Canceling the Austin High School special needs students’ prom was just another blow to be suffered, according to one frustrated parent.

“As a mother of three children in the Austin School District I am very concerned and disappointed in the events which have changed the special education department,” Angela Ruhter said. “I am especially outraged by the recent cancellation of the spring formal dance that those with special needs have attended.

“I have two boys who are in the accelerated program at the high school and who have taken many honors classes as well as benefited from the post secondary option,” she said.

“My daughter is very bright and outgoing, but she struggles more than her brothers, because she has Down’s Syndrome,” Ruhter said.

That’s what the latest special education controversy is about: people.

Real people such as David and Angela Ruhter and their three children.

The mother put a face to the “special needs” controversy at a recent Austin School Board meeting.

When Austin Public Schools administration canceled the special needs students’ prom two weeks ago, interim superintendent Bruce Anderson said it was “mostly based on legal reasons.”

The legal opinion that caused the district to terminate the popular event has never been made public.

What is known is the district hired an attorney, who ruled in favor of the district’s decision to cancel the prom.

Those findings were discussed with parents of special needs students when the district’s representatives announced its decision.

Anderson described the decision to ask Arc Mower County to take over the event as a “transfer of sponsorship.”

Neither parents of the 33 special needs students who attended the 2008 event, nor Arc Mower County, sought to take over sponsorship.

Now, Arc Mower County has three weeks to create a new event tentatively scheduled prior to the annual Arc Mower County consumers’ prom Saturday, April 4.

Dawn Helgeson, director of Arc Mower County, could only say, “We’re working on it,” when last contacted.

The AHS special needs prom was held for the last eight years during a school day off-premises.

The district’s special services department’s teachers and paraprofessionals attended and so did Austin school administrators and elected school board members who observed.

Supporters of the event called it a “social learning experience” for the special needs students, but also one of value to mainstream students, who were immersed in the diversity of their teen peers.

Last year, AHS school administration also invited the special needs students to the mainstream students’ own prom and a few attended.

One of the reasons for the district’s willingness to cancel the special needs students’ prom was what Anderson described as “concerns over the sustainability” of the previous sponsors: parents, other community members and local businesses and industries.

While the current collaboration showed enthusiasm, Anderson said a future group of the same partners may not.

Anderson called it a “wonderful opportunity for young people that will be sustainable down the road.”

He also said the district offers “many opportunities” for special needs students throughout the school year.

Don Fox, president of the Austin School Board, would not comment on the cancellation except to say, “It was a school administration decision” that did not require school board action.

Ruhter testified before the March 9 meeting of the Austin School Board.

Five years ago, her daughter, Lydia, got off to a “great start” in the Austin school district. There were field trips with classmates to the Guthrie Theatre, Minnesota Twins baseball games, Confidence Learning Center and other places.

“The Austin school district was truly a model program for other districts to emulate,” she said.

Fast forward to today and Ruhter has a different opinion.

“Since then, the special education program has been picked away,” she told Austin School Board members. “You no longer see the special education students going to the theater in the cities. Neither do you see the handicapped students at Twins games. You no longer see the kids going to Camp Confidence (Confidence Learning Center).”

After the school district canceled special events for the special needs students, that left only one: the special needs prom.

“This was not only an important event for my daughter, but it was also significant to my sons, who are a senior and a freshman,” the parent said. “My sons got to spend time with students who are not seen as often as we would like in the school system.

The parent charged the district with replacing an inclusive event — both mainstream and special needs students — with a segregated event (all Arc Mower County events are for developmentally disabled individuals only).

“This arrangement mimics the district’s unacceptable practice of segregation in a way similar to the busing issue,” she said. “Our special education kids are no longer seen in the larger community as they once were.”

The Austin School Board took Ruhter’s remarks under advisement.