Yet another teacher has left BASIS and parents are in the dark

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Charter schools are public schools, and as such, they must comply with IDEA, which is federal law.

That's a separate issue from the rest of public school law. Nobody said charters didn't have to comply with IDEA. But the question I'd ask is if the charters are adequately supported where it comes to serving special needs students. I doubt charters receive the same amount of money per special needs student as DCPS does. Charters already get shortchanged everywhere else to begin with.

Doesn't matter. Compliance is compliance.

Just about every public school in this city has had some form of compliance issue around IDEA. In fact DCPS is so bad at dealing with it themselves that they ship many kids out rather than even attempt at compliance. Fortunately DCPS has the financial luxury of doing that - other schools are not so lucky. Broken mandates, broken policies, broken processes, broken funding... That's where it all needs to start. We're seeing the symptoms, not the causes.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:IEPs and accommodations can be a double-edged sword. They can help in many cases but they also need to be applied judiciously, reservedly and with a lot of objective assessment. If a student needs a large amount of extra help and a lot of extra accommodations in testing and other areas can give a skewed idea and incorrect expectations of where the student actually is at and what the student can do. And compounding this is the fact that less and less help is available later on - at colleges and universities, for example, workplaces and so on. The first rule is that people have to be realistic and objective - and when it comes to most parents, few are.

What?
BASIS is a middle school, paving a way to college and the workplace for students who are not even teens.

I cannot believe that there are parents who think implementing IEP goals written down by a group of professional educators means watering down the curriculum.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:BASIS is all about acceleration.
I learned this last year during meetings.
When I asked about modification and differentiation, I was told point blank that "unfortunately BASIS is not this kind of school." IEP's are being written but not followed. I was told that a speech teacher was already hired in November, yet my child has to meet her.
Let BASIS become a test-in gifted and talented school and not promise parents they will serve all kids. It was so obvious to me that this year's " IEP results" had been cut and pasted from last year.
I am utterly disappointed and feel I am being lied to.

Herein lies the crux of the problem. No DC Charter school can become a test in school. BASIS was supposed to be, as nasty and cruel as it sounds, a "flunk out" school and their charter allows them to do that. You can flunk out with or without an IEP.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:BASIS is all about acceleration.
I learned this last year during meetings.
When I asked about modification and differentiation, I was told point blank that "unfortunately BASIS is not this kind of school." IEP's are being written but not followed. I was told that a speech teacher was already hired in November, yet my child has to meet her.
Let BASIS become a test-in gifted and talented school and not promise parents they will serve all kids. It was so obvious to me that this year's " IEP results" had been cut and pasted from last year.
I am utterly disappointed and feel I am being lied to.

Herein lies the crux of the problem. No DC Charter school can become a test in school. BASIS was supposed to be, as nasty and cruel as it sounds, a "flunk out" school and their charter allows them to do that. You can flunk out with or without an IEP.

No different than any of the other charters so often talked about on DCUM. Shrug.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:BASIS is all about acceleration.
I learned this last year during meetings.
When I asked about modification and differentiation, I was told point blank that "unfortunately BASIS is not this kind of school." IEP's are being written but not followed. I was told that a speech teacher was already hired in November, yet my child has to meet her.
Let BASIS become a test-in gifted and talented school and not promise parents they will serve all kids. It was so obvious to me that this year's " IEP results" had been cut and pasted from last year.
I am utterly disappointed and feel I am being lied to.

You are probably right. This may be the different value system that forced xxxx to resign.

When did they say that "BASIS is not this kind of school? In the spring before you were there or this fall? Legally it is immaterial but personally it makes a great deal of difference to me.

[jsteele]

I have just posted a very similar message in the private schools forum which I will quote in part here:

Please keep in mind that you are not having a discussion with a couple of friends over a cup of tea, but posting messages that are immediately indexed by Google and available worldwide. As such, folks deserve a modicum of privacy. Topics such as an individual's reason for leaving, gossip about their performance, etc. are not appropriate for anonymous discussion. If you would like to identify yourself, provide personal details, and allow the DCUM community to publicly evaluate your job performance, perhaps allowances can be made for your posts about others. But, short of that, please use some discretion.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:BASIS is all about acceleration.
I learned this last year during meetings.
When I asked about modification and differentiation, I was told point blank that "unfortunately BASIS is not this kind of school." IEP's are being written but not followed. I was told that a speech teacher was already hired in November, yet my child has to meet her.
Let BASIS become a test-in gifted and talented school and not promise parents they will serve all kids. It was so obvious to me that this year's " IEP results" had been cut and pasted from last year.
I am utterly disappointed and feel I am being lied to.

You are probably right. This may be the different value system that forced xxxx to resign.

When did they say that "BASIS is not this kind of school? In the spring before you were there or this fall? Legally it is immaterial but personally it makes a great deal of difference to me.

Nobody here said anything about any charter becoming test in - but if you are looking for a "differentiated" or "modified" track that would be less demanding, then you are probably choosing the wrong school in the first place.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:IEPs and accommodations can be a double-edged sword. They can help in many cases but they also need to be applied judiciously, reservedly and with a lot of objective assessment. If a student needs a large amount of extra help and a lot of extra accommodations in testing and other areas can give a skewed idea and incorrect expectations of where the student actually is at and what the student can do. And compounding this is the fact that less and less help is available later on - at colleges and universities, for example, workplaces and so on. The first rule is that people have to be realistic and objective - and when it comes to most parents, few are.

