CHARLESTON, W.Va. — Highland Hospital is tired of getting the runaround. The Charleston-based psychiatric health care facility provides education for its long-term school-aged patients but receives no reimbursement from the state.
Highland CEO Cynthia Persily took the concern before the state legislature’s interim commission on Children and Family’s recently. She said she’s been trying to get answers for three years.
“We have been shifted from department to department in terms of who is responsible,” Persily said. “I’m asking the legislature for some guidance on who should be paying for the education of these students and Highland is asking to be treated equitably with out-of-state and in-state providers in that realm.”
Highland is currently treating 18 children in its long-term unit. Each October it turns its student count over to the Kanawha County school system. The hospital is reimbursed mainly by Medicaid for the health costs but receives no reimbursement for education costs. Highland provides year-round education for the patients, Persily said.
“We bear all the expenses of the programming including materials, iPads, teachers, teacher benefits, computers, books, space and staff to attend school with the students,” Persily said.
Highland employs two former Kanawha County teachers for the long-term program. Kanawha County Schools provides a teacher for Highland’s acute care treatment program where the education schedule is more limited.
Persily is asking the state to finance the per-diem for the long-term students or for the state Department of Education to provide permanent teachers to Highland. She said the hospital spends $28.60 a day for student per teacher and another $34.76 a day for personal items. Pay and benefits for two teachers totals $130,000 a year.
Associate State Superintendent of Schools Clayton Burch told lawmakers state School Superintendent Dr. Steve Paine wants the issue to be part of the department’s improvement package that it takes before lawmakers next year. He said they would like to create a pilot project where the department oversees the education under its Office of Diversion and Transition.
Burch indicated the students are in and out of county school systems so it’s created a question of who should pay for their education.
“They are still under the county’s count but there’s this gray area of who is helping who (financially) supporting them. I think we want the Office of Diversion and Transition to fully support them no matter where they are,” Burch said. “I think what we want to do is to step in and full-time have an instructor that’s going to assist them.”
Delegate Kayla Kessinger, R-Fayette, urged Burch not to “reinvent the wheel” with the pilot program. She said what Highland is doing with its education component seems to be working well.
“If we can use what they’re doing and learn from it and apply it in other situations that seems like a much better and cost-efficient solution,” Kessinger said.