School Choice for LD Kids

Couldn’t agree more. Good competition creates a stronger market. Monopolies in any market make the supplier unmotivated, and uninspired to continue to meet customer’s needs. Instead, the product drops to the lowest common acceptable product. Sadly, with few exceptions, the system’s bloated beaurocracy feeds on itself and funds seem to go to the top heavy administrative level, missing the battle lines of the classrooms, the teachers and the needs of students. Hmmmmmmmmm.

Private school cost more that’s why public schools fight so much. The average 8,000-12,000 a year for a public education verses a 25,000-40,000 private education. It wouldn’t be effective enough unless special needs children got atleast 2/3 (though more like 4/5) of the private school tutition.

Kelly:

Consider what the higher dollar cost for private school gives the kids. The public schools have not done a great job in educating our children, and that is why private school with the parents tax monies should be an alternative. Let’s try it.

Actually, for our son’s 7th & 8th grade years we placed him in an extremely small parochial school because of it’s class size. The cost was probably 1/2 of what public schools say it costs to teach a child for one year. The ld school we put him in for 5th & 6th cost a whole lot more. Worked out financial aid and even worked there to pay off tuition (part time). Point with them was if the public school would have released our child’s funding, the would have applied to the state for the rest… unfortunately, we live(d) in a district where they fought vigorously to keep the funding. Irony is after the fact, we found out one of the board member’s children ended up attending the same special ed school (funded)… ironic and a bummer. (board member’s last name is Crooks, go figure?)

The other cost to remember is what is it costing your child, your family and society to leave a child floundering in a system that may not be able to accomodate him/her.

Given the cost of educating many special needs students, many schools are not fighting to be first in line. I believe the actual dollar amount of the voucher may not cover the full tab. So, the parent either kicks in a sum (that would be fine by me), the school fund raised like the dickens (another decent idea), or the occasional school runs on a shoestring (another ok idea, but….this may mean teachers who work for “Peace Corps” money and you will find that there are a small number of teachers who can and will work for low wages, but given the cost of eduction and the cost of living, they are few and far between).

I feel that when we argue that school choice will make schools more competitive, I think there may be some truth to this. However, schools are clearly not permitted to be run like businesses, so to think that they will compete like businesses may a bit of a “pipe dream.” If we were truly permitted to actually run special ed. programs to OUR liking we could and would do things differently.

I would create “centers.” An LD center would house LD students for a given area, along with the general ed. population. This center would also be staffed with specialists (fulltime) and programs/materials. A business would be run this way. Students would be bussed in to the center. However, the reality of special education is more of a regular ed. direction. Let’s keep everyone in their neighborhood school and send the services to them. So, we might have one of these and one of those, plus a few LD peppered across multiple grade levels. This stretches resources and requires specialists to waste valuable teaching time driving from location to location. We pay them mileage as well as for this time that is not spent with students.

Parents have more and more demanded keeping their children at their home school. We have no control over the demands parents make. This sets apart from business, which can be run on a more cost-effective model.

Benito, we have performed a grand experiment in this country that has not been attempted elsewhere: education for ALL. We don’t know what private schools would have done. We DO know they would never take ALL students. Until the latter half of the 20th century we still had a significant drop out rate in our schools. We do NOT have years and years of data on how to educate all children, despite the many challenges that are part and parcel of the goal. We are learning, we must look to teachers and programs that have proven successful and understand why, then teach this to our colleagues.

Public schools are often giant bureaucratic organizations, change comes slowly. I think smaller districts could be more responsive to the needs in their community.

There is always the difficulty of having that occasional severely handicapped yooungster who costs the public school $40,000 per year (don’t kid yourself, they do) and even in a small community, will the rest of the tax payers get behind this and happily allocate these $$$ to these low incidence needs, like in a charter school?

