Inside the great teacher resignation

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think that teachers, students, and parents would all be better off if discipline policies were changed to protect those in school buildings from the most disruptive students (who are a minority). Those truly disruptive, abusive, and unruly students take up too much time and emotional weight. Teachers should not have to suffer abuse at the hands of students, just as students should not lose out on their education due to serious disruptions by other students. Children need structure. By allowing this minority of students to have so much power, teachers are exhausted, and children learn that rules are optional. Parents, too, wind up in defense mode. Getting zeros for late or missing work seems excessive when other students can burst in and out of classrooms, throw items at teachers, and attack other kids at recess. Seriously. If you want discipline, then find a way to address the kids for whom conventional discipline strategies don't work.

I think people have the idea that the law says these disruptive students need to be in a normal school and not in a special school for kids with behavioral issues. I don’t know where they got that since I think the word appropriate implies that it needs to be appropriate for everyone and not just that problem student, but maybe this issue needs to go to the Supreme Court for an official ruling so that school districts all around the country can finally kick out these problem students and start to get learning back on track for everyone else.

Students need to be in the “least restrictive environment” which is a very broad category.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think that teachers, students, and parents would all be better off if discipline policies were changed to protect those in school buildings from the most disruptive students (who are a minority). Those truly disruptive, abusive, and unruly students take up too much time and emotional weight. Teachers should not have to suffer abuse at the hands of students, just as students should not lose out on their education due to serious disruptions by other students. Children need structure. By allowing this minority of students to have so much power, teachers are exhausted, and children learn that rules are optional. Parents, too, wind up in defense mode. Getting zeros for late or missing work seems excessive when other students can burst in and out of classrooms, throw items at teachers, and attack other kids at recess. Seriously. If you want discipline, then find a way to address the kids for whom conventional discipline strategies don't work.

What do you propose?

It's hard to imagine a path to implementing it, but I do think elementary rooms should have two teachers.

Teacher here proposing a few things:
1) There needs to be a way to "fast track" kids like this into a special education self contained classroom within a few weeks, not within a few years. If, with interventions, the child can learn to self regulate, then said kid returns to gen ed, with a full time, 1:1 aide. If they are successful with that support, then fade the TA out.
2) Every single K-1st grade room needs a certified teacher and either a full time TA or a co-teacher. OR, limit K-1 rooms to no more than 10 kids.
3) Pass legislation that requires insurance companies to provide for the educational needs of kids who need to be outplaced. This is primarily a health issue and then second, an education issue. Insurance companies DO YOUR JOB. And the government needs to build, staff, train and supply schools to deal with kids like this.

From your posts (at least, the posts I think come from you), you seem to be at breaking point. And as a parent of a child with special needs and behavioral challenges, I get how exhausting and painful (emotionally and physically) it can be. So I suspect your intentions are pure here. But I don't think you're really thinking through how this would play out for kids with special needs.

The reason we have IDEA to begin with is that states and local school districts were not providing appropriate educational services to kids with disabilities. And I get it-- it is expensive to do so. But essentially eliminating principle of Least Restrictive Environment would bring us right back to that. Kids would quickly get shuffled out to self-contained classrooms that would likely become even more short-staffed and resource poor. Once there, many kids would likely regress. Kids that might otherwise be successful in a gen ed classroom with an aid would never get that chance. Rather than giving kids the benefit of the doubt that they could be successful with supports, they'd instead have to prove themselves in an environment stacked against them. And much of the political pressure to provide resources for the needs of these students would disappear as quickly as the students would disappear into their segregated classrooms.

I don't think health insurance is the right funding path for a variety of reasons. For one, I hope we'll move to single-payer relatively soon anyway. But even more, it sets a bad precedent, would be complicated to regulate, and would likely pose serious challenges to low-income and/or underinsured families. We don't expect insurance companies to reimburse schools in order to make the environment accessible to kids with physical disabilities- why should developmental disabilities be different?

Developmental disabilities come in spectrums that are particularly hard to define and measure. I don't see how you could ever separate educational services that could be covered by the school from habilitative and support services covered by insurance. Any attempt to do so would likely result in battles between insurance companies and schools, where ultimately only the kids would lose. While there are some related challenges already in public schools related to this, at least public schools are arms of the government and ostensibly should have an interest in the public good. The same cannot be said for private insurance companies.

And this would likely get incredibly expensive, assuming these services would be billed like other habilitative services paid through insurance. Since my child was diagnosed with ASD as a toddler, we've simply accepted that we'd hit our out-of-pocket max every year, sometimes exceeding coverage limits and having to pay for things in full. It isn't easy financially, but we're able to do it. But while our income bracket may not be particularly high by DCUM standards, we're in a pretty high HHI percentile with good employer-subsidized health benefits. Not everyone is so lucky.

I might be totally wrong on the private insurance thing. You make good points, thank you for sharing.

I believe in LRE, I do not believe in the current way LRE is being implemented. Kids who need interventions and supports deserve them, but they should not be allowed to be in gen ed rooms for months or years if they can't be successful with those supports. And currently there is ZERO support for those students and for their teachers until there's an actual IEP. Someone needs to fund and mandate that schools provide help in the form of TA's or co-teachers within 10 days of a gen ed teacher saying"help!!!!" And sped teams need to stop preventing or stalling evaluations. Yes, I'm at my breaking point. I'm looking into seeing if workman's comp can be used due to trauma caused by schools not helping teachers who have kids with such extreme needs.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I don't know why people keep talking about the effect of COVID. This thread is about why teachers are resigning.

