October 2010 Archives

Free Resource Friday took a break last week, but we're back!

Who doesn't like a good training module? The IRIS Center, a federally-funded center that serves as a resource for university professors who train special education teachers, has quite a few for your viewing pleasure.

The modules cover several topics in special education, including assistive technology, differentiated instruction and transition. The intended audience of professors, teachers and professional development providers definitely affects the focus of these modules; I'm not sure parents would find this all that interesting.

However, there's so much special education information scattered all over the web that it is useful to have a place like the IRIS Center, where several topics are housed under one roof.

Posted by Christina Samuels at 5:35 PM | Permalink | Leave a comment | Recommend

It's been a quiet week at On Special Education! Sorry about that, my blogging side had to take a temporary back seat to my reporter side: after writing an article on guidance from the Department of Education on bullying, I started right away on an article about a proposal tucked away in the defense reauthorization bill that would start a $5 million voucher pilot program for military families who have children with disabilities.

This is one of those stories where far more was left in my notebook than I had space to explore in the article. The parents who I interviewed and who emailed me were generous with their time, and told me very discouraging stories. Of course, the parents who have had no problems are not the ones who usually talk to reporters. But I heard from enough folks to understand that there are some unique challenges to frequently moving from school district to school district when you have a child with a disability.

Just when you manage to hack through the red tape at one school district, it's time to pack up and head to another, these families say. If a school district decides that it won't provide services like another district did, mediation or due process can take so long that the problems are not resolved before service members are ready to move to a new town. And of course, as we go enter the 10th year of military conflict, some of these educational issues must be handled by just one spouse as the other is getting ready to deploy to a war zone.

Dee Dee Eberle, the director for chapter organizing and advocacy for The Arc of the United States, said her organization is trying to get its chapters located near military installations to be a resource for parents. One of the first steps the organization is taking is to survey military families on their needs, so I would recommend taking the Family and Individual Needs for Disability Supports survey. The Arc plans to work with the military family support organizations to help both active-duty military and family members in the National Guard and Reserves.

None of the military families I spoke with suggested that a $7,500 voucher would solve their specific problems--they told me they need a continuum of services. But they all thought that a voucher might be a good option for at least some parents. In that way, their thinking is very similar to other parents who have supported special education vouchers in the states: such vouchers currently exist in Florida, Georgia, Ohio, Oklahoma, and Utah.

But it's also fair to note that $7,500 in voucher money won't go very far, and that parents who take that money are walking away from the protections offered by the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, as imperfect as they may be. Enrolling a child in a private school may be the right decision for a family, but it can't be made lightly.

Posted by Christina Samuels at 2:50 PM | Permalink | Leave a comment | Recommend

I made a little visit to the Politics K-12 blog to write a post on new guidance from the Education Department on bullying and when it might rise to the level of a federal civil rights violation.

Though my blog post focused on what the guidance had to say about sexual orientation or religion, the guidance also addressed discrimination based on disability status. Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 (I've addressed Section 504 and its school context in another post) and the Americans with Disabilities Act both prohibit disability discrimination.

The guidance letter offered some real-life examples of harassment, including this case:

Several classmates repeatedly called a student with a learning disability "stupid," "idiot," and "retard" while in school and on the school bus. On one occasion, these students tackled him, hit him with a school binder, and threw his personal items into the garbage. The student complained to his teachers and guidance counselor that he was continually being taunted and teased. School officials offered him counseling services and a psychiatric evaluation, but did not discipline the offending students. As a result, the harassment continued. The student, who had been performing well academically, became angry, frustrated, and depressed, and often refused to go to school to avoid the harassment.

In this example, the school failed to recognize the misconduct as disability harassment under Section 504 and Title II. The harassing conduct included behavior based on the student's disability, and limited the student's ability to benefit fully from the school's education program (e.g., absenteeism). In failing to investigate and remedy the misconduct, the school did not comply with its obligations under Section 504 and Title II.