I have a relative who teaches in a charter school, they are public schools. They do provide for LD students, but when the threat of a fully-included Down Syndrome child, complete w/1:1 aide raised its head, the director nicely called the mother and told her they really could not meet the child’s needs. Translation: they did not want to spend the $$$$ to meet her needs. They could jolly well do just what the local neighborhood school had been doing for several years. It would just suck money. They are doggone lucky the parent did not choose to take them to task over that illegal comment.

Oh, that school is boasting of some of the highest test scores in the tiny state. Hmm, well when you have picked all the cherries, what do you expect and your further wiggled out of providing for a moderately retarded child to boot!

Schools fight because they don’t wish to lose their “pot” of money. A smaller total pot means less for “fat cat” administrator salaries, office decor, and ritzy travel budgets. All kinds of budgets!

Teachers’ unions have some teachers convinced that salaries will go down so they find ways to convince teachers that private schools/vouchers are the evil of our modern world. Administrators nod eagerly, based on their private agenda. Off we go following along without thought!

Now, here’s the rub: Public schools *must* take all comers; private schools may legally and ethically pick/choose. Now, if you’re a parent that is cash-intensive, they’ll view you well and take an off-the-wall behavior kid. (The screamers, kickers, biters, lowest-of-the-low-achievers, etc.) Their entrance requirements are pretty stiff and they can ask you to remove your kid any ol’ time they wish. Not so with public schools.

So, now, we would have only the lowest-of-the-low and off-the-wall behavior kids going to public schools. It no longer represents “average” America.

Now, I’ll close with saying that I’m willing to try vouchers for a decade and see if it works. Convene at the midpoint and take stock of the pluses and minuses and readjust. I think it has come to the point that a trial is necessary.

I never thought of this. Both of your posts make so much sense as to why things are the way they are. You are right. Because public schools must take everyone, it is impossible for a school to be run the way it should be run.

Now, this realization does not make me happy nor do I find the current state of education acceptable, but it makes me see things a little clearer.

Thank you.

I can remember a time when it was said that hospitals could not be run like businesses.

I saw that change. The hospital was either run like a business or it lost it’s accreditation. The joint commission on accreditation of hospitals took this requirement seriously. Hospitals were forced to develop continuous quality improvement initiatives in replace of the previous useless, waste of time, quality assurance procedures. Quality assurance was really only about filling out forms and increasing the amount of paperwork.

Hospitals looked at how they did things. They evaluated processes. Committees became teams. We developed the ability to measure our interventions and improve the way we did things. It was a very interesting time to be working at a major healthcare insititution.

This happened in hospitals the late 80s early 90s. I really don’t fully understand what is taking the education system so long. They now call it six sigma. (We called it CQI, same thing though, just some slight improvements.) It is used at many corporations to improve the way things are done.
It really is a methodical approach that relies on obtaining objective data to measure outcomes.

If you are going to test children who are struggling at school there should be planned very specific research based interventions that are done for those who score low on specific areas tests.
An example might be that a child who tests low on phonemic awareness would need to have this issue addressed.
A child with dypraxia clearly needs occupational therapy type exercises.

Instead it seems we test, then put them in a “special situation” but basicly do things they same way with just a little extra help.

I would propose that if systems were set up where by one could look at a test and have available a system for dealing with that deficit it would be more efficient and kids would get what they need.

Also if the work required is too much for the schools perhaps instead of handing out inane busy work for homework the parents could be instructed on specific research based exercises that would help the child actually improve.

When private schools- including LD schools begin taking public money (vouchers) do they not lose the ability to refuse students- which- if you have ever attempted t get your child enrolled in one- is a huge issue. Then they become… public schools. Imagine.

My guess is that private schools will squash vouchers on their own. That exclusivity is too valuable for them to give up- philosophically, programmatically and financially.

