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Obituaries

Kathleen Duplantis | School director, 73

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Kathleen Ryan Duplantis, 73, formerly of East Falls and the retired director of the Green Tree School for special-needs children in Germantown, died of liver failure Dec. 11 at home in Loranger, La.

Mrs. Duplantis became director of Green Tree, which educates students with serious emotional disturbances and autism, in 1989 after a 30-year career as a teacher and supervisor of special education for middle schools in Orleans Parish in Louisiana. She was passionate that children, whatever their disabilities, have a place in a classroom, her daughter Suzanne said.

Mrs. Duplantis lobbied for state funding and was founder and past president of the Alliance for Approved Private Schools in Pennsylvania. Last month, Rep. Dennis M. O'Brien, speaker of the Pennsylvania House of Representatives, paid tribute to Mrs. Duplantis at a dinner in his honor, for teaching him about advocacy for the disabled.

After leaving Green Tree in 2000, she returned to Orleans Parish as a special-education consultant until the schools closed after Hurricane Katrina.

Mrs. Duplantis graduated from St. Mary's Dominican College in New Orleans and earned a master's degree in special education at the University of New Orleans. Despite her academic accomplishments, she felt she had a learning disability and could relate to her students because school had been a challenge for her, her daughter said.

Mrs. Duplantis also is survived by her husband of 48 years, Larry; a son, Lawrence; another daughter, Jeanne Miranne; two sisters; and eight grandchildren.

A service will be held at 10:30 a.m. tomorrow at Bryn Mawr Presbyterian Church, 625 Montgomery Ave.

Memorial donations may be made to the Kathleen Duplantis Fund, Green Tree School, Box 25639, Philadelphia 19144.