There is a rumor that IEPs are handed out in some DCPS like candy. When Johnny can't read or do basic math, but you have to move him up a grade anyway, do you teach him the skills or label him so you don't have to and get extra money for him instead? Not a BASIS parent, but to quote my husband, "you can't accommodate stupid." You also can't accommodate years of neglect. It sounds like at 5th grade, you should not go to BASIS if you cannot read, write, or do math well. Johnny may not be stupid. He may be just another kid that DCPS failed. But BASIS?

Lots of extra help may be a problem, but BASIS offers it to all kids. Watering down the standards, definitely.

But if all a kid needs is extra time, IMO that is very different. Some kids have problems writing. It takes them longer. Some kids have handwriting so bad they have to type and it slows them down. Some kids have ADD. I don't know much about ADD, but they might need extra time. None of these means stupid or lacking skills.

One of the brightest men I know is on medication for ADD. He attended a top Ivy, stayed for law school, and is now a partner at a firm making more money in a year than many of us will make in our lives. He would have loved to go to BASIS. If he needed extra time or to take tests in a quieter room and BASIS said no, as his Dad, I would have hired a lawyer.

[Anonymous]

MODERATOR

IT IS NOT COOL TO ERASE POSTS LIKE THAT. SOME OF THE POSTS HAD CONTENT BEYOND THE NAME OF THE TEACHER. YOU SHOULD HAVE REDACTED THE NAME AND LEFT THE POST. OTHERWISE IT IS CENSORSHIP!

[Anonymous]

We don't know what the specifics are which are causing the family in question grief due to IEPs or 504s.

I do know they have done a lot to help special needs kids such as ours, we have had no problems at all with Basis accommodating us and as I mentioned earlier, our DC is thriving there - but then again, we haven't asked them for much, either.

From what I had heard, they do offer things like extra time to SN students based on IEPs as well but I don't know any specifics or details beyond that. I don't think it's valid to suggest they ignore IEPs or 504s outright based on what we know, there may be some very specific issues that I'm not aware of - but overall from what I have seen, they have been working with families.

[Anonymous]

jsteele wrote:I have just posted a very similar message in the private schools forum which I will quote in part here:

Please keep in mind that you are not having a discussion with a couple of friends over a cup of tea, but posting messages that are immediately indexed by Google and available worldwide. As such, folks deserve a modicum of privacy. Topics such as an individual's reason for leaving, gossip about their performance, etc. are not appropriate for anonymous discussion. If you would like to identify yourself, provide personal details, and allow the DCUM community to publicly evaluate your job performance, perhaps allowances can be made for your posts about others. But, short of that, please use some discretion.

What about public officials like Henderson, Aguirre, Abigail Smith? Are we allowed to discuss their motivation and job performance? Where is the line here? Truly interested in not stepping over it.

[jsteele]

Anonymous wrote:

jsteele wrote:I have just posted a very similar message in the private schools forum which I will quote in part here:

Please keep in mind that you are not having a discussion with a couple of friends over a cup of tea, but posting messages that are immediately indexed by Google and available worldwide. As such, folks deserve a modicum of privacy. Topics such as an individual's reason for leaving, gossip about their performance, etc. are not appropriate for anonymous discussion. If you would like to identify yourself, provide personal details, and allow the DCUM community to publicly evaluate your job performance, perhaps allowances can be made for your posts about others. But, short of that, please use some discretion.

What about public officials like Henderson, Aguirre, Abigail Smith? Are we allowed to discuss their motivation and job performance? Where is the line here? Truly interested in not stepping over it.

I answered a similar question in the Private Schools forum, so see my response there:

http://www.dcurbanmom.com/jforum/posts/list/357385.page

The three you mentioned are more obviously public figures than are school officials. Hence, I will allow a bit more leeway as long it is about their professional performance and not personal information. Abby Smith used to babysit my kids, so I am a bit more sensitive in her case.

[Anonymous]

Abby Smith probably has had more influence over how public education has evolved in DC for better or for worse over the last decade than any of the others combined. And with her leadership on the boundaries and school assignment committee she will influence all of our kids way into the future. So the fact that you know her personally should not have any bearing on how you way the appropriateness of discussion, in my opinion.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:MODERATOR

IT IS NOT COOL TO ERASE POSTS LIKE THAT. SOME OF THE POSTS HAD CONTENT BEYOND THE NAME OF THE TEACHER. YOU SHOULD HAVE REDACTED THE NAME AND LEFT THE POST. OTHERWISE IT IS CENSORSHIP!

He owns the website, he can do with it what he wants.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:MODERATOR

IT IS NOT COOL TO ERASE POSTS LIKE THAT. SOME OF THE POSTS HAD CONTENT BEYOND THE NAME OF THE TEACHER. YOU SHOULD HAVE REDACTED THE NAME AND LEFT THE POST. OTHERWISE IT IS CENSORSHIP!

He owns the website, he can do with it what he wants.

Such a dumb reply. So, we can't complain about how the board is managed?

Nobody likes it but sometime it is a good thing to hear some criticisms.