In this case, the department said, the school should have adopted a "comprehensive approach to eliminating the hostile environment," including disciplinary action against the harassers, consultation with the district's Section 504/Title II coordinator, special training for staff, and monitoring to ensure the harassment did not resume.

In 2000, the Education Department wrote another guidance letter to schools, focusing exclusively on disability harassment. That letter spells out in more detail the responsibilities of schools to address these problems.

Posted by Christina Samuels at 1:15 PM | Permalink | Leave a comment | Recommend

Special education in Detroit is in run so poorly that Michigan plans to withhold $5 million in federal special education funds meant for the district, according to an article in The Detroit News.

From the article:

According to White, the district has failed to monitor the 7,000 disabled students' progress in the public schools; failed to produce a plan that moves appropriate students into a general classroom setting; failed to offer proof that sufficient and appropriate staff has been trained; failed to provide a list of qualified instructors, therapists and social workers; and failed to compile a list of students who did not receive evaluations or services.

The problems were first identified in a July 2008 report. Because of a lack of progress, the state put the district on increased supervision in July 2009, more than four months after [Emergency Financial Manager Robert] Bobb arrived. More than a year later, the district still had failed to comply, the state said.

The writers over at IDEA Money Watch bring up an excellent point: the federal government requires states to monitor districts for compliance with federal special education law. Just over a year ago, Michigan said Detroit "meets requirements" under that monitoring framework. Obviously, the monitoring system is not working well.

(I've written about the evaluation process in more detail in this article.)

Posted by Christina Samuels at 5:00 PM | Permalink | Leave a comment | Recommend

As a part of the 35th anniversary commemoration of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, the U.S. Department of Education is asking members of the public how they have been positively affected by the law, which guarantees a public education for 6.6 million students with disabilities.

Your comments, submitted by Nov. 8, may be used in a special event planned by the department. You can share art work, photography, poetry and written stories.

My first experience with IDEA was several years ago, when I was working at another newspaper, covering a school district in suburban Washington D.C. A parent called me up to say that she was unhappy with her son's education. When I met with her, she had files of paperwork that were inches thick, detailing her tussle with the school and local district. I begged off from writing an article, realizing that she needed assistance beyond what a reporter could provide.

Fast forward to 2004, and my interview for an open position at Education Week. Again, I tried to beg off the special education beat, saying that it was way too complicated for me. Obviously, the paper paid no attention to my protests, and during my time on this beat, I've had a chance to meet some remarkable people. I hope some of you choose to share your thoughts.

Posted by Christina Samuels at 4:03 PM | Permalink | Leave a comment | Recommend

My colleague Katie Ash recently wrote a fine article on the use of e-readers with students who have reading disabilities. My takeaway is that the jury is still out on the usefulness of such devices as a widespread intervention, but that for some students, e-readers could be helpful.

Also interesting: one educator quoted in the article made the point that because e-readers are not designed specifically for students with disabilities, they don't have a stigma attached to them and might be used more readily by students in front of their classmates. I can actually imagine a group of students fighting over who gets to be the first one to use the iPad or the Kindle.

But nothing can replace solid teaching, everyone agrees. From the article:

That looking-before-you-leap cautionary note is something that Lotta Larson, an assistant professor of curriculum and instruction at Kansas State University, in Manhattan, Kan., also expresses about e-readers in education.

"There's a huge sense of urgency right now," she says. "This [technology] is starting to enter our schools very rapidly, especially as the prices come down, and before that happens, we have to inform people."

Indeed, there's a real need for professional development to accompany the reading devices, says Larson. "I don't think the e-reader in itself is going to make a difference, but if it's used with effective instruction, then it can make a huge difference," she says.

Posted by Christina Samuels at 5:39 PM | Permalink | Leave a comment | Recommend

Alabama has joined Iowa, Kansas, South Carolina, and West Virginia in requesting that the U.S. Department of Education allow the state to reduce the amount of money spent on special education due to an "unforeseen decline in the financial resources" of the state.

The one-page letter was submitted on Sept. 30, according to a spokesman for the Alabama State Department of Education.

