Special-Ed Funds Redirected

[tonysam]

Subtitle: School Districts Shift Millions of Dollars to General Needs After Getting Stimulus Cash

From further down in the article:

But supporters of special education say special-needs students are being shortchanged. The biggest rub: To shift the funds, schools must show they have met certain criteria, which may include graduation and drop-out rates of special-education students. To allow more districts to qualify, some states are ignoring or lowering the standards.

"This is a slap in the face," said Candace Cortiella, director of the Advocacy Institute, a Washington, D.C.-area nonprofit that advises students with disabilities. "This is historic funding that could have had a huge impact with students, and states and districts have instead chosen to minimize the amount of good."

At the heart of the debate is a provision in the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, or IDEA, a version of a statute originally enacted in 1975. The provision says that in years in which there is an increase in federal funding for special-needs students, districts already meeting certain standards can choose to reduce their local spending on special education by as much as 50% of the federal-funding increase -- and, in turn, divert the freed-up money to other uses.

In past years, increases, if any, in IDEA funding were generally small, so the provision -- intended to give districts some flexibility -- wasn't used much. But the Obama administration's economic-stimulus plan boosted IDEA funding by an unprecedented $11.3 billion over this school year and the next -- roughly equal to the total amount states received a year ago.

Well, time to throw special education students overboard, I guess.

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[proud2BlibKansan]

1. IDEA funding has always been a mess

So is the qualifying procedure. It's possible to be classified as disabled in one state but not in another - which makes zero sense. You can also be classified as disabled and then they change the criteria, and a student with your same eval profile would NOT be considered disabled.

It's a bunch of screwed up nonsense.

[tonysam]

2. You'd think there'd be standards across the board, but evidently

there are none.

Why am I not surprised?

[proud2BlibKansan]

3. I believe it was a compromise to maintain local control

It's been 40 years ago and I would have to check my history but IIRC, national diagnostic standards were not put into the original sped legislation as a compromise to maintain some local control.

The history of this legislation is actually quite interesting. I tell teachers it's a testimony to the power of parents. We don't have programs for kids with disabilities because any educators promoted them. We have this legislation because parents of disabled kids organized and lobbied for 10 years to get it passed.

[FBaggins]

4. So they're changing their standard of measurement because of an unintended incentive?

Seems we've had this conversation before. :)

[alp227]

5. General needs do deserve needed funding as much as special needs.

Public school districts, purveyors of educational inequality indeed!

[tonysam]

6. It costs more for "special needs" because of the specialized help,

and they NEED it. Parents of these kids tend to be VERY, VERY vocal about their children.

[alp227]

7. Is it really possible to fund special ed fully without harming the needs of the others?

You just said that special ed is really expensive. Now I see why parents often complain that public schools "spend too much" on special education.

[tonysam]

8. You can't spend "too much" money on sped.

It's federal law these kids have a right to a free and appropriate education. It has been the law for decades.

We need to fund schools more, not rob Peter to pay Paul.

[FBaggins]

9. And if you were one of the 900 teachers laid off because of it?

As I read the article, the district or state was only allowed to redirect a portion of the increase in sped funding. So... while other parts of the budget are cut (and teachers laid off), sped funding was increasing. This decision (while wrongheaded IMO) merely redirected some of the increase in funding to avoid cutting other programs.

I think parents could reasonably ask why some areas were being cut while funding was increasing significantly in one area. Yes we need to better fund our schools (couldn't guess whether that means "more" or "different" in each case), but you're not saying that only sped is underfunded, right?

[proud2BlibKansan]

10. Why not cut administrative positions?

Or - one of my favorites - the travel budget. Unless of course you think that over paid admins really do need to go to Jamaica in January for a Reading conference :)

[FBaggins]

11. Everyone always has an idea where things should be cut

and, of course, it's never to their own area. :)

I seriously doubt that a school system that was going to lay off hundreds of teachers was only making cuts in the classroom. If they were then, yes, there were likely more effective options...

...but as with examples we're discussed before, they saw a way to get funding from where it was to where they thought it was needed.