Public Autism Education in New Jersey

Public schools open their doors to autism —-the fourth in a series of articles on autism in the Bergen Record —provides a thorough account of how public school districts are seeking to create in-district programs to meet the needs of a growing number of autistic students. While it costs one New Jersey school district $12,000 a year to educate a typical student, the total for an autistic student is $62,000 per year—-versus over $100,000 per year in an out-of-district private school program.—-the fourth in a series of articles on autism in the Bergen Record—provides a thorough account of how public school districts are seeking to create in-district programs to meet the needs of a growing number of autistic students. While it costs one New Jersey school district $12,000 a year to educate a typical student, the total for an autistic student is $62,000 per year—-versus over $100,000 per year in an out-of-district private school program.

 While only 29 New Jersey school districts had autism classrooms in 1995, 139 now do; most of these classrooms use Applied Behavior Analysis (ABA) as their teaching methodology. Families have moved, and are moving in, to New Jersey from all over the country, due in no small part to the state’s having “a strong reputation as an excellent place for public education in general — and autism education in particular. Indeed, we moved to New Jersey—back to New Jersey, that is, as it is my husband’s home state—in 2001 for Charlie’s education, and we are very glad to be here.

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