Friday Open Thread
Happy May Day (and workers of the world, unite).
From The Art of Simple, some good parenting ideas on "5 ways we can give our kids more freedom." It's about finding that sweet spot between allowing your kid to explore the world and keeping said kid safe in that world.
Sad/funny video of Arne Duncan trying to explain programs that serve students with dyslexia. From Diane Ravitch:
Federal special education law lumps them under one category, but new research from the University of Washington makes the case that they are distinct disorders that require different types of instruction.
Candidate sightings - I'm going to start this bit so fill in as you can. (Candidates, if I'm there, be sure to say hi; I don't want to leave anyone out.)
What's on your mind?
From The Art of Simple, some good parenting ideas on "5 ways we can give our kids more freedom." It's about finding that sweet spot between allowing your kid to explore the world and keeping said kid safe in that world.
Sad/funny video of Arne Duncan trying to explain programs that serve students with dyslexia. From Diane Ravitch:
Senator Bill Cassidy (R-Louisiana) asks a simple question: What specific programs do we have in place for helping students with dyslexia?
And it just goes south from there.
The answer, pretty clearly, is “none.” But Duncan is bound determined not to go there, so he tries, “Well, students with dyslexia have special needs, and we have a special needs fund, so they fall under that–“Thanks for clearing that up, Sec'y Duncan. Speaking of dsylexia, there's an interesting article in the Times about dsylexia versus dysgraphia based on an article in the journal, NeuroImage: Clinical.
Federal special education law lumps them under one category, but new research from the University of Washington makes the case that they are distinct disorders that require different types of instruction.
Candidate sightings - I'm going to start this bit so fill in as you can. (Candidates, if I'm there, be sure to say hi; I don't want to leave anyone out.)
- 43rd/46th Dems forum for City Council District 4 elections - Leslie Harris and Jill Geary ( Public education came up as I - and apparently several other people - submitted questions about the role of the City in Seattle public education. (I also asked about Mayor and/or City Council appointing School Board members. Both Tony Provine and Michael Maddux said - before any other statement - that they would not support the appointment of School Board candidates. Mr. Maddux rightly said he thought the City had plenty to do with its own current work. Jean Godden and Rob Johnson either ignored that part of the question or forgot to answer it.)
- Bell Times forum at HIMS - Rick Burke and Lauren McGuire.
What's on your mind?
Comments
What's on my mind this Friday? Effective leadership is on my mind. As in, where is it?
Frustrated Stevens parent
The report also reveals an intermediate EBD department with staff that has been in place for years that has no idea about social skills curriculum. And a practice of treating students placement and minutes not on what is in the student's IEP but on the whim and professional judgement of staff...
This is a small win for students in this school but points out just how little has been done in SPED even with the FEDs watching.
How is it we can spend millions on implementing the new kid on the block Common Core and the test dujour and not give one damn about the decades federal laws protecting students with disabilitys to ensure they get a fair and appropriate public education.
You can read the full report https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/Seattle_SpEd_PTA/info
-Shaking My Head
The district believes they know better on how to "serve" these students than Dr. Berninger and other clinical neuropsychologist.
We are preparing for a civil rights law suit and hopfully we can force the district to listen to the experts.
NBP
This is why we need a strong Board. Clearly, the almost apparent lip service being given to parents by district staff is not helping. I know that is harsh but how many times and how many parents will we hear this from? The deaf/hard of hearing parents? Parents with students with dyslexia/dysgraphia. Parents with students who are restrained?
There is a problem in this district and the best way to solve it is to be honest and transparent.
Is having to pay out $150,000 worthy of a director's attention or do they only care when it hits $250,000?
--Michael
reader
Open enrollment used to be posted as a matter of course. Am I just missing the info on the district website? What is going on? This is not top secret data. Is it?
- worried
It would have been money better spent on a comprehensive building by building program review/audit.
I'm sure this is not an isolated issue.
--Michael
Schools are expected to receive scores electronically within a month of the last assessment completed at that school, and schools will need time to distribute to families.
I'm tired of this and as a parent I want the scores as soon as they are available. When and how will third graders receive our scores?
Who do you email if the admin at your school says they don't know?
Parent
Carr replied it's "if ,not when"
I would interpret her response as
he is still a SPS employee.