The letter is requesting a waiver for fiscal year 2010, which has already ended. So, I am unsure what the federal Department of Education could do if, for some reason, it decided to decline this request. Force the state to distribute more money to districts in fiscal 2011 to make up for any cuts in fiscal 2010? Cut the state's federal support as punishment—which would only seem to make a bad situation worse? I'm seeking clarification on these questions.

Just a reminder of how these waiver requests work: states generally are not allowed to reduce the amount of money that they give to districts for special education funding. One exception can be created if the state is going through "exceptional or uncontrollable" circumstances, like a precipitous drop in state revenues. The waiver only is granted for one fiscal year at a time. You can read more details, including a link to a letter from the federal Education Department explaining the waiver process, at my blog entry from earlier this year.

Posted by Christina Samuels at 2:24 PM | Permalink | Leave a comment | Recommend

A few weeks ago, I blogged about a mother who had worked tirelessly to get special education services for her son, who was in jail on suspicion of murder.

In that blog entry, I asked what groups are continuing to monitor issues related to incarcerated youth, because the website I found on a quick search was out of date. A reader emailed me later to suggest I check out the National Evaluation and Technical Assistance Center for the Education of Children and Youth who are Neglected, Delinquent or At-Risk—mercifully known by the much-easier-to-handle acronym, NDTAC.

Much of the information on the NDTAC website focuses on education in a juvenile justice context, which is interesting on its own. But broadly, this site seems to contain good resources for people who work with youths who have serious and ongoing emotional and behavioral problems. I know that in my travels around the Web, I've seen quite a few resources for teachers to help steer the behavior of elementary school students. But for older students, the resources are harder to find.

Admittedly, some of the resources are intended for state officials and deal with technical aspects of juvenile justice education. But here's a webinar on identifying and supporting youth who are at-risk of school failure. And this page is a collection of learning and behavioral management resources, and I'm sure special educators could glean some ideas here even if they don't work with incarcerated youth.

I'm always interested in other suggestions for Free Resource Friday, so keep them coming!

Posted by Christina Samuels at 5:34 PM | Permalink | Leave a comment | Recommend

Last week I blogged about school districts in Oklahoma who were refusing to comply with the state's new special education voucher law. In this week's issue, my colleague Mary Ann Zehr follows up on that issue, interviewing superintendents who are involved and the lawmaker who sponsored the voucher law.

Jason Nelson, the state representative who authored the law, criticized the defiant school districts for "violating the law." He said, "I think what is happening is that we've got schools that have an ideological opposition to what the legislation is. They don't like vouchers." ...

Lisa Muller, the assistant superintendent for curriculum and school improvement for the Jenks school district, said that in addition to concerns about the mismatch between the state constitution and the new law, Jenks officials are concerned that private schools are not obliged by federal law, as public school districts are, to honor the individualized education program, or IEP, of a student with a disability.

"Our concern is that many parents may not understand the protections they are giving up by requesting these scholarships," she said.

A reader who commented on the article noted that she knows full well what protections she would give up to enroll her child in private school—she just feels that the letter of the law hasn't meant a better education for her child. Are the school districts wrong for not allowing the parents to "vote with their feet?"

Posted by Christina Samuels at 4:47 PM | Permalink | Leave a comment | Recommend

My colleague Mary-Ellen Deily blogged about the decision, which came down last week. Her blog entry provides plenty of interesting details on the case, which says that students with disabilities must be given accommodations for after-school activities, even if those activities are not related to a student's academic program.

Matthew Stoloff, a New Jersey lawyer who specializes in special education, has also blogged about extracurricular activities in children with disabilities; this piece was written before the Minnesota decision was announced but gives a thorough overview of what kinds of accommodations schools should provide, along with links to other decisions.

As Stoloff notes, many of the protections given to students in this area fall under Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act, as opposed to (or sometimes, in addition to) the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act. For a quick-and-dirty description of Section 504 and how it intersects with IDEA, check out my post from 2008.

