SPLIT TOPIC: Special education and the City Council race

The thing is, it's an intensely personal decision where to send a student to school. I work with kids who often have a choice between their local public school that likely doesn't know how to address their special needs, a public school farther away that has more resources for them or a private, residential school that can absolutely address their needs. While I don't think politicians always do a good job of or are allowed to keep their personal livves separate from their political lives, it seems like this is a situation where the dude is attempting to address more macro issues and not one issue specific to his own life. This is a pretty good way to govern, in my opinion. If he did only focus on special education, or make it a bullet point in his campaign, might he then be accused of only pandering his private issues?

I just checked out Brad Lander's campaign site which says,

"we can do more to make sure that all students are getting a good education, including children with special needs (who are often poorly served, or forced to sue the DOE just to get the services they need)"

Nice!

Source: http://bradlander.org/public-education

scarlett,

You write, " If he did only focus on special education, or make it a bullet point in his campaign, might he then be accused of only pandering his private issues?"

I think you might be over thinking it. If scarlett, as you suggest, Mr. Skaller’s “private issues” prevent him from advocating for children with special needs, then he shouldn’t even be in the race.

pokersloper wrote: As far as repeating myself goes, I would say I am responding to posts. Either way, I appalled that a candidate with a child in a private, special education school doesn't seem interested in [yada, yada, yada, same as every other post I've made in this thread]...

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MOD NOTE: I have split this discussion off into its own thread so that those with a special interest in this issue can discuss it as much as they like without derailing the other thread. I placed several links to this thread in the general Skaller/City Council thread.

I am exploring Brad Lander's web site and really like what I am seeing. Mr. Lerner wrote,

"...fewer than one in four Black and Latino students graduate high school in four years with a Regents diploma. And only one in five special education students and one in four English Language Learners graduate in four years."

Source: http://bradlander.org/blog/2009/07/24/educational-justice-pac-endorses-brad

Lerner seems to have his education priorities in place and his comments on education strike me as well informed and I dare say impassioned.

Danielle,

I have no connection at all with any candidate except for being stopped several times by various ones at the subway.

As far as context goes, I am very interested in the special education aspects (or lack of) for this election.

I have a child that attends private school funded through the the Dept of Education. My other child attended public school.

Many kids that were previously referred to seperate special ed classes are now
integrated into mainstream classes with assistance. It works better in the early years when the academic demands are not as high and because the earlier grades are more likely to have smaller class sizes. These kids tend to be higher functioning and generally will be limited to a few in each classroom
that is set up for the inclusion model of education.

However, this has had an unintended consequence in my mind, that more kids
are eligible for private school. Higher functioning kids are shut out of the mainstream classrooms due to limitations in seat availibility, and the special ed only classrooms that exist will have no to low academic content since they are set up to satisfy the lowest common demoninator.

It is not an easy process to get Carter funding and approval for a non public
setting. Certainly no parent I know pretends their child has a disability to get a seat in a private school.

reader,

You wrote,

“Many kids that were previously referred to seperate special ed classes are now integrated into mainstream classes with assistance.”

Yes, 100% agreed. Every year, I tend to “graduate” about 5-10% of the children I work with out of special education services or out of some of their services. In Bay Ridge, many parents understand this is a good thing. In Park Slope, many parents see this as denying their child a service. I have tried to explain to some parents that moving in and out of special education services is relatively rare and a really good thing because I only move a child out of special education when he/she is able to function at level in the classroom. Parents, especially in Park Slope, sometimes forget that you only take a child out of the classroom if that child is having academic difficulties in the classroom.

You wrote,

“It works better in the early years when the academic demands are not as high and because the earlier grades are more likely to have smaller class sizes. These kids tend to be higher functioning…”

My experience has been that there are different levels of functioning across all grade and age levels.

You wrote,

“Higher functioning kids are shut out of the mainstream classrooms due to limitations in seat availibility,”

I haven’t heard this or experienced this, but it is clearly your experience which makes it valid.

You wrote,

“and the special ed only classrooms that exist will have no to low academic content since they are set up to satisfy the lowest common demoninator.”

Good special education teachers (I know some!) teach and modify to each child’s level. This isn’t just the company line, I am amazed at how well my colleagues do this.

