Welcome in her community, but not at school, autistic teen misses years of education

Boston Globe

08-07-2025

For years, the mother and daughter have cruised Newburyport on a red tandem bike, becoming regulars at several local joints. At The Juicery, workers deliver Nina's 'Peanut Butter Bliss' smoothie straight to their window-side table so Nina, who has severe autism, doesn't have to wait at the pickup counter amid a throng of other customers
.
Other times, Nina and her mother head to the YMCA, where the teen slices her athletic frame across the lap pool, often sharing a lane with another swimmer.
Anywhere you go here, it's clear to see: Nina,
despite being unable to communicate with strangers using words, is embraced by her community — in all but one place, that is.
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Though the local high school is just an eight-minute walk from Nina's home, she cannot attend there.
Newburyport Public Schools has said the campus is not equipped to meet her complex needs, despite, according to Joor, having appropriate specialists on staff. Instead, the district has been pushing to send Nina away to a residential school for disabled students possibly hours from her home. Joor and her husband are fighting the proposal.
The push and pull has had considerable consequences on the Joor family. Nina, now out of the classroom for three years, has missed crucial lessons, as well as opportunities for friendship. Her parents have been squeezed financially. Sarah Joor has had to take leave from her job, while she and her husband had to start paying for extra insurance so that Nina could access therapies she should be getting in school.
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Nina's story, in many ways, illuminates the strides left to be made
Nina stands at a muscular 5 feet 8 inches, with thick brown hair and eyes as blue as a summer sky. Her verbal skills are limited, though her family typically understands what she's trying to convey with her mumbles and groans. She
comprehends what is being said around her.
Nina is outgoing, unafraid to hold a stranger's hand or to point out something she deems wrong with a person's appearance. One time, her target was a woman in a home decor store whose coat was not zipped up all the way. Nina reached toward the zipper to pull it up herself. The woman, initially startled by Nina's intrusion, ultimately accepted the teen's recommendation with grace.
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It's interactions like this — ones that grow people's understanding of individuals with disabilities — that Nina's parents can't help but imagine would be taking place at the local high school, if only Nina was enrolled. Instead, she's been without a school where she can learn and thrive for three years.
'Schools should not be able to pick what kids they can and can't educate,' Joor said. 'Where does it stop?'
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Nina's education has been at issue since June 2022, when Joor and her husband Bill chose to withdraw the then-14-year-old from a private special education day school in New Hampshire. The Joors had discovered the school, which, according to state tuition rates, would have cost Newburyport Public Schools at least $120,000 per year, had so little structure that they had concerns for Nina's safety.
Nina was running around, day after day, doing whatever she pleased, rarely interacting with the school's staff, according to her parents. When behavioral therapy was first offered, it was through a virtual appointment; the practitioner lived in Michigan. The Joors were not initially told of this arrangement, believing for two months Nina was getting in-person support on campus.
'To put it in perspective,' Joor said, 'an ambulatory student needs a scooter, a deaf student needs a hearing device, and an autistic student needs appropriate behavior support to access an education.'
When Nina would come home in the evening from the New Hampshire school, her body would 'vibrate'
with chaotic energy, Sarah Joor said, leaving the teen unable to get a sound night's sleep. Nina required medical intervention to become regulated and healthy again, according to her mom.
The Joors let Newburyport know in advance their reasons for withdrawing Nina; the district, according to the Joors, did not dispute their decision. (The Joors would later find out the district had been withholding practitioner notes documenting Nina's precipitous decline. The documents, obtained by the Joors through an ongoing legal battle
and viewed by the Globe, showed Nina was at times unable to participate in vital therapy sessions because of her uncontrolled behavior.)
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In the years since she and her husband withdrew Nina from the New Hampshire school, Sarah Joor, an attorney by trade, has found herself fighting with the district's lawyers over what's best for her daughter.
The Joors said all they want is for Nina to attend school during the day with her peers and to be able to continue living with her family. But the district, according to correspondence viewed by the Globe, has continually pushed through its lawyers for her to go to a residential school, even recommending one in another state that costs as much as $500,000 per year and has been
