<p>I have a kid who had an IEP for years.
For each child with an IEP there are three buckets of money, not one.
The money from federal, money from state to serve the IEP and the money that each student in the district receives.
When districts expend their monies, there is safety net funding from the state they can apply for.
Yet, although we would read divisive articles in the paper citing viewpoints like Allmusics, the district did not apply for safety net funding.
Why?
Because the money they received for special education students went into the general fund, and was not accounted for, so they couldn’t prove that they needed even more money.
As a parent I paid for tutoring and special programs outside of school, that we couldn’t afford ( we had to take out loans) because the district did not follow my childs IEP or they would not write an appropriate one. ( I had teachers cross out things that I had suggested to be added during the meeting and which everyone signed, before I was sent a copy)</p>
<p>While there may be a few kids in the district who have outside placement, more often families experience mirrors mine.</p>
<p>There is little oversight or accountability within the district. Ironically my child who I had removed from SPED at her previous school because it was not providing appropriate services ( I sat in on her resource class, they were diagraming sentences and she was sitting at another table doing homework), is receiving more support and appropriate instruction at a large comprehensive high school that is known for their AP classes.</p>
<p>Well, the kids that I am talking about are not learning to tie their shoes. Hopefully, their schooling will help them to become productive people in society. </p>
<p>The thing that bothers me the most, is when an agreement is not reached and tax money goes into litigation. This is tax money poorly spent, but I understand that it is a message to say that the sky is not the limit, but it also could have gone to educate children. It also puts such financial hardship on parents, and that is money that could have been invested in the child.</p>
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<p>Ek, I agree with you. This is because the fox is watching the hen house. There is no outside neutral party looking in.</p>
<p>Our district which currently has a case before the united states supreme court regarding assignment to schools by race- has spent millions of dollars over the years to get to this point.
However, if their intention was to serve kids & to have diverse schools, they could have assigned students by income level, which is legal and has shown to have as much if not more positive effect than by assigning by race and would have freed up millions of dollars that could have been used in the classroom.
The kicker is, that district attorneys have been quoted in teh paper as saying even if the supremes decide in their favor, they are not obligated to change their process.
<a href=“http://saveseattleschools.blogspot.com/2007/02/race-based-enrollment-tie-breakers.html[/url]”>http://saveseattleschools.blogspot.com/2007/02/race-based-enrollment-tie-breakers.html</a>
( School district attorneys have also been heard to say that it is cheaper and easier to not provide legal IEP services and just wait for the very few parents who have the time and money to sue)</p>
Marite, you petitioned to get a teacher reassigned. Certainly this qualifies as an “agenda,” no? Because it makes sense to you, and was deemed necessary by you, you believe it was a “good” agenda. However, your mission was clearly an “agenda.” Why is the discusssion of the wisdom of assigning a book considered inappropriate by parents automatically considered a reactionary “agenda?” Don’t school districts have an obligation to hear the concerns of parents and determine if there is validity in their concerns?</p>
<p>My agenda was that in S’s Honors English class, the students were still not finished reading A Tale of Two Cities in January. The book had been assigned in early September. When I brought this up to S’s GC, I was strongly encouraged to write to the principal. Without parents’ formal complaints, I was told, the principal could not move the teacher. Apparently, there had been grumbling about that teacher before from other parents. The principal must have seen merit in my complaint (wouldn’t you?). He did not have to act on it if it was baseless.<br>
I’ll repeat, though, that the teacher was highly dedicated and well-liked by the students. Once she was put in a more appropriate class, she did very well by the new students.</p>
<p>As for book contents, I’m assuming it’s not only “reactionary” conservative parents who might object to certain books. I tend to think that on the question of censorship both left and right are for it, but on different grounds.</p>
