Late last month, Easterseals Arkansas cut the ribbon on its new academy. The K-12 school aims to provide a tailored curriculum for children with developmental disabilities. Little Rock Public Radio's Nathan Treece has been following the story and has this report.
When opening a story, it's always good to start with a joke.
"Knock, knock."
"Who's there?"
"Howard."
"Howard who?"
"Howard you like the tour of our new school?"
And when working at a place like Easterseals, it helps to love what you do and who you work with.
"I haven't seen my people in a while. I gotta stop. I gotta get a hug."
Luckily, there is no shortage of dedicated people.
"This is the only place I've ever worked," said Syd Imo, who has worked with the nonprofit since 1987.
"I started as a TA in a school-age classroom, and then I went to the preschool and was a TA in the preschool and decided I wanted to be a teacher."
She said every day is a challenge.
“But it's also really rewarding and funny and gentle and genuine and crazy and all the things."
Easterseals Academy was founded by board member Lisenne Rockefeller and her husband, the late Lt. Gov. Winthrop Rockefeller, in the 1990s. The school was, at the time, run from their home, but later moved to a location in Riverdale. The school continued largely unchanged until the COVID-19 pandemic, when CEO Ron Ekstrand said they hit a stumbling block.
"Financially it was struggling and we weren't sure whether we could keep it open. And with COVID, we weren't really sure how we could keep people safe."
They continued to provide their services throughout the height of the pandemic, and as word spread of their model, more space was quickly needed.
"Families were so happy with how their children were learning and how safe an environment it was. Word of mouth spread, and we opened up a second location here. So we had two campuses, but we really wanted everyone under one roof."
The school launched a campaign to consolidate its services, expanding its capacity for comprehensive care and education for children with developmental disabilities.
Monday, Easterseals cut the ribbon on that culminated effort: a new K-12 academy in West Little Rock, offering services to up to 220 students.
Community Engagement Officer Karye Brockert said it takes a village to help these children grow and thrive, and now that village is under one roof.
"They can start as early as 5. They can stay until they're 18, then graduate, if they're ready, or 21 if they need to."
The building is designed with sensory-friendly rooms and accessories like noise-canceling headsets and wobble chairs for kids who need to move to stay focused. There's space for both group and individual therapy and medical services, including an on-site nurse.
Another feature is the Activities of Daily Living Classroom, which mimics a small apartment.
"Some of these skills to be independent doesn't come naturally, and so we have to teach them specifically with task analysis. This is a visual recipe book. And so it's going to tell you, rather show you, what I'm going to need when I'm making the recipe."
Ekstrand said their efforts have one focal point: independence.
"Because a lot of times, families and society will put unintentional limits on their loved one because they will say, trying to keep them safe, 'Oh, Johnny can't do that.' And what I would say is Johnny can't do that yet."
For an organization that is working to break down limitations, Easterseals is no stranger to barriers.
While the LEARNS Act was working its way through the Legislature, Ekstrand noticed that while the act was providing higher pay for teachers, it was inadvertently reducing benefits to their families.
"They could either access Educational Freedom Accounts, or they could access what's called the Philanthropic Investment in Arkansas Kids Act scholarship. Unintended consequence: the increase in starting salaries means that we are going to have to increase, which means our tuition is going to be more. And it's potentially going to make sending your child here financially out of reach."
He reached out to legislators immediately with an alternative solution.
"Allow our families to not only access Educational Freedom Accounts to pay for tuition and fees, but also stack onto it the Philanthropic Investment in Arkansas Kids Scholarship, which is a needs-based scholarship. And it went from an idea to talking to the governor's office to talking to the bill sponsor and having it modified within a three-week period of time."
In addition, Ekstrand met with the governor's office for public funding for the academy's construction, and the ask was just under $5 million.
"And I actually asked if we could do more. And we directed $6.5 million toward this project so that we could get every single kid off of the waitlist and enrolled here at Easterseals to watch life-changing activity."
But despite the commitment to the nonprofit from the state, the organization now faces the threat of federal funding loss.
"The funding cuts have been one of the biggest threats we have. We are an organization that is funded 92% on government funding, and probably 90% of the total is Medicaid. So cuts to Medicaid, any kind of cuts, are a threat to us and our ability to continue to sustain."
The reconciliation bill that just passed through Congress will levy new work requirements, change eligibility determinations and renewal procedures for Medicaid, among other provisions.
But it isn't just direct cuts that Ekstrand is worried about.
"It's also the indirect consequences of cuts that are coming across the board because Medicaid is a joint program. It's partially funded, primarily funded by the federal government and partially funded by the state. Well, if the federal government is going to cut its overall funding and it's going to impact nursing homes, or it's going to impact rural hospitals, and it could threaten the shutdown of those, the state probably doesn't want that to happen. And so they're going to think about, well, what can we do to ensure that funding? And with a limited budget, it may have to shift some funding. And we hope that it doesn't. That's designated for us that would then be used elsewhere."
Still, Ekstrand is optimistic about the future. He said the Little Rock academy is a great leap forward, but it is still just a start, and he already has his sights on the future.
"We're just scratching the surface of the need. We could have probably built a school here that was three times larger than this, but there's a certain size beyond which you start losing that sense of community. We're actively looking to open up another location like this in Northwest Arkansas, as well as southeast and southwest Arkansas. We'd like to be in all four corners of the state."
Ozarks at Large transcripts are created on a rush deadline and edited for length and clarity. Copy editors utilize AI tools to review work. KUAF does not publish content created by AI. Please reach out to kuafinfo@uark.edu to report an issue. The audio version is the authoritative record of KUAF programming.