Robin

Mamm:

All I am suggesting is that people be able to use dollars their dollars to find alternatives to public schools which are failing or are not meeting the child’s needs. The education of the child comes first: If people are so opposed to it… why do they later complain about the high crime rate or folks on welfare. Besides, in your life do you want there to only be one phone company or car company to choose from ??? Why should education be any diffrent ? How is it that government gives financial aid to people to attend the college of their choice but not the elementary or secondary school of their choice ? What’s the difference? If the mother who has a Down Syndrome child claims the charter school did not want to take her child that can be solved by her signing a waiver of liability legal form to let the school take action if her child is being disruptive of the rest of the class in spite of the accomodations made for the child. The school prefers not to have to get in a legal tussle with some parents over severly handicapped or violent children disrupting other peole’s education.

Anyway you say education for all is a great experiment ?? I beg to differ… Why do we in the U.S. rank below Korea, Taiwan and China in math, science and geography to cite examples… It is not because we do not fund enough $$$. Besides…. taking all students is not always to everybody benefit… because it is not fair if a few are allowed to disrupt the class. If parents want an LD school for example…. they should be able to spend the $7,500 in tax monies to help pay for the private school which better serves their child if their public school did not do the job of education.

Teacher:

You are very courageous to come out and say this in favor of trying vouchers for choice. I want to assure you that this idea I bought up is not anti-teacher… I grew up seeing a classmate who was LD suffer through junior high/high school academically and it hurt ! He did not have the option to use tax monies of parents for even a trial run. He is now in a job he dislikes but is helpless to try to take a chance v=because he is not strong academically to go through school and reach higher. I applaud you for telling the truth although, I understand you want to stay unnamed for your own safety. I hope we can do this trial run and see what really works.

I had to put my two cents in here. Both of my boys are currently using a school voucher for a private school. We live in Florida and the McKay Scholarship is specificly developed for ESE students. If the student has an IEP,and the parent is unhappy with the students progress they can recieve a voucher( the ESE funding) for their child to attend a private school,that is participating in this statewide program.
We agreed,or better yet BEGGED to participate from the first day that this program became a statewide statute. This was July of 1999,at this time it was called the “opportunity scholarship for the disabled”. How it became the McKay? Senator John McKay a senator out of sarasota county,Fla. Got passed into legislation a pilot program that was this voucher,specificly for his constituents,in Sarasota county. His daughter happens to have ADHD and LD,and he seems to have an insight in regards to the quality of education for Special ed students in this state. Now why did it become the McKay? This particular statute has been amended three times since it’s it first passed through legislation. I have my own personal theory,but I will let you decide for yourself.

I applied for the voucher,at the time of it’s first edition,the parent must provide documented evidence of lack of progress in two consecutive years in two different subjects,in regards to specific IEP goals.I had no problems doing this,my boys made no progress,and the state already had documented evidence by way of four state complaints on behalf of my oldest son:-)Okay so the parent sent this information to the state department of education,the department of education would say,yup you can have this voucher. The catch,once applied I looked at the list of private schools,hmm,there were two in my county. One school was specificly for children with ADHD,once visiting the director looked at my boys scores and writing samples and basicly said,I will have to let our school psych look at these,but I don’t think we can help your kids. The next school,was nonexistent. Seriously. They had applied to the state,got on the list,and had NO SCHOOL! For two days I mourned for the fact that here was this program and no school wanted to participate,for fear of governmental regulations. OH,one of which was they must take the state funding amount,or the schools tuition whichever was less. Not many schools wanted to participate under this constraint. I looked one last time at the list and my kids school showed up,wanting to particpate and accept students. We jumped at the chance. It couldn’t be any worst then where we had already been. We quickly enrolled,it was the day before the new school years was supposed to start.This school wound up being the very best thing to happen to my kid and our family:-)

We never revised the boys IEP’s,we left without getting services reccomended for them on their IEP. Never had I as parent, concerned myself much with the amount of funding,or how it was formulated. I knew the services reccomended needed to be on the IEP,I had evals pending and wanted to wait until the results were in a report before we had the IEP. I got the reports,I requested the IEP,now don’t forget I had my two already enrolled in a private school,under the state’s funding. I was shocked to find out I no longer had a legal right to an IEP.( the school district refused to have an IEP meeting,and the state allowed it,they had to amend commisoiners orders on the state complaints! in order to do it) The first check came in and it was thousands of dollars less then what they would need. As the statute was written the school would get either the tuition only or the sped funding. What they didn’t include was any type of related services. So here my two were,severely dysgraphic,in need of assitive technology,in need of OT,in need of speech and language. They didn’t have the money,they couldn’t afford these programs,and they would either have to go back to the public school,or go to the private one without the services.