Posted by Christina Samuels at 6:40 PM | Permalink | Leave a comment | Recommend

Friend-of-the-blog John Wills Lloyd has written about an interesting study in the latest issue of Pediatrics on attention deficit hyperactivity disorder and its correlation to reading disabilities.

The study, which looked at more than 5,000 Minnesota youth, found that children with ADHD have dramatically higher rates of reading disabilities than youth without the disorder. The incidence of reading disabilities among boys with ADHD was 51 percent, and among girls it was 46.7 percent. For boys without ADHD, the reading disability rate among the study participants was 14.5 percent; among girls it was 7.7 percent.

This news is particularly noteworthy for girls, because those who don't have ADHD have relatively low rate of reading disabilities, according to the study. The authors conclude: "Although the American Academy of Pediatrics clinical practice guideline on the diagnosis and evaluation of children with ADHD does not specifically recommend psychoeducational testing for every child with ADHD, our findings clearly demonstrate that it is essential for clinicians to assess all children with ADHD for the presence of comorbid [reading disabilities.]"

Posted by Christina Samuels at 4:40 PM | Permalink | Leave a comment | Recommend

Bullying is very much in the news recently, for tragic reasons: five teens (Justin Aaberg, Billy Lucas, Asher Brown, Seth Walsh, and Rutgers University student Tyler Clementi) committed suicide in the last month. All were victims of anti-gay bullying.

In one Ohio school, bullying is being blamed for the deaths of four teens in two years.

And, now, a study published in the most recent edition of the Journal of Adolescent Health that says children with disabilities or chronic illnesses are more likely to be the target of bullies.

Sentenac and her colleagues used data from the Irish and French 2006 Health Behavior in School-aged Children World Health Organization collaborative study. In all, 12,048 students ages 11, 13 and 15 participated.

Students responded to items on how frequently they had been bullied at school in the past couple of months. They also answered questions on whether they had a disability or chronic illness such as cerebral palsy, diabetes, arthritis or allergy. Twenty percent of the students in Ireland and 16.6 percent in France reported having one of these conditions.

The study showed that students who reported having a disability or chronic illness no matter where they lived were more likely to be bullied by peers than those who did not. For instance, in France, 41 percent of boys with a disability or chronic illness reported being bullied compared with 32 percent of boys without. Gender, however, was not a factor in being bullied; both boys and girls were equally victimized.

You can find an abstract of the study at this link.

The PACER Center, a national parent center that serves youth with a special emphasis on children with disabilities, has compiled resources for children, teens and parents through the National Center for Bullying Prevention. Digging a little further into the site, these publications offer a bit more specific information for children with disabilities and bullying. For example, there's some information on how parents may be able to talk to the class about their child's disability, in a bid to foster acceptance. I also liked the document "What if Your Child IS the Bully?" Bullies all come from somewhere, and though parents may think they have the tools to support a bullied child, they may be more at a loss of what to do if their child is the aggressor.

In response to the recent suicides that have been linked to anti-gay bullying, columnist Dan Savage has started the "It Gets Better" project, where hundreds of people have posted messages of support to kids who might be suffering. (Some of which, I should warn, are "PG" rated.) Though the videos are aimed at lesbian, gay, or questioning youth, I think that the same message holds true for all people who are the victims of bullies: it does get better.

Posted by Christina Samuels at 2:46 PM | Permalink | Leave a comment | Recommend

Back in June, I blogged about a new special education voucher program in Oklahoma that will pay tuition costs for students with disabilities to attend private schools, starting this year.

Now, two Tulsa-area school districts have said that they will not comply with the law, saying that it is an unconstitutional diversion of public funds to religious institutions.

Rep. Jason Nelson, a Republican in the Oklahoma House of Representatives who sponsored the bill, is irate, calling the move of the two school districts "grotesquely irresponsible."

Broken Arrow and Jenks are the districts saying no to the new law. Probably not coincidentally, both districts are represented by the same attorney, Doug Mann, who told them that the state constitution precludes these tuition payments and could be a "huge financial hit" for districts.