I'm an elementary school teacher. I know three teachers who resigned last year, a few years earlier than they had anticipated. Last year was an exceptionally hard year, it is true. We had so many teacher absences, and were constantly covering for teachers who were out and had no subs. This year it is even harder. We still have a lot of teacher vacancies; in addition we have a large number of brand new teachers, or conditional teachers without formal teacher training and student teaching. They can do OK for a while, but they really need mentors; yet the mentor teacher support isn't there because most of those teachers have been moved back into the classroom themselves.

Meanwhile, our school district is going like gangbusters with the next new big thing. They do NOT understand how tapped out we all are. More and more teachers are leaving or planning to leave.

The ONE thing that the school district could do, to retain experienced teachers, IMO is just to calm the eff down. Just let it be OK for us to be competent. Everything doesn't have to be bright and shiny and amazing. And beef up HR however you need to hire more teachers. Retrain administrators who are experiencing staff attrition. When `10% of your teaching staff resigns, that's a sign you have a poor administrator. Look at the principals who have managed to retain their experienced staff and ask "What is he doing, that other principals aren't doing?" And then train your administrators to do those things.

Are you referring to the switch away from Lucy Caulkins' Readers and Writers workshop? That change had to happen. Leaving that curriculum in place would be negligent given what is known. It had to go and should have never happened.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:Byyeeee.

School is not childcare. We remember.

Sorry, I don’t care about that anymore.

Old news.

I want my kids taught by experience teachers. I don’t want to drive them away.

We all want our kids taught by skilled, reliable teachers. But then our teachers refused to come to work. They came back, but how long until their next temper tantrum?

Health concerns are a temper tantrum? MCPS issued a blanket denial of ADA accommodations to teachers who wanted to return, but needed some additional safeguards in place. Then, Central Office was in shock that people quit rather than disregard their doctors’ recommendations.

If you were surprised by rejections of requests to stay home, then you don’t seem to understand what the ADA says.

Health concerns aren’t a temper tantrum. Refusing to do your job, while still demanding pay, is a temper tantrum. Some of this even went on after teachers got priority access to vaccines.

Asking to return with safeguards is not the same as asking to stay home. MCPS refused to offer any specific guarantees or even a small set of options to teachers with documented physical disabilities, including the seriously immunocompromised. As a result, people either took FMLA or resigned. Hope you like the long-term subs.

They did return with safeguards. Teachers were prioritized for vaccinations. Masks were required. HVAC filters were upgraded when possible, and they purchased HEPA filters. They even did the silly hybrid schedule, even though it didn’t make any sense.

The teachers that were complaining simply didn’t want to fulfill the demands and expectations of their jobs, which had always included classroom management and the associated risk of exposure to illnesses.

Ok. Sure.

So, they quit and more will. Congrats!

This was 2 YEARS ago. If it were a boy/girlfriend you would be bordering on obsession. Go help someone. Exercise, make peace with it. It has been 2 years.

It started two years ago, although some teachers were still trying to close schools this year! Others still haven't acknowledged their role in the catostrophic decisions to keep schools closed as long as they did and to limit educational services even longer. That suggests they may try to do the same thing in the future.

But go ahead and pretend I'm the only one worried about this. Except I'm sure you've seen the numbers indicating public perception of teachers is at a record low. Are you really going to pretend you don't know why that is?

Are you saying things like Hawley introducing the “parent bill of rights” is backlash from schools closing for covid?

https://www.hawley.senate.gov/hawley-introduces-parents-bill-rights-defend-parents-role-education

That is an extraordinarily immature way of handling anger on the part of Senator Hawley.

I don’t think I’m pretending nor are other posters when they say this is concerted effort by the GOP to defund public education.

+1 Mike Pompeo just said that the most dangerous person in the world isn’t Vladimir Putin, but Randi Weingarten.

[Anonymous]

I think the vitriol against teachers is disgusting and terrifying. More than half of our teachers are amazing, and 90+ percent are trying really hard. I’ve been in the work world long enough to know those are amazing numbers—most fields have a much higher number of people who are lazy, not good at their jobs, etc.

I agree with PP teacher who said that central admin makes teachers jobs much harder than they need to be with the constant curriculum changes. They need to involve teachers much more in this process. Find teachers who want summer jobs and pay them to figure this out. Then pay teachers to come back early and actually get trained on it. Unfortunately, at least in Mcps, there were bad curriculum choices made 10 years ago and they are still trying to course correct so it’s been a decade of so of upheaval.

We need a fundamental shift in thinking in this country to invest much more in k-12 education, including much greater incentives for special educators to attract more of them so they can keep the special Ed class size low and double up on teachers in those classrooms so the teachers can have a break. Any mom of a kid with special needs knows that taking care of a dozen kids with special needs every day is basically impossible. If the special Ed classrooms weren’t such a disaster, people wouldn’t fight to keep their kids out of them. And all teachers should be trained on techniques for dealing with special needs so that they can better manage the kids in their class who are maybe borderline.