The DOE had no answers for us,there were 62 students involved in this program it’s first year. They were ill prepared to administer the program,and let us not forget,they now had 62 very telling IEP’s that were either illegal,or showed appalling lack of services causing lack of progress,and they were getting more of this documentation every day.

While the state tried to figure out what to do,I felt they were not only discriminating against these students,by terminating their civil rights to IDEA,but they were using a document( the IEP) that was very much a terminated right to formulate the funding. The problem with this? Well,once enrolled the student had no way to formulate needed funding for needed services. I will give you an example,the student enrolls in the private school,the parent knows the kid has not made any progress,but they don’t necessarily know why,well the very qualified ed specialist does an eval the first week the kid is there and finds out the kid has significant issues that need to be addressed with an OT. The therapy isn’t on the old IEP,because the public school never identified the student,( sound familiar?) and NOW the student no longer has the right to the IEP,( the only way to generate the needed funding for the service). Hmm catch twenty two or a very good plan by the state to control the funding of these students?
Anyway the office of civil rights stated that the placement was a parental choice,therefore they no longer had the right to IDEA rights,except as a parentally placed private school student,BUT the way the state administrated the program was still under federal laws.

I filed a civil rights complaint against the state,they increased the boys funding,then…
this is when the first amendment of the statute took place:-) The parent no longer had to show documented evidence of lack of progress,they only had to be unhappy with the public school. What the funding is used for is strictly up to the parent and the private school. The state once sending the money has no right to tell the private school or the parent what they can used the funding for. This a very scary situation. There is a private school asking parents to sign guardianship over the them, so the checks coming from the state can go directly to there main office in another area of the state.WHAT? I know,but it is happening. The state has put themselves in a position of not having ANY control over what the funding is used for,in order to control the amounts being sent. Now the other very important change they made to the staute was the state could not make any retrocative payments or have an authority to do so.hmmm.. AND the part about taking the amount of tuition or funding whichever is less as full payment mysteriously disappeared from the staute. They do not state the private school can require the parent to pay the difference,they don’t state the private school can’t they just don’t say it at all. This means what? Well lots of parents are being asked to pay the difference,and until this is challenged in court it will stay this way,until the next amendment….

Do not get me wrong I LOVE the school my children attend. I have no intentions of leaving this school until they are ready for college. It took a long time of fighting to get what they needed once they were there,but hell,I was well trained in being the Mother from hell,my school district already did that!
I learned a lot about the program and how to make sure other parents don’t have to go through what I went through ,besides the state changed the staute so they couldn’t! The biggest thing that bothers me,is the state does not inform parents that they WILL lose the rights to IDEA,parents do not realize this,because it is state funding,so it is assumed it would be a state placement,but it is not,hence the term Parental choice,this is why this term is now used,instead of state voucher. The OCR reccomendeded to our state that they inform parents of this termination,but also stated there was nothing they could do if they didn’t. So far the state hasn’t decided to take them up on this reccomendation. HMMM……

Where I live the private LD schools are VERY fussy about who they will admit(above average IQ, no NVLD, etc.) and cost upwards of $15,000/yr…the private prep schools are even more difficult to get into and also very expensive. A voucher of $2-3,000 wouldn’t go very far in Massachusetts for private school. And yes private schools can be as choosy as they’d like as to whom they admit.

that you, Benito, remain anonymous also. Are you a teacher, too?

What a nighmare. Somehow, getting parents to sign their rights away seems like it will eventually bite these big boys in the butt. Legal wheels turn really slow, don’t we know.