Seventeen-year-old Nina Joor goes for a walk with her service dog, Raja, and her mother, Sarah Joor. Nina is autistic and struggles to articulate words. She hasn't been in school for three years.
Jonathan Wiggs/Globe Staff
Between tuition and lawyer fees, the Joors question why Newburyport won't put money toward in-district programming suitable for Nina.
The Joors offered to waive Nina's student confidentiality rights so the district could speak to the Globe for this story. The district declined.
'As a matter of practice, we do not comment publicly on individual student matters — even when a release is offered — out of respect for the student's confidentiality," said Superintendent Sean Gallagher. 'The district has no further information to provide and will not be making any additional comments.'
Richard Jackson, a retired associate professor at Boston College's Lynch School of Education and Human Development, doesn't know Newburyport's reasoning for not educating Nina at its own high school. But over his decades in special education, he has dealt with a number of districts that
said they didn't know how to provide needed services. His frustration over the inaction has never dissipated.
''We don't know what to do,' is not an excuse, because there's too many people making that claim that are licensed and professionally trained,' he said. 'If they don't know what to do, then they're incompetent.'
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Study after study shows children with disabilities benefit when instructed alongside their typical peers, said Arlene Kanter, who founded the nation's first disability law program, at Syracuse University, and continues to travel the world working to end the institutionalization of disabled children.
What may be less known, she said, is that children without disabilities also achieve more in inclusive classrooms.
Some private special education schools have said they can't — and shouldn't — be the default solution for children with complex needs. Elizabeth Becker, executive director for the Massachusetts Association of Approved Private Schools, said the schools she represents 'are an important part of the continuum, but not a catch-all.'
Nina's most recent neuropsychological assessment, conducted in 2024, recommends that the teen attend a day school. School after school with day placements, though, have told the Joors they cannot take Nina. Some said they didn't have an opening in her age range. Others said their schools would be inappropriate for Nina's needs, such as being unable to provide her with a dedicated aide.
While awaiting a solution that does not involve uprooting Nina from her family and community, the Joors have since September 2022 paid through their insurance for Nina to receive critical services, including physical and speech therapies. The Joors are now suing Newburyport Public Schools over its failure to provide the free and appropriate public education Nina is entitled to under federal law.
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Bob Crabtree, a retired special education attorney who co-authored Massachusetts's 1972 special education law, never imagined children like Nina would still be denied appropriate schooling all these decades later. Her story triggered in him a memory from the time he, as a legislative staffer, was working to get the Massachusetts law passed. Bumping, back then, into a state senator outside of a State House elevator, Crabtree had no choice but to listen to the man's callous comment.
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'He said, 'I just want you to know, the money that goes into what you're pushing is right down the drain,'' Crabtree recalled.
In late spring,
Newburyport finally agreed to provide Nina with limited services, paying for her to attend a behavioral support center part time during the month of June.
Nina is still receiving no educational services.
On a recent outing to The Juicery, Sarah Joor and Nina bumped into a young man at the counter. The man, who appeared not much older than Nina, had a cognitive disability and was with an aide.
He asked Nina her name and age, and Joor helped translate Nina's responses. He then asked where Nina went to school.
'She doesn't,' Joor said.
'She doesn't go to school?' the young man asked, stunned. 'Why not?'
As she approaches adulthood, the Joors can't help but think about
their daughter's long-term wellbeing. Nina's brother, Sam, is a 20-year-old college student. The day will come when Nina will be his responsibility, Sarah Joor said.
The Joors want Nina to have her own life. They want that for their son, too. But with every missed school day, Nina's chances for some level of independence feel further out of reach.
'We want to get her to a point where she can be successful and (her brother) doesn't have to support her and advocate for her the way we do,' Joor said.
She sighed.
'Special education parents haven't figured out how to live forever.'
Mandy McLaren can be reached at