The pandemic highlighted the fact that the public education system had no give in its design. Schools are packed to the brim so no room to distance. Not enough extra teachers so no one to fill kn when people get sick. Etc etc. MCPS for instance seems to have an attitude that it won’t buy any property down county— they will just stack extra floors onto property they already have, or build over the playgrounds. The county needs to acknowledge they need more schools with fewer kids in each building and buy property even though it’s expensive. As a society we need to throw some smart money at this problem to decrease school size and decrease class size and increase the number of support professionals (therapists, trained aides, etc.) in schools. But it’s going to require a major shift in thinking and unfortunately republicans would prefer a different shift — towards vouchers for private schools which will lead us down a path towards places like Mexico where rich and MC kids mostly go to private schools for k12, and poor kids get very little education. It’s not the formula for a successful democracy.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think that teachers, students, and parents would all be better off if discipline policies were changed to protect those in school buildings from the most disruptive students (who are a minority). Those truly disruptive, abusive, and unruly students take up too much time and emotional weight. Teachers should not have to suffer abuse at the hands of students, just as students should not lose out on their education due to serious disruptions by other students. Children need structure. By allowing this minority of students to have so much power, teachers are exhausted, and children learn that rules are optional. Parents, too, wind up in defense mode. Getting zeros for late or missing work seems excessive when other students can burst in and out of classrooms, throw items at teachers, and attack other kids at recess. Seriously. If you want discipline, then find a way to address the kids for whom conventional discipline strategies don't work.

What do you propose?

It's hard to imagine a path to implementing it, but I do think elementary rooms should have two teachers.

Teacher here proposing a few things:
1) There needs to be a way to "fast track" kids like this into a special education self contained classroom within a few weeks, not within a few years. If, with interventions, the child can learn to self regulate, then said kid returns to gen ed, with a full time, 1:1 aide. If they are successful with that support, then fade the TA out.
2) Every single K-1st grade room needs a certified teacher and either a full time TA or a co-teacher. OR, limit K-1 rooms to no more than 10 kids.
3) Pass legislation that requires insurance companies to provide for the educational needs of kids who need to be outplaced. This is primarily a health issue and then second, an education issue. Insurance companies DO YOUR JOB. And the government needs to build, staff, train and supply schools to deal with kids like this.

From your posts (at least, the posts I think come from you), you seem to be at breaking point. And as a parent of a child with special needs and behavioral challenges, I get how exhausting and painful (emotionally and physically) it can be. So I suspect your intentions are pure here. But I don't think you're really thinking through how this would play out for kids with special needs.

The reason we have IDEA to begin with is that states and local school districts were not providing appropriate educational services to kids with disabilities. And I get it-- it is expensive to do so. But essentially eliminating principle of Least Restrictive Environment would bring us right back to that. Kids would quickly get shuffled out to self-contained classrooms that would likely become even more short-staffed and resource poor. Once there, many kids would likely regress. Kids that might otherwise be successful in a gen ed classroom with an aid would never get that chance. Rather than giving kids the benefit of the doubt that they could be successful with supports, they'd instead have to prove themselves in an environment stacked against them. And much of the political pressure to provide resources for the needs of these students would disappear as quickly as the students would disappear into their segregated classrooms.

I don't think health insurance is the right funding path for a variety of reasons. For one, I hope we'll move to single-payer relatively soon anyway. But even more, it sets a bad precedent, would be complicated to regulate, and would likely pose serious challenges to low-income and/or underinsured families. We don't expect insurance companies to reimburse schools in order to make the environment accessible to kids with physical disabilities- why should developmental disabilities be different?

Developmental disabilities come in spectrums that are particularly hard to define and measure. I don't see how you could ever separate educational services that could be covered by the school from habilitative and support services covered by insurance. Any attempt to do so would likely result in battles between insurance companies and schools, where ultimately only the kids would lose. While there are some related challenges already in public schools related to this, at least public schools are arms of the government and ostensibly should have an interest in the public good. The same cannot be said for private insurance companies.

And this would likely get incredibly expensive, assuming these services would be billed like other habilitative services paid through insurance. Since my child was diagnosed with ASD as a toddler, we've simply accepted that we'd hit our out-of-pocket max every year, sometimes exceeding coverage limits and having to pay for things in full. It isn't easy financially, but we're able to do it. But while our income bracket may not be particularly high by DCUM standards, we're in a pretty high HHI percentile with good employer-subsidized health benefits. Not everyone is so lucky.

Every child -- those with special needs or not -- deserves the best we can give. Unfortunately, the number of students with special needs in public schools has increased substantially, along with parents who have very high expectations for services, correspondence updates, and paperwork; and they bring advocates and/or attorneys to meetings. I understand why that's being done, but the reality is that the typical school system across our country does not have the resources or personnel to provide that level of service. We are facing a crisis with too few teachers.

So, we should sacrifice the students with special needs for the benefit of the other students? I think you're starting from a place of good intentions, but there's a fine line between being burnt out and simply not caring.

If we burn out our teachers by requiring them to meet the needs of every single individual child, some of whom has extensive needs, with little to no support - which is what is happening now -- we are end up with no teachers and all students will suffer.

So what do you suggest then?

Some of these parents and advocates are going to learn the hard way.

Or the public school districts will. In another generation all they will be left with is poor kids and sped kids. Everyone else will have left.

PP here. "Poor kids and sped kids" have parents, too.

Yes and they will have advocated their way into a school where the only other kids have needs like theirs.

If you're referring to children with significant special needs, that would be a return to the way it was years ago -- special schools for students with special needs.

But there goes Least Restrictive Environment.

