Special Ed Disaster

[Anonymous]

Word on the street is that all those special education RTSE jobs that were posted starting on 4/13 (and still posted) that people have been interviewed for, some people already hired, many people continuing to interview for...those positions are going, going, gone....

Yes, the latest is school principals have been advised to halt the process, and it looks unlikely that those positions will be funded. This is a mess!

What will this mean for Home School Model staffing next year?

[Anonymous]

It means they are cutting back on Sped and don't care who it hurts. They said they were going to do this a few years ago as part of the cuts when they took out the virtual school, trade programs and early education. Not surprising at all. They need to pay for their silly regional model somehow.

[Anonymous]

This is disgraceful. I hope TT rots in hell

[Anonymous]

It's pretty crappy of an organization to advertise a whole bunch of jobs for the teachers of the most vulnerable students that it doesn't really have. MCPS is in some shaky hands right now.

[Anonymous]

At my school the entire Special Ed department is leaving.

This doesn't bode well for next year.

If a school has less SPED positions or qualified teachers who can do the job, students with IEPs/504s will suffer.

If your child has a disability, I suggest you reach out to the entire County Council because this affects everyone. This means that the kid who is high strung or a behavior challenge will impact the learning of his peers.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Word on the street is that all those special education RTSE jobs that were posted starting on 4/13 (and still posted) that people have been interviewed for, some people already hired, many people continuing to interview for...those positions are going, going, gone....

Yes, the latest is school principals have been advised to halt the process, and it looks unlikely that those positions will be funded. This is a mess!

What will this mean for Home School Model staffing next year?

Has this been officially posted yet? That's really crazy. I have a teacher friend at a different school who was excited about moving into the role. She was offered the job last Friday!

[Anonymous]

no it has not officially been posted yet, but it's coming. I hope everyone raises their voices LOUD!

[Anonymous]

Sounds like a classic Thomas Taylor "if the county doesn't fund our budget request we'll have to cut special ed, everyone go scream at county council" move...

[Anonymous]

What is RTSE?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It's pretty crappy of an organization to advertise a whole bunch of jobs for the teachers of the most vulnerable students that it doesn't really have. MCPS is in some shaky hands right now.

They already started down the path when they took away the virtual school. Many of us saw this coming. Not a surprise at all.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Sounds like a classic Thomas Taylor "if the county doesn't fund our budget request we'll have to cut special ed, everyone go scream at county council" move...

Pretty much.

[Anonymous]

At the risk of getting attacked for saying anything remotely in defense of Dr Taylor, I would imagine that the gutting of the Department of Education by the current administration pays a massive role in the lost funding available to staff and support special education in a district our size.

I don't know enough about it to be sure, but it cannot be easy to attempt to improve and support Special Education without federal government support

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:At the risk of getting attacked for saying anything remotely in defense of Dr Taylor, I would imagine that the gutting of the Department of Education by the current administration pays a massive role in the lost funding available to staff and support special education in a district our size.

I don't know enough about it to be sure, but it cannot be easy to attempt to improve and support Special Education without federal government support

Very little money from the feds funds school systems. This is pure mismanagement.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:At the risk of getting attacked for saying anything remotely in defense of Dr Taylor, I would imagine that the gutting of the Department of Education by the current administration pays a massive role in the lost funding available to staff and support special education in a district our size.

I don't know enough about it to be sure, but it cannot be easy to attempt to improve and support Special Education without federal government support

You don't need federal Dept of Ed staffers to tell you that it is a bad decision to slash special ed staffing at schools but tell people that at least they will get a new RTSE position in return, and then say "actually, nevermind, we're not giving you the RTSE positions after all, it's just all cuts." I don't follow your point here. If you're saying that MCPS was only willing to spend money on special ed because they were worried about getting into trouble with the feds and now they're not, I suppose that's a reasonable explanation, but one that reflects very badly on them...

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This is disgraceful. I hope TT rots in hell

He broke CO SPED support for schools and still hasn't figured out how SPED is going to come together again, except that it will somehow be wedged into the ever important regional program system.

I hope he rots in hell too.