You wrote,

“It is not an easy process to get Carter funding and approval for a non public setting.”

My experience has been very different. In the past (I no longer do evaluations), I evaluated many children for the Department of Education, maybe as many as 50 who were Carter cases. I didn’t even know what a Carter case was until one day my supervisor explained to me what they were. How cool is that? I was evaluating children whose families were suing the city and the DOE didn’t give me any special instructions or warnings – these cases were just treated like all the others. My supervisor explained to me that it was pretty much a game. The parents hired private therapists to conduct evaluations, the DOE did our evaluations, the parents hired a lawyer, a hearing was held, and the parents and the city negotiated a number for tuition reimbursement. From my experience, the process was not that challenging for parents who know how to advocate and know how to find the right attorney.

You wrote,

“Certainly no parent I know pretends their child has a disability to get a seat in a private school.”

Well, for the most part, I share this experience. But I have also evaluated a handful of children whose parents were clearly upset that the testing scores were not lower. One parent (and yes, this was only one parent) said to me that his son shouldn’t have scored so high because he is autistic. Some parents asked to sit in during my evaluations so they could observe me test their child. I always said okay, but I also told the parents that in my report I would write that the parent’s attendance during testing may have a positive or negative effect upon testing results (which, was of course, very true). A child may freeze up in front of a parent, be distracted or attempt to play close attention. Parents would never attend testing once hearing that I would write in the report that the parent was present.

I will never forget testing a child on the autistic spectrum and finding many of his skills to be at or above grade level. The parents were upset. I don’t envy a parent who has to fight for services for a child who is very bright on many levels, but it does sometimes create a situation in which parents want or expect their child to score lower than they do on testing.

porkersloper, you might be interested in the last segment of this episode of This American Life. it's about a woman whose daughter has down syndrome. the child tests well after receiving early intervention therapy, and the mother has to decide whether to just be happy that she's testing better or fight the results so the child can keep getting services.

http://www.thisamericanlife.org/Radio_Episode.aspx?sched=1249

sweet tea,

I will check that out. Weird, I must have missed that episode, I tend to tune in every week. From what you have described, it sounds like real life!

This country is facing some tough special education decisions, including,

Are we satisfied that some disorders go "untreated" if they do not adversely effect classroom performance?

Down syndrome aside....

It always fascinated me to see how some parents of kids with psych dx (aka kids in SIE VII and SIE VIII) let their kids go to a District 75 school, while other paents put in the effort to get Nickerson letters.

At the time my son was aging out of EI, there were not too many inclusion seats. His initial recommendation from the local CSE was NPS, because of the political ramifications of that, a second team did an eval, and recommended inclusion or MISIV. Then a third team did an eval and recommended NPS, because of the exteme variation in ability in his testing and multiple problems uncovered.

I placed him in a non public setting, as recommended, but still had to do the
hearing process for a number of years to obtain funding. I've never used any outside testing nor hired an attorney to win my case, but used the write-ups from the BoE testing to make my case that there is no appropriate seat. The quality of the BofE testing has always been excellent and professional.

I wanted my bright disabled child to be educated not warehoused. Any seat that has been offered in the system did not meet his needs. Unfortunately this means my child is bused out of the neighborhood and missed out on the neighborhood school experience.

Ironically, it is my opinion that because he tests so high on many of the subtests that the NPS setting has been held from K-12.

reader,

You wrote,

"His initial recommendation from the local CSE was NPS [non public school]..." I must say, I can't ever recall a time that a student was recommended by the schools for a non public school placement. This makes me wonder why? Considering that the recommendation came from the schools, it makes sense that you would not need a lawyer. Most of the Carter cases I worked on, it was my impression that the parents were either lawyered up or could be soon.

"Unfortunately this means my child is bused out of the neighborhood and missed out on the neighborhood school experience." This is unfortunate. Where I grew up, we all took the bus to school as a by product of civil rights legislation.

I know that different schools in my district offer different services and different facilities. I don't expect the city to offer a perfect school for every child in every neighborhood, but I do expect that politicians work hard making it so that every child has an appropriate seat within a reasonable distance.

I agree with you about the quality of DOE testing. My colleagues, for the most part, do a great job.