The reality is that this means least supported environment at most schools.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:But honestly, that is probably something that needs to happen -- parents need to get something written in federal law that states all students, including the non-disabled, have the right to an appropriate education, including one which is emotionally and physically safe for them, and then define a non-disruptive classroom learning environment as one in which loud outbursts of yelling and screaming, kicking and so on, do not regularly happen.

Agree, but I think you can’t be so vague. You can’t say “regularly happen” because people will claim that if it’s not every week or every day or every hour then it’s fine. I think you need to say that if the same kid causes a disruption more than once per year then the school has the right to remove the child from mainstream classes. And after the very first instance of violence or threatened violence then the child could be removed. That type of thing would never be allowed in a workplace and should never be allowed to happen in our schools either.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think that teachers, students, and parents would all be better off if discipline policies were changed to protect those in school buildings from the most disruptive students (who are a minority). Those truly disruptive, abusive, and unruly students take up too much time and emotional weight. Teachers should not have to suffer abuse at the hands of students, just as students should not lose out on their education due to serious disruptions by other students. Children need structure. By allowing this minority of students to have so much power, teachers are exhausted, and children learn that rules are optional. Parents, too, wind up in defense mode. Getting zeros for late or missing work seems excessive when other students can burst in and out of classrooms, throw items at teachers, and attack other kids at recess. Seriously. If you want discipline, then find a way to address the kids for whom conventional discipline strategies don't work.

What do you propose?

It's hard to imagine a path to implementing it, but I do think elementary rooms should have two teachers.

Teacher here proposing a few things:
1) There needs to be a way to "fast track" kids like this into a special education self contained classroom within a few weeks, not within a few years. If, with interventions, the child can learn to self regulate, then said kid returns to gen ed, with a full time, 1:1 aide. If they are successful with that support, then fade the TA out.
2) Every single K-1st grade room needs a certified teacher and either a full time TA or a co-teacher. OR, limit K-1 rooms to no more than 10 kids.
3) Pass legislation that requires insurance companies to provide for the educational needs of kids who need to be outplaced. This is primarily a health issue and then second, an education issue. Insurance companies DO YOUR JOB. And the government needs to build, staff, train and supply schools to deal with kids like this.

From your posts (at least, the posts I think come from you), you seem to be at breaking point. And as a parent of a child with special needs and behavioral challenges, I get how exhausting and painful (emotionally and physically) it can be. So I suspect your intentions are pure here. But I don't think you're really thinking through how this would play out for kids with special needs.

The reason we have IDEA to begin with is that states and local school districts were not providing appropriate educational services to kids with disabilities. And I get it-- it is expensive to do so. But essentially eliminating principle of Least Restrictive Environment would bring us right back to that. Kids would quickly get shuffled out to self-contained classrooms that would likely become even more short-staffed and resource poor. Once there, many kids would likely regress. Kids that might otherwise be successful in a gen ed classroom with an aid would never get that chance. Rather than giving kids the benefit of the doubt that they could be successful with supports, they'd instead have to prove themselves in an environment stacked against them. And much of the political pressure to provide resources for the needs of these students would disappear as quickly as the students would disappear into their segregated classrooms.

I don't think health insurance is the right funding path for a variety of reasons. For one, I hope we'll move to single-payer relatively soon anyway. But even more, it sets a bad precedent, would be complicated to regulate, and would likely pose serious challenges to low-income and/or underinsured families. We don't expect insurance companies to reimburse schools in order to make the environment accessible to kids with physical disabilities- why should developmental disabilities be different?

Developmental disabilities come in spectrums that are particularly hard to define and measure. I don't see how you could ever separate educational services that could be covered by the school from habilitative and support services covered by insurance. Any attempt to do so would likely result in battles between insurance companies and schools, where ultimately only the kids would lose. While there are some related challenges already in public schools related to this, at least public schools are arms of the government and ostensibly should have an interest in the public good. The same cannot be said for private insurance companies.

And this would likely get incredibly expensive, assuming these services would be billed like other habilitative services paid through insurance. Since my child was diagnosed with ASD as a toddler, we've simply accepted that we'd hit our out-of-pocket max every year, sometimes exceeding coverage limits and having to pay for things in full. It isn't easy financially, but we're able to do it. But while our income bracket may not be particularly high by DCUM standards, we're in a pretty high HHI percentile with good employer-subsidized health benefits. Not everyone is so lucky.

Every child -- those with special needs or not -- deserves the best we can give. Unfortunately, the number of students with special needs in public schools has increased substantially, along with parents who have very high expectations for services, correspondence updates, and paperwork; and they bring advocates and/or attorneys to meetings. I understand why that's being done, but the reality is that the typical school system across our country does not have the resources or personnel to provide that level of service. We are facing a crisis with too few teachers.

So, we should sacrifice the students with special needs for the benefit of the other students? I think you're starting from a place of good intentions, but there's a fine line between being burnt out and simply not caring.

If we burn out our teachers by requiring them to meet the needs of every single individual child, some of whom has extensive needs, with little to no support - which is what is happening now -- we are end up with no teachers and all students will suffer.

So what do you suggest then?

Some of these parents and advocates are going to learn the hard way.

Or the public school districts will. In another generation all they will be left with is poor kids and sped kids. Everyone else will have left.

PP here. "Poor kids and sped kids" have parents, too.

Yes and they will have advocated their way into a school where the only other kids have needs like theirs.

If you're referring to children with significant special needs, that would be a return to the way it was years ago -- special schools for students with special needs.

But there goes Least Restrictive Environment.