I admire your fight, socks!

You are so right: Posh private schools want language-based LD (lower verbal, higher performance) and at least 95 FS IQ. My son, who was a flip-kid, was always on the verge on non-acceptance. He has scores that range from 18 to 4 on both sides—with an FS over 100.

Most of the kids with emotional issues have higher verbal and lower performance scores. Private schools just don’t want to deal with all that. There are some summer programs that will take these kids, though.

Public schools must, by law, attempt to educate each child they are given.

No I am not a teacher. I just do not want Spam flooding email systems. Anyway, choice is what we need.

Mamm:

Only in America would we as a society abdicate stuff parents are suppose to deal with and let a bunch of strangers to serve as advisors for our children’s emotional issues. Japan does not do it; China nor Taiwan does it either… Their test scores are higher than ours and violence in schools is a fraction of what it is here. It ought to tell us something….

A good statistician knows that correlation of numbers doth not show cause. When we are dealing with a culture and norms markedly different from our own, the variables are many.

Try again.

Basically, the cost to edcuate a LD student verses a regular ed student is more even in the public system. My point is that vouchers for LD children should be higher becuase of the coast of private schools. There are many types of private schools out there some just LD and specific special need while others private with a lot of support. A children deserve to be able to live up to their full protenial and if it takes a school that tailors to their needs, they should have it. I’m a outplaced student my self and the city pays half my tutition and my tutoring cost. To me that is reasonalbe. It always varies from case to case, for some the city should cover everything.

Right! Until someone out there decides to fight the statute( in court) in regards to terminating IDEA rights,then they get away with it. The question is why do they want it this way? The state funds the program,to me,it IS a state refered placement? I find it interesting that the term parental choice is now used,is this there way of informing parents? Can they turn around and say,well,it’s a parental choice,this should of told you that IDEA rights are terminated?

Parents see this opportunity as a way to escape the public school system,to never have to sit and fight hours at an IEP meeting. To try and try to get services that will affect progress for their child,to try and get anything from their public school is time consuming and emotionally draining,we all can agree on this.Parents leaving for the voucher are UNHAPPY with the public school system. The reality is this last IEP,the IEP you will leave with is NOT the IEP to forget about. If you thought your rights were there to revisit when needs developed you might be willing to go and not worry about that last IEP.This is a fatal mistake. If parents knew about the termination of these rights,at least they would have a fighting chance at understanding that this IEP is worth every ounce of parental fighting power that you can muster.Why is it the state has decided not to tell parents?

DO NOT be mistaken,this state program has national attention. The OCR I filed is still open,the washington office became interested and has been in conversations with our state DOE. Due to being a program specificly for disabled students,it is the only program of it’s kind in the nation. What develops here will set precedence for voucher’s yet to come.OCR used the wisconsin voucher program to determine what rights theses kids had. The governor wrote to OCR asking what IDEA rights students with disablities had in the scheme of things.OCR used the same response to the questions being raised.

One basic question that OCR does have is,the only way for a student in a private school under this program has to generate funding for needs that have been identified( which by the way a private school student still has the right to be evaluated and identified by the public school system) is to reenroll into a public school,add the service on the IEP and pull them out again with a voucher?

Yes, you are right,what a nightmare…
Let us hope they figure out something better here,otherwise,one will have to decide how valuable your kid’s civil rights are.That is if you figure out they are gone! Hey,for me at this juncture they don’t mean a damn thing. What has IDEA done for me lately?

absoulutely… The teacher union and administrators will try to convince you otherwise. Thanks for the input.

This is why American education is so messed up today… We listen to the “experts and statisticians instead of using common sense passed down from the past. The other societies I mentioned seperate the other issues from education and stick with educating their kids. We need to try some of it… It might just work….

Nothing ! Except give a migrane headache. Ha Ha Ha…. LD rules !

