an online instructional platform with state-certified English language arts and mathematics teachers for high school students with disabilities while they continue receiving support from district teachers.
- The Interpreter Network for up to $880,000 to renew sign-language interpreter services for students whose Individualized Education Programs require them.
- Krush Evaluations for up to $293,000 to renew psychoeducational evaluation services to help the district complete student evaluations while addressing staffing shortages.
- Pear for up to $265,000 to renew psychoeducational evaluation services supporting cognitive, academic, adaptive behavior, and social-emotional assessments used to determine eligibility for Exceptional Children’s services.
‘That Is Something to Celebrate’
The agreements with Krush Evaluations and Pear continue the district’s use of outside companies to complete psychoeducational evaluations as Cumberland County Schools works to address staffing shortages and an increase in referrals.
The evaluations measure areas such as students’ cognitive abilities, academic performance, social-emotional development, and adaptive skills. The results can help school teams determine whether students qualify for special education services and what support they may need.
Lisa Craver, the school district’s psychological services coordinator, said both companies have worked with the district for three years and have become an important part of its evaluation process.
“These two agencies we’ve been working with for the past three years have consistently completed 200 evaluations a piece for each company,” Craver said. “They do make a significant impact on the number of evaluations that we’re able to complete.”
Craver said the district completes more than 2,000 psychoeducational evaluations each year through a combination of contractors and district psychologists.
Ahead of the 2026-27 school year, Cumberland County Schools also hired eight new school psychologists, an accomplishment Craver highlighted during the committee discussion.
“That is something to celebrate,” Craver said.
Craver said the district recruited heavily from university training programs across the country, bringing interns from West Virginia, Massachusetts, New York, Florida, Kansas, and Western Carolina University.
“We don’t typically get any North Carolina folks,” she said. “They’re all coming in as interns, very well qualified, and we’re looking forward to having them with us and training them up so they’ll stay.”
The district is also participating in a three-year federal grant administered through the N.C. Department of Public Instruction that provides retention bonuses for current staff members, sign-on bonuses for new hires, and additional professional training opportunities.
110 Evaluations Completed During Summer Push
During the committee meeting, Board member Terra Jordan asked district leaders how much progress the school district made this summer in reducing the number of students waiting for psychoeducational evaluations.
Crave said the district completed approximately 110 evaluations over the summer, though she cautioned that the figure could change as final reports continue coming in.
Craver said the district relied on its own staff to conduct summer evaluations rather than the outside contractors it uses during the school year. Some contracted evaluators travel to Cumberland County from out of state, and student no-shows during the summer can make scheduling those evaluators inefficient.
“The contractors don’t work in the summer, simply because we have to bring those kids in, and they’re traveling from out of state,” Craver said. “So when they come in, we don’t want them to waste their time when they have no-shows in the summer, which we do.”
Instead, Cumberland County Schools brought together psychologists, occupational therapists, and speech-language pathologists in what Craver described as a “one-stop shop,” allowing multiple evaluation services to be provided in one location.
Looking ahead to the 2026-27 school year, Craver said the combination of newly hired psychologists and contractors should allow the district to continue reducing its evaluation backlog.
“I have every confidence with the staff that we have, and the contractors that we have, that we should be able to clear the decks,” she said.
Having more school psychologists assigned to individual schoolss this year should also strengthen the referral process by allowing them to work more closely with teachers, administrators, and families before evaluations are requested, Craver said.
“We were so short last year, we had 17 people, and they worked as points of contact,” Craver said. “Now they’ll be back in the buildings. They’ll be able to consult with teachers, administrators, and parents on how to guide those referrals as they come in.”
Craver added that the district is preparing for a larger effort to strengthen its Multi-Tiered System of Supports, or MTSS, framework, which is designed to identify and address students’ academic and behavioral needs before special education referrals become necessary.
Steep Drop in Speech-Language Pathologists
The discussion during Tuesday’s meeting later shifted to the district’s continuing difficulty filling specialized positions supporting students with disabilities.
Superintendent Eric Bracy asked when the school district was last fully staffed with school psychologists.
“It’s been a long time,” Craver replied. “We had one year where we were completely fully staffed, and it wasn’t a week into the school system before we lost one. There’s a shortage all over.”
Board Vice Chair Jacquelyn Brown asked whether many of those staffing losses occurred after the COVID-19 pandemic. Craver said more school psychologists have opted for contract work instead of direct employment with school districts.
“We see lots of folks who want to go out on their own and do contracting,” Craver said. “I try for direct hire. Contracting is really expensive. I really prefer to have direct hires because we get more bang for our buck that way, and they’re able to work with children, as well as schools and families.”
Brown suggested workplace flexibility has also become a factor in recruiting and retaining employees.
“If they can work from home you’ve got to dangle the carrot to lure them back,” Brown said.
As board members celebrated the district’s progress recruiting school psychologists, Bracy turned the discussion to the continuing shortage of speech-language pathologists (SLPs).
“As we sit here and celebrate psychologists, we have to figure this out for SLPs,” Bracy said. “So, is this a compensation thing? What can we do to attract them?
“It’s not just us going through it as a county, but I’m worried about us. How do we fix it? Because we have to fix it.”
Craver said recruiting directly from university training programs before prospective employees graduate has been one of the district’s strategies.
“The easy way is to go straight to the training programs, and make yourself known before they ever get out of that training program, and try to get them in, either through internship or whatever they’d have to do for their programs,” Craver said.
Melody Chalmers McClain, associate superintendent of Student Support Services, said the shortage remains critical and that the district continues to face the same number of vacancies it had last year.
“That is critical. It’s very critical,” McClain said. “We continue to have the same number of vacancies.”
Reuben Reyes, associate superintendent of Human Resources, put the shortage into historical context, saying the district’s speech-language pathologist workforce has declined dramatically over the past decade.
“Back in 2014 we had almost 60 SLPs, and I believe we are at less than six,” Reyes said.
Bracy suggested compensation may ultimately determine whether the district can reverse that decline.
“If we get the money right now, they will come to work,” Bracy said.
When Board member Mary Hales asked whether prospective employees are informed about available hiring incentives, Craver said they are. Bracy, however, said the district’s current incentives may not be enough.
“But obviously it’s not enough,” Bracy said. “If we went from 60 to less than six, it’s probably something as simple as compensation.”