The reality is that this means least supported environment at most schools.

Yes and when you factor in the huge cost of entire cohorts of kids learning nothing for years, good teachers leaving, 1:1 aides, damage to school property, it can’t possibly be the cheapest option to keep these kids in mainstream classes. Clearly the schools are scared of the laws, so the laws need to be changed.

[Anonymous]

Randi Weingarten does not represent your kids‘ best interests.

She doesn’t not represent any of your kids’ interests, best or otherwise.

Randi only cares about more $$$ for her union coffers, more $$$ she can give to PACs and political campaigns, and more benefits for unionized teachers (like adding more paid, days off while YOU have to figure out childcare).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Randi Weingarten does not represent your kids‘ best interests.

She doesn’t not represent any of your kids’ interests, best or otherwise.

Randi only cares about more $$$ for her union coffers, more $$$ she can give to PACs and political campaigns, and more benefits for unionized teachers (like adding more paid, days off while YOU have to figure out childcare).

So now its childcare or is it only childcare when you are responsible for your children? Teachers are working professionals who deserve paid days off just like you have PTO. Your disregard for this aspect shows how you view teachers.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think that teachers, students, and parents would all be better off if discipline policies were changed to protect those in school buildings from the most disruptive students (who are a minority). Those truly disruptive, abusive, and unruly students take up too much time and emotional weight. Teachers should not have to suffer abuse at the hands of students, just as students should not lose out on their education due to serious disruptions by other students. Children need structure. By allowing this minority of students to have so much power, teachers are exhausted, and children learn that rules are optional. Parents, too, wind up in defense mode. Getting zeros for late or missing work seems excessive when other students can burst in and out of classrooms, throw items at teachers, and attack other kids at recess. Seriously. If you want discipline, then find a way to address the kids for whom conventional discipline strategies don't work.

What do you propose?

It's hard to imagine a path to implementing it, but I do think elementary rooms should have two teachers.

Teacher here proposing a few things:
1) There needs to be a way to "fast track" kids like this into a special education self contained classroom within a few weeks, not within a few years. If, with interventions, the child can learn to self regulate, then said kid returns to gen ed, with a full time, 1:1 aide. If they are successful with that support, then fade the TA out.
2) Every single K-1st grade room needs a certified teacher and either a full time TA or a co-teacher. OR, limit K-1 rooms to no more than 10 kids.
3) Pass legislation that requires insurance companies to provide for the educational needs of kids who need to be outplaced. This is primarily a health issue and then second, an education issue. Insurance companies DO YOUR JOB. And the government needs to build, staff, train and supply schools to deal with kids like this.

From your posts (at least, the posts I think come from you), you seem to be at breaking point. And as a parent of a child with special needs and behavioral challenges, I get how exhausting and painful (emotionally and physically) it can be. So I suspect your intentions are pure here. But I don't think you're really thinking through how this would play out for kids with special needs.

The reason we have IDEA to begin with is that states and local school districts were not providing appropriate educational services to kids with disabilities. And I get it-- it is expensive to do so. But essentially eliminating principle of Least Restrictive Environment would bring us right back to that. Kids would quickly get shuffled out to self-contained classrooms that would likely become even more short-staffed and resource poor. Once there, many kids would likely regress. Kids that might otherwise be successful in a gen ed classroom with an aid would never get that chance. Rather than giving kids the benefit of the doubt that they could be successful with supports, they'd instead have to prove themselves in an environment stacked against them. And much of the political pressure to provide resources for the needs of these students would disappear as quickly as the students would disappear into their segregated classrooms.

I don't think health insurance is the right funding path for a variety of reasons. For one, I hope we'll move to single-payer relatively soon anyway. But even more, it sets a bad precedent, would be complicated to regulate, and would likely pose serious challenges to low-income and/or underinsured families. We don't expect insurance companies to reimburse schools in order to make the environment accessible to kids with physical disabilities- why should developmental disabilities be different?

Developmental disabilities come in spectrums that are particularly hard to define and measure. I don't see how you could ever separate educational services that could be covered by the school from habilitative and support services covered by insurance. Any attempt to do so would likely result in battles between insurance companies and schools, where ultimately only the kids would lose. While there are some related challenges already in public schools related to this, at least public schools are arms of the government and ostensibly should have an interest in the public good. The same cannot be said for private insurance companies.

And this would likely get incredibly expensive, assuming these services would be billed like other habilitative services paid through insurance. Since my child was diagnosed with ASD as a toddler, we've simply accepted that we'd hit our out-of-pocket max every year, sometimes exceeding coverage limits and having to pay for things in full. It isn't easy financially, but we're able to do it. But while our income bracket may not be particularly high by DCUM standards, we're in a pretty high HHI percentile with good employer-subsidized health benefits. Not everyone is so lucky.

Every child -- those with special needs or not -- deserves the best we can give. Unfortunately, the number of students with special needs in public schools has increased substantially, along with parents who have very high expectations for services, correspondence updates, and paperwork; and they bring advocates and/or attorneys to meetings. I understand why that's being done, but the reality is that the typical school system across our country does not have the resources or personnel to provide that level of service. We are facing a crisis with too few teachers.

So, we should sacrifice the students with special needs for the benefit of the other students? I think you're starting from a place of good intentions, but there's a fine line between being burnt out and simply not caring.

If we burn out our teachers by requiring them to meet the needs of every single individual child, some of whom has extensive needs, with little to no support - which is what is happening now -- we are end up with no teachers and all students will suffer.