I knew this in bits and pieces Socks- but what a mess it is to see it all together. Your fortitude astounds me. I still haven’t worked out how people can think vouchers are better but… and despite the obvious attractions I will never move to Florida. The bureaucratic manure would kill me:)
Robin

The huge irony in all of this is, I am all for vouchers! What I am not for is the government turning it into a way to deny rights,and control funding. It makes me laugh when people scream about the money leaving the school system. Let’s get real,the bill analyst estimated the system saved upwards of a million dollars by these kids exiting the school system. They saved on less paper,less meetings,less staff needed. They will continue to save money,because they figured out a way to control the funding,when if they were a public school student the funding can change time and time again,whether it lowers or is raised,depending on the needs of the student.And let us not forget the hours upon hours an IEP can last while they try and convince the parent the kid is doing well. The disparity exists when a parent,either doesn’t know what rights they have lost,when I kid who needs OT can not afford to pay for it,and is forced to go back to the very place they were trying to escape, or do without it
Which class of citizen you think will suffer? It sure won’t be the upper class,or even the upper middle class.Leave no child behind? BS.

One little thing I forgot to mention. The students do not take federal funds with them( one more reason the OCR stated they had no jurisdiction,that this placement was a parent being offered FAPE and refusing it). Where is their federal funds going??The state continues to recieve federal funds for the whole population of kids? Parental choice? Let me see if I get this straight. I could continue to denied FAPE,or I could go where I couldn’t afford FAPE.
The way I saw it,what choice did I really have? My kids needed to learn,they didn’t learn in public school,I found them a place they could learn in,I was NOT going to lose it.I pray everyday the voucher continues..

Fine, try it. However, bear in mind that public schools operate under numerous federal and state mandates, constraints and dictates. They do not have the right to do as they believe is best for handicapped students. I still don’t think those schools for LD are going to pop up everywhere.

But, you never know until you try it. The model has many issues to work out. And I agree with Susan that this will siphon off the kids from the families who have more, care more and can do more and will leave the bottom of the barrel in public, so to speak. This is what happened in my sister’s community when a group of parents started a charter school. Only the white collar, concerned about education parents were on the ball enough to get their childrens’ names submitted and get in. They had the highest test scores in the state. Any surprise? Good school, yes, GREAT parents.

You know we teachers continue to believe that great parents are an asset of immeasurable value.

Well then, you just cast a vote in favor of let someone decide who is a good parent or has the potential to be a good parent and say they can have kids if they are responsible. The ones who are not good parents don’t bother to have kids. I still know that people are better off with choice rather than a one big monopoly which in some cases destroys lives and demorilizes some LD folks. I cannot control the fact some parents do not have backbone to stand up for their kids and some do.. I just do not want the rest of the people to suffer because someone is try to do social experimenting like a scientist in a research lab does on a monkey to guess reactions.

Dear Robin,
It is too damn bad that you wouldn’t move down here,but I can obviously see why you,such a great evaluator,wouldn’t want to.This has been a reoccuring theme. The very good educators,therapist,and evaluators get tired of the system such as it is,and wind up moving out of the public sector for the private one( good for me;-) or they move out of the state all together.

Correlation still does not show cause. When considering asian cultures, one must remember the values instilled in people requiring selflessness, altruism, wisdom, and value of the old and learned. None of these things appear to be very important in our culture. Is education really the cause, then, or is it asystemic cultural issue?

Teach:

Culture is not what the issue is: The thing that makes their schools good is that they focus on delivering one product: Educated students. They do not concern themselves with being a dating advisor or wheather one should comit hari-kari or divorced parents. Stuff like that is minimal. They have educated populations because they only focus on Reading, Writing and Arithmitic. We focus on sports, advising students about condoms or dating, why mommy and daddy use drugs instead of feeding me…. These issues are not educations buisiness. Those are home issues. Also, Taiwan is like America now in fashions, musical tastes, two income families and r rated tv shows. Yet, they manage to have good education systems.

