Seattle Schools Community Forum

From KPLU: How The Language Of Special Education Is Evolving

My first piece in this series was about how the City and other outside forces seem to be lining up to takeover the district, piece by piece. This thread is about legally mandated programs for students that have been an issue for the district for a very long time, namely, ELL, Special Education and Advanced Learning. I'm not going to go into a dissection of each because I'm not qualified to speak fully on ELL or Sped. (And I'm not looking for another discussion on Advanced Learning.  Please do not go off-topic on this point.) The issue is that our district has consistently either failed to provide services, provided partial service or failed to provide services in a timely manner for all of these programs at one time or another.  This has happened for many years.  The district has been under review for both Special Education services and ELL services by OSPI over the last year.  To be fair, I know that ELL and Special Education services are expensive and it...

 Update: The Times is saying that the guardian did not just bring it to the law firm's attention weeks ago that he received unasked for student data but that he told the district.  And yet got even more student data after that notification.  If true, this would support the guardian's thought (and mine) that the district and the law firm were trying to bury him with masses of data.  That would mean that somewhere in the district someone did not bother to redact anything, possibly not thinking of the consequences of sending out a huge volume of data.  Because if some of the records had been redacted, that would have been an accident.  To me, that none were, then it seems a deliberate action, possibly done in a lazy fashion. The Times also reports that "the district asked (the guardian) to return or destroy the records so that they can be replaced by a set that doesn't reveal confidential student information."  I'll have to ask if that means he wou...

Update : from the Washington Post's The Answer Shee t on this story: How well special education students perform on a test called the National Assessment of Educational Progress, or NAEP, will be one of the factors considered. This marks the first time that NAEP scores have been attached to any education policy that has potential consequences; the Education Department could withhold federal funds to states that don’t comply with the new special education regulations, though officials there said that is not something they want to do. But NAEP, a test given every two years to a nationally representative sampling of students,  wasn’t designed for this purpose . When asked by reporters about whether using NAEP for this purpose was turning it into a high-stakes test, Duncan said, “I wouldn’t call it high stakes.” He said his department was using NAEP because, however “imperfect,” it was the “only accurate measurement we have.” Well, shades of MAP, imagine using a test for a purpose ...

Wednesday, June 4nd School Board meeting , starting at 4:15 pm. Agenda . It is quite a long agenda with a longer-than-usual Consent agenda.  I was surprised to see a item like this not being discussed with Intro and then Action but they need to get work done on the North Queen Anne  Elementary School as soon as possible for the move in of the Cascade Parent Partnership Program.   I find this also disturbing in its rush as there is no contract attached to this Consent item (and may not be until Tuesday).  Not a lot of time for public review on spending over $400k in capital dollars.  The very odd notation for where the revenue is coming from is "capital funds."  BEX IV?  BTA III? CIP?  What?  I also raise the concern over BEX IV funds being used to replace the elevator at Jane Addams Middle School. This elevator has been problematic for several years and yet it was NOT on BEX IV.  The BEX IV funding for JAMS is very small at $7.3M...

I wanted to pull this issue out from the Seattle Schools This Week thread because I believe this could affect many, many schools and their after-school programs. Amending School Board Policy #4260,   Use of School Facilities.  It has come to my attention that the district wants to create a change in usage of facilities.  The district says it is "working with SCPTSA" over using facilities and there is a rent waiver process for groups wishing to use facilities for "youth enrichment that meet requirements."  This is a change from type of organization to type of use. The issue is that the district now wants the group - not the district - to pay for aides or support for any special needs child. With respect to all non-District uses of school facilities, the organization conducting t he activity shall be responsible for assuring that youth are able to participate consistent with these requirements.  This includes providing appropriate services and accommodations and...

KUOW also has a report on Special Education in SPS.  It is heartbreaking and, to me, confusing. Confusing because in the first story, about a little boy named Ryder, it labels him as being on the "autism spectrum."  It states he received services in  preschool and yet, he can't get them in SPS?  If he has a diagnosis, then he should be receiving services. Then there is another child in the story, Tenzin, who also has autism and yet he can't get something simple like instructions in a written form.  (I was able to get that for my son in high school and that was multiple teachers and no one called it a problem.)  His mom says, "...the quality of special education in Seattle schools depends too much on how well a school’s principal understands the federal law that guarantees services to kids with disabilities."  It shouldn't be that way.    This almost seems to echo DeBell's comment about how expensive it is to serve Special Ed ...

Today is the fifth annual World Autism Awareness Day.  The theme this year, from Autism Speaks, is Light It Up Blue with landmarks like the Empire State Building going blue tonight.  This starts a month of awareness events to shine a light on the issues around autism.  World autism Awareness Day was started in 2007 by the United Nations General Assembly. It is estimated that 1 in every 88 children in the U.S. is on the autism spectrum.   That's about 1.5M Americans. According to the Centers for Disease Control, it is the most prevalent developmental disorder to date.  Studies suggest that boys are more likely to be born with it than girls but girls appear to develop the more severe types of autism.  From the Autism Speaks website: Will my child be able to attend school? Most likely yes. Much depends on where your child falls on the spectrum, but with your support, as well as that of doctors, therapists and teachers, your child should be able...

For Bright Students with Disabilities and Learning Differences Please come to a community meeting to learn more about bright students who have disabilities and school difficulties, known as "Twice-Exceptional". Date: Monday, November 16th Time: 7-9pm Location: Hamilton International Middle School at Lincoln High School in the Library 4400 Interlake Ave. N., Seattle, 98103 This meeting is open to all parents of students at all grade levels. If you have a student currently in Advanced Learning programs, APP or Spectrum, AP classes, or the IB program, who also has a 504 plan, Special Ed IEP, or has difficulties in school due to medical or learning issues, it is important for you to attend. Information will be provided, support groups are forming. For more information, email Lynne at: contact@nwexceptionalchildren.org