So what do you suggest then?

Some of these parents and advocates are going to learn the hard way.

Or the public school districts will. In another generation all they will be left with is poor kids and sped kids. Everyone else will have left.

PP here. "Poor kids and sped kids" have parents, too.

Yes and they will have advocated their way into a school where the only other kids have needs like theirs.

If you're referring to children with significant special needs, that would be a return to the way it was years ago -- special schools for students with special needs.

But there goes Least Restrictive Environment.

The reality is that this means least supported environment at most schools.

unfortunately, you are correct.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think that teachers, students, and parents would all be better off if discipline policies were changed to protect those in school buildings from the most disruptive students (who are a minority). Those truly disruptive, abusive, and unruly students take up too much time and emotional weight. Teachers should not have to suffer abuse at the hands of students, just as students should not lose out on their education due to serious disruptions by other students. Children need structure. By allowing this minority of students to have so much power, teachers are exhausted, and children learn that rules are optional. Parents, too, wind up in defense mode. Getting zeros for late or missing work seems excessive when other students can burst in and out of classrooms, throw items at teachers, and attack other kids at recess. Seriously. If you want discipline, then find a way to address the kids for whom conventional discipline strategies don't work.

What do you propose?

It's hard to imagine a path to implementing it, but I do think elementary rooms should have two teachers.

Teacher here proposing a few things:
1) There needs to be a way to "fast track" kids like this into a special education self contained classroom within a few weeks, not within a few years. If, with interventions, the child can learn to self regulate, then said kid returns to gen ed, with a full time, 1:1 aide. If they are successful with that support, then fade the TA out.
2) Every single K-1st grade room needs a certified teacher and either a full time TA or a co-teacher. OR, limit K-1 rooms to no more than 10 kids.
3) Pass legislation that requires insurance companies to provide for the educational needs of kids who need to be outplaced. This is primarily a health issue and then second, an education issue. Insurance companies DO YOUR JOB. And the government needs to build, staff, train and supply schools to deal with kids like this.

From your posts (at least, the posts I think come from you), you seem to be at breaking point. And as a parent of a child with special needs and behavioral challenges, I get how exhausting and painful (emotionally and physically) it can be. So I suspect your intentions are pure here. But I don't think you're really thinking through how this would play out for kids with special needs.

The reason we have IDEA to begin with is that states and local school districts were not providing appropriate educational services to kids with disabilities. And I get it-- it is expensive to do so. But essentially eliminating principle of Least Restrictive Environment would bring us right back to that. Kids would quickly get shuffled out to self-contained classrooms that would likely become even more short-staffed and resource poor. Once there, many kids would likely regress. Kids that might otherwise be successful in a gen ed classroom with an aid would never get that chance. Rather than giving kids the benefit of the doubt that they could be successful with supports, they'd instead have to prove themselves in an environment stacked against them. And much of the political pressure to provide resources for the needs of these students would disappear as quickly as the students would disappear into their segregated classrooms.

I don't think health insurance is the right funding path for a variety of reasons. For one, I hope we'll move to single-payer relatively soon anyway. But even more, it sets a bad precedent, would be complicated to regulate, and would likely pose serious challenges to low-income and/or underinsured families. We don't expect insurance companies to reimburse schools in order to make the environment accessible to kids with physical disabilities- why should developmental disabilities be different?

Developmental disabilities come in spectrums that are particularly hard to define and measure. I don't see how you could ever separate educational services that could be covered by the school from habilitative and support services covered by insurance. Any attempt to do so would likely result in battles between insurance companies and schools, where ultimately only the kids would lose. While there are some related challenges already in public schools related to this, at least public schools are arms of the government and ostensibly should have an interest in the public good. The same cannot be said for private insurance companies.

And this would likely get incredibly expensive, assuming these services would be billed like other habilitative services paid through insurance. Since my child was diagnosed with ASD as a toddler, we've simply accepted that we'd hit our out-of-pocket max every year, sometimes exceeding coverage limits and having to pay for things in full. It isn't easy financially, but we're able to do it. But while our income bracket may not be particularly high by DCUM standards, we're in a pretty high HHI percentile with good employer-subsidized health benefits. Not everyone is so lucky.

Every child -- those with special needs or not -- deserves the best we can give. Unfortunately, the number of students with special needs in public schools has increased substantially, along with parents who have very high expectations for services, correspondence updates, and paperwork; and they bring advocates and/or attorneys to meetings. I understand why that's being done, but the reality is that the typical school system across our country does not have the resources or personnel to provide that level of service. We are facing a crisis with too few teachers.

So, we should sacrifice the students with special needs for the benefit of the other students? I think you're starting from a place of good intentions, but there's a fine line between being burnt out and simply not caring.

If we burn out our teachers by requiring them to meet the needs of every single individual child, some of whom has extensive needs, with little to no support - which is what is happening now -- we are end up with no teachers and all students will suffer.

So what do you suggest then?

Some of these parents and advocates are going to learn the hard way.

Or the public school districts will. In another generation all they will be left with is poor kids and sped kids. Everyone else will have left.

PP here. "Poor kids and sped kids" have parents, too.

Yes and they will have advocated their way into a school where the only other kids have needs like theirs.

If you're referring to children with significant special needs, that would be a return to the way it was years ago -- special schools for students with special needs.

But there goes Least Restrictive Environment.