When children are hungry, cold, fearful, etc. they cannot learn. This premise has long been accepted and crosses cultural barriers. The lack of personal freedoms in some other nations would make it easy to remove such children from the home of neglectful parents and put them in a place where they are safe, fed, and subsequently able to learn. This is a more difficult feat in our nation of civil liberties and many children suffer much for the freedoms of adults. Yet, our societal foundations are based on individual rights. Not so in most Asian nations. Group rights are the norm.

Time will tell on the Taiwan topic. Too little longitudinal data. Too many neighboring countries in close proximity with different opinions.

Benito, your arguments have little to do with education and more to do with cultural elements. I’m checkin’ out on ya, brother.

Tell us all about special education programs in, say, Japan. Are there IEPs? Can a parent demand and get full-inclusion? Are there mandated functional behavior analyses and behavior intervention plans? Please help us to understand how Japan is doing a much better job educating disabiled youngsters.

Yes, it is a totally different culture. I daresay the culture may be the reason for the lower crime rate, not the schools.

First of all teach… The civil liberties have nothing to do with removing children from neglectful homes/parents and education success. If the authorities want to do something here they can when they put their mind to it. Second: You have not shown why we should keep our current education system vs providing vouchers. Can you show me any other reason other than . “It drains monies from the public school system. What public monopoly has been shown to be a success ? A government owned telephone system ? The Post office ? D.C. General Hospital in Wash. D.C. ? Why should school be different ? And for the record: Taiwan is a democracy like us with civil liberties and big lawsuits too since the 1980’s. Yet education seems to be so much better than we are doing. So Teach…. the only ones who beneifit from this system are teacher unions and fat cat administrators here in America.

As I said- I continue to be awed by all you folks accomplish and I learn more every day!

First of all: Japan does not waste time on producing paper. It educates students disabled and abled. It makes them feel welcome and secure. The trouble makers are delt with, and the disabled are taught well and if parents are not satisfied, then can get their demands met without resorting to lawsuits which only lawyers make big money. Also, there have been alot of kids who are identified as ADD in America who really are not too serious. The school just medicates em to not having to deal with them. Japan does not overdo with psycho docs and social workers who are in some cases not sane themselves or use dope or smoke weed less than they should be advising kids on proper behavior.

You are absolutely right. There is a boy at school that was at two private schools. He wasn’t progressing as fast as they wanted him to, so they asked his mother to take him out of their school in the middle of second semester and he didn’t receive credits for many of his courses. He is a junior at our public high school and a student of mine this past summer. He was tested and didn’t qualify for sped services so we hand picked his courses so that he is one of the regular ed kids in our team classes. We help all kids in those classes so he will receive help just like all of the rest. I worked with him this summer with PG, so now he is reading his 11th grade books with fluidity and I will watch out for him in school. Just because you send your child to a private or charter school, doesn’t mean that he will be receiving a better education. Many private schools, like you said, pick and choose who they take. And like this boy, asks your son/daughter to leave if they aren’t doing well in mid-year so that they won’t ruin their statistics! Also, most private schools won’t recognize an IEP and don’t have special educators on staff. Many schools don’t use remedial programs either. We are one of the only countries, (does Canada as well?) that has tried to teach all children, even those that do cost a lot of money. We have one teacher, not an aide, that has one student that is severe and profound mentally challenged and physically handicapped. Where else in the world except in the U.S. would you find this girl in the public schools? There are, at last count, 1700 kids in our school , and growing, 75 languages, and 21 special educators. Our classes are maxing out and our dean is going to ask for another teacher. There are 30 students in my teamed English 11 classes and I have 13 in a self-contained English 11 class. I have an aide, but I just can’t take any more kids, the classroom is too small.. I told some of my disruptive students that they had better leave their behaviors outside the door or I would have them leave with my aide. I don’t have time or space to deal with them. So far, they have been good. They have to pass the 11th grade English SOL in order to receive a standard diploma, so they have to be able to learn. I think that they understand that, but we’ll see.

