July 07, 2009

The Glow of July

The sound of wooden planks and a cement mixer flows through the emptiness of what was my living room. You see, we had the choice of retiring or turning our house into a school for pre-K kids with disabilities and working through old age as merely a developmental stage. The decision was to work until we couldn’t do a good job anymore, then wander away into the jungle and find a quiet place to sleep, burying our tusks in the elephant graveyard. Since we’ve always had our home function like a community center anyway, the neighbors said it was OK to extend the house a little in order to have quality space for our growing number of preschoolers. That’s why you haven’t had a blog in a while. It has been busy. The gorgeous glow of this July day sends tiny streaks of light across the inside floor of what will be a little miniature gym. Even with the construction in full swing, and in spite of a full teaching load, the door bell still rings with new parents looking for help. If only there was a place to send them…and a system that would render them justice.

By now you all know that the Supreme Court found for the parents in the Forest Grove case, ordering the district to reimburse for unilateral placement. Look under Current Law on this website for further discussion of this case and related issues. Other news events of interest to special education are:

1. The Supreme Court agreed to hear whether or not its reasoning in striking down the death penalty for juvenile offenders 4 years ago should also apply to life sentences without parole. The United States is the only country in the world that makes routine use of life-without-parole sentences for juvenile offenders. This is of particular interest to special educators and parents because of the number of incarcerated youth with disabilities, some of whom comment heinous crimes. The impact of this case may have implications for expulsions, as well as how special education students involved with crime are handled by school authorities, the police, and the court system. (Justices Agree to Take Up Life-Without Parole Sentences for Young Offenders, Adam Liptak, The New York Times, 5/5/09).
2. Readiness for college by high school graduates is an issue gaining increased examination. The amount of high school graduates who are required to take non-credit remedial classes is enormous. More than a million college freshman are required to take remedial courses each year, many dropping out before getting a degree. The Obama administration is pushing to get colleges and public schools to work together on aligning high school requirements with what is expected in a college student, such as basic composition. More than 60% of students at two-year colleges, and 20-30% at four year colleges take remedial courses. (New Push Seeks to End Need for Pre- College remedial Classes, Sam Dillon, The New York Times, 5/28/09.) Education Week analyzed the knowledge and skills students needed for college in “Consensus on Meaning of “Readiness” Remains Elusive” (Sterling C. Lloyd, Diplomas Count, 6/11/09). The data revealed:
   1. The intensity of a student’s course taking is strongly related to eventual attainment of a bachelor’s degree, especially for black and Latino students. Others point out that course-based approaches are only loose proxies for the skills and knowledge needed.
   2. Other research noted four categories of readiness: key cognitive strategies (can they think for themselves, put together old information in new ways, etc.), specific content knowledge and academic skills, attitude and behaviors, and contextual knowledge of college culture (can the student figure out and deliver what is expected in a new social world with different traditions and values from those in high school). The issue of mastery is debated, a common criticism of standards oriented approaches. Is it enough to just pass the test- or do you have to really know the subject? In special education this question arises as early as First Grade and continues throughout public school. The vague answers about the degree of mastery never satisfied the parents and perhaps now, will not satisfy educators either.
   3. Few states have statewide assessments of content knowledge capable of gauging college readiness.
   4. Test score benchmarks on the SAT or ACT are often used as indicators of college readiness. It has been suggested the target scores in English, math, reading, and science offer a performance-based method of finding college ready students.

   As of 2007, 11 states described the skills necessary for college. Two years later, 20 states had completed the task with 11 additional states having a definition in progress. This information becomes critical for classified students when developing their IEP transition plans.

3. “Critics Call Delaware a Tax Haven“(Lynnley Browning, The New York Times, 5/30/09) tickled me. I’ve called that state a lot of things, and tax haven was the nicest of the lot! Corporations avoid paying taxes in these tough times by going to America’s pathetic little onshore refuge- Delaware. It is so bad that even Switzerland is complaining! Delaware’s tax loopholes have other states upset because it cheats their governments out of tens of billions of tax dollars- in just the same way it cheats its own children from the most minimal of basic skills. This shady, corrupt state may finally get what it deserves when other states sue it to claim taxes that are rightfully their own.
4. Sonia Sotomayor is the first nominee for the U.S. Supreme Court in the Obama administration. In 1995 Judge Sotomayor heard the case of Marilyn Bartlett v. New York State Board of Law Examiners, a lawsuit against the state agency that administered the bar exam brought under the Americans With Disabilities Act. Dr. Bartlett was severely dyslexic and wanted more time to take the exam and permission to use a computer to write the essay questions. The board refused. A variety of experts testified for both sides in an array of disputed facts and theories. Judge Sotomayor held for Dr. Bartlett, saying in part, “The board (like many others in the public) wants the comfort of a test score to measure this complex process…a learning disability is not measurable in the same way a blood disease can be measured in a serum test…For those of us for whom words sing, sentences paint pictures, and paragraphs create panoramic views of the world, the inability to identify and process words with ease would be crippling. “ Of note is that Dr. Barlett never did pass the bar exam and is now dean of the School of Education at Texas A&M. (On The Bench, With Fairness And Empathy, Jim Dwyer, The New York Times, 5/27/09).
5. The Brennan Center for Justice at New York University examined 35 states with the highest immigration populations. It found that interpreter services are not always provided, or not provided well, and not keeping up with the growing demand. Of those states, 46% do not require interpreters be provided in all cases, 37% do not require proper credentialing of translators, and 80% fail to guarantee that courts will pay for the interpreter, as the Department of Justice’s view of the law requires. In family law cases, lack of translators means the difference between justice and injustice. Cost factors for translators are cited as excuses. In New York $24 million was spent in 08-09 with 282,000 hours of interpretation. Federal court costs went from $18 million in 2004 to $23 million in 2007. Implications regarding availability of bi-lingual translators for parents in public schools are obvious. Far too many non-English speaking families are pushed through the system or drop out because of language barriers in understanding their child’s needs and how to have them met.

Finally, in this glowing month of July, let me share a feel-good story about a child study team. Two weeks ago I attended a meeting for one of our 10 year old tutoring students who could not read- not a word. He had been in a school for emotionally disturbed students and his reading problems denied by his last school district. His new school district did beautiful evaluations, fully explained them to the mother, and suggested (all by themselves!) that he get reading 1-1, 5 days a week all summer, with both an O.T. and a dyslexia specialist working together in the sessions. The speech pathologist was to join them once a week and the guidance counselor would work with both the child and the staff to help them understand the connection between being word blind and being traumatized and embarrassed because he could not read. It was a beautiful thing.

The cement mixer has stopped and now there is only hammering coming from the back yard. Yes, special education is a mess but we have to do what we can for each kid who comes to us. I intend to fill this house with them and their parents. We can’t lie down and roll over and let the bad guys win. We can’t let our anger interfere with our hope. There are good times and bad- but today there are blue skies, sweet smells, and the promise of tomorrow.