The reality is that this means least supported environment at most schools.

unfortunately, you are correct.

1:1 aides for every kid are not the answer. At some point we need to acknowledge that some kids just don’t belong in a mainstream school. The bar is already quite low, really. If they can’t even reach that bar then they need to be in a special environment where the standards are different.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Randi Weingarten does not represent your kids‘ best interests.

She doesn’t not represent any of your kids’ interests, best or otherwise.

Randi only cares about more $$$ for her union coffers, more $$$ she can give to PACs and political campaigns, and more benefits for unionized teachers (like adding more paid, days off while YOU have to figure out childcare).

Power is all she cares about, keeping her power. She has ruined the teaching profession.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think that teachers, students, and parents would all be better off if discipline policies were changed to protect those in school buildings from the most disruptive students (who are a minority). Those truly disruptive, abusive, and unruly students take up too much time and emotional weight. Teachers should not have to suffer abuse at the hands of students, just as students should not lose out on their education due to serious disruptions by other students. Children need structure. By allowing this minority of students to have so much power, teachers are exhausted, and children learn that rules are optional. Parents, too, wind up in defense mode. Getting zeros for late or missing work seems excessive when other students can burst in and out of classrooms, throw items at teachers, and attack other kids at recess. Seriously. If you want discipline, then find a way to address the kids for whom conventional discipline strategies don't work.

What do you propose?

It's hard to imagine a path to implementing it, but I do think elementary rooms should have two teachers.

Teacher here proposing a few things:
1) There needs to be a way to "fast track" kids like this into a special education self contained classroom within a few weeks, not within a few years. If, with interventions, the child can learn to self regulate, then said kid returns to gen ed, with a full time, 1:1 aide. If they are successful with that support, then fade the TA out.
2) Every single K-1st grade room needs a certified teacher and either a full time TA or a co-teacher. OR, limit K-1 rooms to no more than 10 kids.
3) Pass legislation that requires insurance companies to provide for the educational needs of kids who need to be outplaced. This is primarily a health issue and then second, an education issue. Insurance companies DO YOUR JOB. And the government needs to build, staff, train and supply schools to deal with kids like this.

From your posts (at least, the posts I think come from you), you seem to be at breaking point. And as a parent of a child with special needs and behavioral challenges, I get how exhausting and painful (emotionally and physically) it can be. So I suspect your intentions are pure here. But I don't think you're really thinking through how this would play out for kids with special needs.

The reason we have IDEA to begin with is that states and local school districts were not providing appropriate educational services to kids with disabilities. And I get it-- it is expensive to do so. But essentially eliminating principle of Least Restrictive Environment would bring us right back to that. Kids would quickly get shuffled out to self-contained classrooms that would likely become even more short-staffed and resource poor. Once there, many kids would likely regress. Kids that might otherwise be successful in a gen ed classroom with an aid would never get that chance. Rather than giving kids the benefit of the doubt that they could be successful with supports, they'd instead have to prove themselves in an environment stacked against them. And much of the political pressure to provide resources for the needs of these students would disappear as quickly as the students would disappear into their segregated classrooms.

I don't think health insurance is the right funding path for a variety of reasons. For one, I hope we'll move to single-payer relatively soon anyway. But even more, it sets a bad precedent, would be complicated to regulate, and would likely pose serious challenges to low-income and/or underinsured families. We don't expect insurance companies to reimburse schools in order to make the environment accessible to kids with physical disabilities- why should developmental disabilities be different?

Developmental disabilities come in spectrums that are particularly hard to define and measure. I don't see how you could ever separate educational services that could be covered by the school from habilitative and support services covered by insurance. Any attempt to do so would likely result in battles between insurance companies and schools, where ultimately only the kids would lose. While there are some related challenges already in public schools related to this, at least public schools are arms of the government and ostensibly should have an interest in the public good. The same cannot be said for private insurance companies.

And this would likely get incredibly expensive, assuming these services would be billed like other habilitative services paid through insurance. Since my child was diagnosed with ASD as a toddler, we've simply accepted that we'd hit our out-of-pocket max every year, sometimes exceeding coverage limits and having to pay for things in full. It isn't easy financially, but we're able to do it. But while our income bracket may not be particularly high by DCUM standards, we're in a pretty high HHI percentile with good employer-subsidized health benefits. Not everyone is so lucky.

Every child -- those with special needs or not -- deserves the best we can give. Unfortunately, the number of students with special needs in public schools has increased substantially, along with parents who have very high expectations for services, correspondence updates, and paperwork; and they bring advocates and/or attorneys to meetings. I understand why that's being done, but the reality is that the typical school system across our country does not have the resources or personnel to provide that level of service. We are facing a crisis with too few teachers.

So, we should sacrifice the students with special needs for the benefit of the other students? I think you're starting from a place of good intentions, but there's a fine line between being burnt out and simply not caring.

If we burn out our teachers by requiring them to meet the needs of every single individual child, some of whom has extensive needs, with little to no support - which is what is happening now -- we are end up with no teachers and all students will suffer.

So what do you suggest then?

Some of these parents and advocates are going to learn the hard way.

Or the public school districts will. In another generation all they will be left with is poor kids and sped kids. Everyone else will have left.

PP here. "Poor kids and sped kids" have parents, too.

Yes and they will have advocated their way into a school where the only other kids have needs like theirs.

If you're referring to children with significant special needs, that would be a return to the way it was years ago -- special schools for students with special needs.