There's no set dollar amount that would be given to each student. Instead, the amount of the scholarship would be either the private school's tuition or the amount of per-pupil state aid that would be given to the school district where the student is enrolled, whichever is less.

What's fascinating to me is that I had no idea that school districts could just decide on their own not to comply with laws like this. Who knew? Based on Rep. Nelson's comments in one article, the only way the law can be enforced is if parents choose to sue their district, which puts families in a pretty difficult spot. And according to an article in the Broken Arrow Ledger, several districts are considering banding together to deflect any legal costs.

I'll definitely be watching to see how this one turns out. Apparently eight Broken Arrow families have applied for these funds. And I'm sure there are school choice supporters willing to back them, too.

Posted by Christina Samuels at 10:57 AM | Permalink | Leave a comment | Recommend

The Emily Hall Tremaine Foundation, based in Connecticut, released its fourth poll on public perceptions of learning disabilities today.

The good news: about 80 percent of the people polled agreed strongly or somewhat with the statement that people with learning disabilities are "just as smart as you and me."

Not so good news: a sizable proportion of the public also believes that learning disabilities might just really be the product of laziness or a bad home environment.

Read my article that outlines some of the results, and then dig into the full study and press release at the Foundation's page on the results.

Posted by Christina Samuels at 5:40 PM | Permalink | Leave a comment | Recommend

There's been a burst of news from the Education Department related to students with disabilities.

First, coming on the heels of today's Summit on Community Colleges at the White House, the department has announced a grant program that will help youths with intellectual disabilities transition to two- and four-year institutions.

From a press release:

U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan today announced the award of $10.9 million for 28 grants under two new federal programs that create opportunities for students with intellectual disabilities to attend and be successful in higher education.

"President Obama has set a goal for America to have the highest percentage of college graduates in the world by 2020," Duncan said. "These new programs make an important contribution toward that goal by giving students with intellectual disabilities the opportunity to receive a quality postsecondary education with the supports they need to attend, complete, and succeed in higher education."

College for students with intellectual disabilities won't look exactly the same as colleges for typically developing students. The department offered an example of how one college will use the money: "Bergen Community College in New Jersey will use its $394,918 grant to serve 100 students with intellectual disabilities. Bergen Community College will work with Camden County College to provide job coaches who will shadow students at work sites, helping to reinforce job skills and assist with placement into employment. They will also provide peer mentors to support students in academic classes and ease integration of students into social events involving peers without disabilities."

But wait, there's more! The department also announced that it was awarding nearly $20 million to colleges in order to train more special education teachers.

Of the $19.9 million in grants announced today, $13.5 million will be targeted at improving the quality and increasing the number of people who are fully credentialed to serve children with disabilities. The funds will help current and future special education professionals complete degrees, state certification, professional licenses, or state endorsement in early intervention, special education, or a related services field.

It will also support the preparation of special education paraprofessionals, assistants in related services professions (such as physical therapist assistants, occupational therapist assistants), or educational interpreters.

And as if that weren't enough, the department is also paying for a $5.6 million grant program that will support training vocational rehabilitation staff who will, in turn, help individuals with disabilities get jobs.

Just to put this all in perspective, the grants announced over the past few days total $30 million. The amount of grants distributed to states through Part B of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act for students ages 6 through 21 is about $11.5 billion.

However, the attention to postsecondary transition is one way to address the fairly dire situation many people with disabilities face when they enter the workforce. The unemployment rate among people with disabilities is 14.5 percent, compared with 9 percent among people without a disability, according to a recent report (pdf) from the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

That gap persists among all ages and education levels, but it is most narrow among people with bachelor's degree or higher: the unemployment rate is 8.3 percent among people with a disability at that education level, compared to 4.5 percent among people who do not have a disability.

Posted by Christina Samuels at 5:40 PM | Permalink | Leave a comment | Recommend

My colleague Catherine Gewertz blogged today that the U.S. Department of Education is giving $67 million to groups of states that will create Common Core assessments aimed at students who have severe cognitive disabilities.