--Michael
Special Education Certificated to Instructional Assistant Waiver:
Historically staffing waivers were submitted by schools as a part of the annual budget process
where some were allowed to convert Special Education (SpEd) Certificated (Cert) Full-Time
Employee (FTE) to SpEd Instructional Assistant (IA) FTE. Last year this practice was restricted
as a part of the District’s process of ensuring compliance with State and Federal Regulations
related to Individuals Disability Education Act (IDEA). This year we are continuing to enforce
the need to maintain SpEd Cert FTE as distributed through the WSS process. We need to
adequately assign SpEd Cert FTE to ensure the designing and monitoring of Specially Designed
Instruction (SDI) is provided as described in each student’s IEP. As a district, we continue to
receive corrective actions from the Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction (OSPI)
monitoring and due process review for not providing the minutes and types of special education
services in students’ IEPs. One SPS procedural decision to assist with maintaining and
improving compliance in this area is to favor the allocation of SpEd Cert FTE over SpEd IA FTE
since IA’s can’t create or oversee SDI.
We recognize the need for continuity of staff as well as the difficulty of filing partial SPED Cert
FTE positions. We hope to address this issue in the upcoming negotiations with Seattle
Education Association (SEA). In the meantime, we will work with Human Resources, SEA and
district administrators in filling SPED Cert positons for 2015-16.
GL
--Michael
I'd also like to know where the buck stops?
-Will the EBD teacher and IAs who failed all of their students loose their jobs?
-Will the principal finally be be removed?
-Will Bill Keating's insufferable apathy get him the boot or will it yield another promotion?
-Will Wyeth Jessie continue to be praised and talk of how much better things are and will be under his leadership?
-Will Nyland waste more time threatening teachers to administer SBAC while turning a blind eye to doing anything to those administrators, principals, and staff that violate our most vulnerable students' rights.
-Tired of the lack of accountability
Sped Reader
-Hope Next One Sticks
Seattle opt out Facebook page has post on House Bill 2214 regarding high school graduation requirements.
-nh
--Cameo
Diane Ravitch has a link to Yong Zhao's speech to Network for Public Education regarding standardized testing.
http://dianeravitch.net/2015/05/01/the-final-best-cut-of-yong-zhaos-great-and-funny-speech-at-npe/
-nh
GL
Not.
Everyone of the Districts responses to OSPI or DOE were 90% redacted to the point that the majority of the pages were 100% blacked out with WAC 44-14-06002 inserted. In contrast, the DOE and OSPI documents only had redacted students names and parents name.
So, I could easy contrasts and extrapolate the redacted information. Why would SPS want to block public citizens from reading their defense or denials.
Another abuse of LCP is when SPS refuses to release SPED citizen complaints they have received. They site they involve possible employee discipline, however OSPI will send to a lightly redacted copy if you know what to ask for. The same goes for due process filings regardless if they where withdrawn.
On that note parents thinking of filing should request from OSPI copies of all withdrawn due process filings, because these are the cases SPS mostly settles and are never published on OSPI website.
--Michael
All these strategies feel like they have one purpose: to mislead and manage parents/taxpayers.
Curious
He has not, on his own, lead on one single thing.
Buildings and JSCEE running amok on sped. Nyland MIA. School Board content with the Happy Talk.
reader
I understand your comment better now. I totally can see how OSPI and DOE are more forthcoming with the district-specific documents related to closed cases then SPS is. But I bet if you for example, ask OSPI for all of the emails between their in-house attorney and Doug Gill on things like the conflict of interest contracting issue that OSPI would be withholding those documents as privileged. My experience is that agencies are more forthcoming with other agencies documents that have come into their possession then their own documents.
Also, I hope you watched Ravitch question Weingarten and Eskelsen at the same gathering. We don't hear from these two enough in Seattle. Gives me some hope that our union is still viable. Our leadership is so lame. Parents and teachers should watch both.
https://vimeo.com/126322770 (I hope it comes up on this link. Part of NPE conference.)
I have nothing against unions except when they are used as excuses for not doing the right thing.Where does WEA and SEA officially stand on the IDEA.
Spin this
As for the Steven's EBD teachers not having knowledge of Social/Emotional curriculum; it is heartbreaking, but probably more common than you think. I think the better question is- Why doesn't SPS provide all EBD teachers with a Social/Emotional curriculum?
Fired Up
You reminded me of one huge issue I'd like to start a thread on - PD for teachers.
What I have heard - in just the last few weeks - is that teachers need PD to support both ELL and Sped students as well as training in socio-emotional issues.
Where is the time and the money for this? And, on the latter, I'm not sure at what point we are trying to make teachers into counselors. I think they should have the training to have the basic understanding of what stages/issues students may have but I cannot believe they have the time to adequately address those issues.
Who better to rattle cages than parents - you are the clients. Make demands. Get out in the streets if you need to. Don't ask somebody else to do it. Spin this is not speaking on behalf of children. That poster is blaming teachers and unions. That poster is a reformer. I ignore those posts because blame isn't solving anything. I can't be everything to every kid. Much as I wish I could.
Get the money out of John Stanford and put it back into the schools. That at least would be a start.
Been There