But there goes Least Restrictive Environment.

The reality is that this means least supported environment at most schools.

unfortunately, you are correct.

1:1 aides for every kid are not the answer. At some point we need to acknowledge that some kids just don’t belong in a mainstream school. The bar is already quite low, really. If they can’t even reach that bar then they need to be in a special environment where the standards are different.

And then send them to special internment camps when they “graduate” from those programs, since you’re obviously not interested in integrating them into society?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think that teachers, students, and parents would all be better off if discipline policies were changed to protect those in school buildings from the most disruptive students (who are a minority). Those truly disruptive, abusive, and unruly students take up too much time and emotional weight. Teachers should not have to suffer abuse at the hands of students, just as students should not lose out on their education due to serious disruptions by other students. Children need structure. By allowing this minority of students to have so much power, teachers are exhausted, and children learn that rules are optional. Parents, too, wind up in defense mode. Getting zeros for late or missing work seems excessive when other students can burst in and out of classrooms, throw items at teachers, and attack other kids at recess. Seriously. If you want discipline, then find a way to address the kids for whom conventional discipline strategies don't work.

What do you propose?

It's hard to imagine a path to implementing it, but I do think elementary rooms should have two teachers.

Teacher here proposing a few things:
1) There needs to be a way to "fast track" kids like this into a special education self contained classroom within a few weeks, not within a few years. If, with interventions, the child can learn to self regulate, then said kid returns to gen ed, with a full time, 1:1 aide. If they are successful with that support, then fade the TA out.
2) Every single K-1st grade room needs a certified teacher and either a full time TA or a co-teacher. OR, limit K-1 rooms to no more than 10 kids.
3) Pass legislation that requires insurance companies to provide for the educational needs of kids who need to be outplaced. This is primarily a health issue and then second, an education issue. Insurance companies DO YOUR JOB. And the government needs to build, staff, train and supply schools to deal with kids like this.

From your posts (at least, the posts I think come from you), you seem to be at breaking point. And as a parent of a child with special needs and behavioral challenges, I get how exhausting and painful (emotionally and physically) it can be. So I suspect your intentions are pure here. But I don't think you're really thinking through how this would play out for kids with special needs.

The reason we have IDEA to begin with is that states and local school districts were not providing appropriate educational services to kids with disabilities. And I get it-- it is expensive to do so. But essentially eliminating principle of Least Restrictive Environment would bring us right back to that. Kids would quickly get shuffled out to self-contained classrooms that would likely become even more short-staffed and resource poor. Once there, many kids would likely regress. Kids that might otherwise be successful in a gen ed classroom with an aid would never get that chance. Rather than giving kids the benefit of the doubt that they could be successful with supports, they'd instead have to prove themselves in an environment stacked against them. And much of the political pressure to provide resources for the needs of these students would disappear as quickly as the students would disappear into their segregated classrooms.

I don't think health insurance is the right funding path for a variety of reasons. For one, I hope we'll move to single-payer relatively soon anyway. But even more, it sets a bad precedent, would be complicated to regulate, and would likely pose serious challenges to low-income and/or underinsured families. We don't expect insurance companies to reimburse schools in order to make the environment accessible to kids with physical disabilities- why should developmental disabilities be different?

Developmental disabilities come in spectrums that are particularly hard to define and measure. I don't see how you could ever separate educational services that could be covered by the school from habilitative and support services covered by insurance. Any attempt to do so would likely result in battles between insurance companies and schools, where ultimately only the kids would lose. While there are some related challenges already in public schools related to this, at least public schools are arms of the government and ostensibly should have an interest in the public good. The same cannot be said for private insurance companies.

And this would likely get incredibly expensive, assuming these services would be billed like other habilitative services paid through insurance. Since my child was diagnosed with ASD as a toddler, we've simply accepted that we'd hit our out-of-pocket max every year, sometimes exceeding coverage limits and having to pay for things in full. It isn't easy financially, but we're able to do it. But while our income bracket may not be particularly high by DCUM standards, we're in a pretty high HHI percentile with good employer-subsidized health benefits. Not everyone is so lucky.

Every child -- those with special needs or not -- deserves the best we can give. Unfortunately, the number of students with special needs in public schools has increased substantially, along with parents who have very high expectations for services, correspondence updates, and paperwork; and they bring advocates and/or attorneys to meetings. I understand why that's being done, but the reality is that the typical school system across our country does not have the resources or personnel to provide that level of service. We are facing a crisis with too few teachers.

So, we should sacrifice the students with special needs for the benefit of the other students? I think you're starting from a place of good intentions, but there's a fine line between being burnt out and simply not caring.

If we burn out our teachers by requiring them to meet the needs of every single individual child, some of whom has extensive needs, with little to no support - which is what is happening now -- we are end up with no teachers and all students will suffer.

So what do you suggest then?

Some of these parents and advocates are going to learn the hard way.

Or the public school districts will. In another generation all they will be left with is poor kids and sped kids. Everyone else will have left.

PP here. "Poor kids and sped kids" have parents, too.

Yes and they will have advocated their way into a school where the only other kids have needs like theirs.

If you're referring to children with significant special needs, that would be a return to the way it was years ago -- special schools for students with special needs.

But there goes Least Restrictive Environment.

I am positive that no one who passed the law requiring least restrictive environment had the current situation in mind, where teachers without special training try desperately to deal with kids with special needs while the rest of the class languishes.