<p>Marite, your agenda was certainly a legitimate one in my eyes. And in the principal’s, as well. (I’m assuming you had first asked the teacher to pick up the pace & nothing happened.) My point is that when input from parents and the community is received by administrators or teachers, they should not immediately bristle & get defensive. Every concern deserves a hearing, or at least a brief, polite explanation about why the parent’s wish is not possible or prudent. Some are from cranks, no doubt. But what if your S’s teacher had assigned, say, “Last Exit To Brooklyn” to a group of h.s. freshmen. A very dark, disturbing book. I think parents would be wise to point out how inappropriate that would be for a group of freshmen. So often that type of complaint is immediately deemed “censorship” when in actuality, most rational adults would agree that asking the teacher to choose another novel would be a smart idea. </p>
<p>I also think it’s nuts that parent complaints are necessary for a principal to act. I have a similar, but silly story about a vice principal. In (public) middle school, D wore a pair of flip flops to school. Stupid footwear choice, given that hundreds of kids have to climb up & down crowded staircases all day, but I wasn’t even paying attention. VP’s office called home requesting that I bring proper footwear. I ran right in, and told the VP that I was sorry for the oversight & certainly understood flip flops were dangerous in that setting. I jokingly asked why Mr. C was always wearing them. Her face lit up, and she told me how glad she was to hear that, because now she could proceed with an attempt to amend the teacher dress code. She confided to me that all the teachers hated how he was allowed to get away with those flip flops & were hoping a parent would bring it up so it could be addressed. </p>
<p>Now, frankly, I didn’t give a moments thought to teacher footwear before this incident. (Although, who wants to look at man toes all day? LOL!) But it had been bugging this VP & other teachers, yet they were apparently powerless to bring it up on their own. It just shows how powerful a teachers’ union is. Even for the most inconsequential, trifling issues, the teachers are protected. No wonder important issues like curriculum and disciplinary standards are so tough to address.</p>
<p>I agree with all your points. I don’t know why the GC and principal thought that they needed a complaint in writing in order to act. They were quite familiar with the problem, apparently. But it sounded like an issue of procedures rather than a union matter.</p>
<p>When S1 began attending school, the union head was quite intransigent and created tensions with parents and the School Committee. But he was eventually replaced by another teacher who had a child in the system and wa s able to see things from different perspectives. He was enormously helpful when some schools had to be merged. My experience with teacher unions has, as you can see, been diverse. I’ve also liked some principals better than others, and some school committees and individual members better than others. I do think that in our district, teachers, principals, school committee members tend to be responsive to the community. I believe this is not the case in many districts.</p>
<p>SS, so now the male teacher will just wear open toe (ie:sandals) to school. IMO, it is inappropriate footwear for a male to wear to a professional job, but I do see is a double standard. BTW, I know of a student who told me that her teacher took off his shoes in class to cut his toenails while his students were taking an exam (ewwhh!). He is a well respected teacher too.</p>
<p>Yuck, Northeastmom! I’m old fashioned, and I really wish that teachers would dress professionally. (Most I know do.) But at this point, I just hope for competence.</p>
<p>Can you imagine if a businessman clipped his toenails in front of a client? He’d be out the door in a New Yok minute.</p>
<p>SS, yuck is right. I was not there (thankfully), but I trust that this student is not making this up. No, I cannot imagine a businessperson doing this, and cannot understand why a teacher would do this either. It is completely disgusting. I think that a teacher should be expected to dress and behave like a professional person while on the job.</p>
<p>Teachers are going to have a mixed bag of personalities, just like any other profession. Some of them will be much more in tune to professionalism and concern for how others see them than others. And some teachers are going to eventually become less motivated. But I think the biggest factor is experience. Some of the biggest issues I’ve seen are with inexperienced teachers and clothing that’s too revealing or informal–particularly teachers who haven’t had a traditional student teaching experience (or sometimes even much education coursework).</p>
<p>It’s difficult for principals, because other constraints aside, many of them find it awkward to address this kind of thing with another adult professional. Their model is to lead colleagues, not supervise employees, and that’s definitely the expectation of the faculty–who have them badly outnumbered. I think this may be part of the reason that some principals wait for a parent to say something.</p>