Currently, states have "alternate assessments based on alternate achievement standards;" these are tests intended for the small group of students who cannot meet unmodified standards. The Education Department puts no limit on how many students can take the tests, but only 1 percent of all students—10 percent of all students with disabilities—can be counted as proficient for AYP purposes if they use those particular assessments.

The so-called "1 percent" tests haven't been easy for states to create, or for teachers to administer, as I wrote in this 2006 article. Optimists suggest that a group of states working together through this grant program may be able to pool their resources to create a valid and reliable way of testing this group of students, with its variety of needs. These new tests are scheduled to be in use by the 2014-15 school year.

The National Center for Educational Outcomes, based at the University of Minnesota, will be leading one of the state groups charged with creating new alternate assessments. In March, NCEO released a document (pdf) that lists 10 common misperceptions about this group of students commonly lumped together as "severely cognitively impaired." It's worth a read. Among the misperceptions listed: many students who would take the test function more like infants and toddlers than their actual age; most have life-threatening conditions or cannot communicate; or standardized testing for this group means that there's no time left for teaching important functional skills. All three of those statements are false, the NCEO contends.

Posted by Christina Samuels at 12:57 PM | Permalink | Leave a comment | Recommend

How should teachers and parents tend to the unique needs of a student who has a disability AND is gifted? How do you even identify such children? The Colorado Department of Education has produced a 118-page handbook (pdf) with information on these children, often referred to as "twice-exceptional," or "2e" for short. The audience for this handbook appears to be teachers and parents.

Some of the information, like how to identify children for services, is Colorado-specific. But most of the information in this book could be used by parents and teachers anywhere. I particularly liked the charts of "distinguishing characteristics" of gifted learners who are learning English, come from low socio-economic backgrounds, or have a learning disability.

For example, a "questioning attitude" is listed as a traditional characteristic of gifted students. But for English-language learners, there may be a cultural aversion to questioning authority. Children from a less-affluent background or with disabilities may manifest that attitude in a challenging or confrontational way. The charts just offer another way of examining giftedness.

The handbook also includes a handful of case studies and recommended strategies. Plus, there's a bibliography of additional sources. In all, this document offers a good, comprehensive, (and free!) introduction to the needs of the "2e" child.

Have an idea for Free Resource Friday? Email me at csamuels@epe.org.

Posted by Christina Samuels at 3:40 PM | Permalink | Leave a comment | Recommend

About 89,000 juveniles were held in public and private correctional facilities in 2008, according to the most recent one-day count conducted by the U.S Justice Department (pdf) And we know that, compared to the student population at large, incarcerated youth tend to be well below grade level academically, and with learning disabilities that may or may not have been diagnosed, much less addressed in a prison setting.

This article from the Los Angeles Times about a mother who fought for special education services for her imprisoned son, shines a spotlight on an under-covered issue.

Yamileth Fuentes constantly worried about her son Michael's education.

As the mother of a child with learning disabilities, she made sure he didn't get overlooked in school. She fretted when his math worksheets weren't challenging enough, or when his spelling slipped.

The energetic 42-year-old Metro bus driver wasn't afraid to fight on her son's behalf. She enlisted the help of clergymen, bureaucrats and an army of lawyers in the battle to get Michael a proper education. Once, she even stopped her bus to confront the mayor when she spotted him giving a news conference on a downtown street corner.

She believed, as countless other parents do, that her child should be given every opportunity to succeed.

Even if he was sitting behind bars, accused of murder.

I have nothing but admiration for this mother, who says she wants her son to walk out of prison a better man than he went in. But I also admit to feeling pessimistic about the prospects for this young man who, despite having a mother who cares deeply about him, will probably still leave prison undereducated—and with two children of his own to support. May he prove me wrong.

Who is studying the issure of incarcerated youth with special education needs? In a quick search, I came across the National Center on Education, Disability and Juvenile Justice, but the site looks like it went dormant around 2007.

Posted by Christina Samuels at 3:30 PM | Permalink | Leave a comment | Recommend