I think all of you know that I am a high school teacher, sped, in a public school. I have been given $250 to spend for my kids. I actually have a reading class this year because I had received such good results last year with an after school program. My county has no other program for ld kids except Wilsons and this hasn’t helped. We have a SOL, state tests, passing rate of 45% for LD kids. So they gave me a reading class. I have 10 kids and all of the programs that I am using are mine. I am going to the department chair and see if I can get money for Read Naturally and some walkmen. I would really like to know why sped costs so much and where does the money go? Except for my remedial programs, the department doesn’t have any. The whole concept for special ed in 6-12 is accommodations not remediation. If I don’t get the money, I guess I will have to buy RN myself. I like the program because the student feels that for the first time, he has a say in his reading education and it does help fluidity.

I would like to know what state you are talking about, concerning teachers’ unions having clout? I teach in VA and our union has no clout. The state board of education runs the show, good or bad. I know that when I taught in Pa, the union had a lot of ‘clout’, I don’t know if it still does.

You wrote at the beginning of this thread:
This is why American education is so messed up today… We listen to the “experts and statisticians instead of using common sense passed down from the past. The other societies I mentioned seperate the other issues from education and stick with educating their kids. We need to try some of it… It might just work….

How have you become a qualitative expert on American and Asian/Japanese education and cultural systems? Common sense from whose perspective? I find your rhetoric is inflamatory and rambling, thanks.

Got Prozac?

Because I lived it. I have friends who lived it. Also, if you have soo much confidence in the system, why don’t you teachers subject your classes to a competition with those Japanese or Taiwanese students who knows more and why don’t you teachers take a proficency test too. The ones who pass get to keep tenure the ones who do not… Sorry…Bye-Bye.

New York state.. Especially New York City They are king.

I agree with Shay in respect that teachers unions have no clout at all. In fact in the state of Georgia it is illegal for teachers to become unionized and has been since the 1950’s. If anyone is curious, Georgia did away with tenure for new teachers beginning in 2000.

Laurie

Shay that is a damn good question. I would like to know where the funding goes. It is a double edged sword,the school and parents expect a certain amount of progress,and no one seems to want to come up with any money for it. Wonder how many parents would participate in a fund raiser for the RN program? Talk about the kids feeling an ownership of their reading education.
I would personally have no problem getting a walkman for my kid as part of his suply list. God knows they ask for weirder things:-)

Since the good ol’ USA no longer tracks students into professions as they did in the 50’s & 60’s, you are comparing apples & oranges because Japan does track students into trades/careers for which they have an aptitude. (Sorry to point that out…) If our cell-pool-of-a-system is so lousy, why is everyone clammoring to get in it?

Japan also only tests the best-n-brightest. Same with many European, and other Asian, nations. We are the only country that would allow choice to low-achieving students—and insist those students take the SAT’s. Anything else you know about?

Well… Tenure should have been ended for teachers begining in 1990 the year they were hired. Tenure hurts kids and the parents. I f a teacher is not making it, or shows little intrest in the job, then you can’t remove em. The burden of proof is too hard.

Well teach. I don’t know if after 9-11-01 if many Arab students or non-white ones want to come and attend American universities if they have to put up with the hassles and the harassment from the INS because they look like terrorists. Are you aware, that many people from this country clamor to attend foreign education ? It gives you a wider view of the world. Also, in case you did not know or were asleep in your education classes, Japan’s education system was redone after World War 2 by the American Occupation Forces under Gen. Douglas MacArthur, who imported American style education values and procedures to the Japanese. So, I do not know where you get the idea Japan only tests the best and brightest ? If what you say is true, about the students getting tracked into professions based on tests, maybe they are doing a favor to the students… Instead of leading them to believe without facts, they can become a rocket scientist without an appropriate math courses, they are presenting reality to students. Unlike here, where alot of students who are LD are told by teachers “oh you are doing great” Not! However, I doubt it greatly that the Japanese test only the best even today.