Concerned about lower spending on Regular Kids in FCPS?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I found the Fairfax County Appraisal site that shows property assessments (values) dropping in McLean -0.475 and Great Falls -2.83%, up 0.29% in Vienna (I think this is different from the Town of Vienna) and up 0.68% for the whole County. Just to help see it all in perspective. http://www.fairfaxcounty.gov/news2/2017-real-estate-assessments/ If you go down the page there's a map that shows the different districts and the change in assessments. Not good news for my retirement plans.

The SAT numbers are interesting. My son is taking ACTs this morning and I hear that more and more kids are taking ACTs rather than SATs. I don't know what effect this has. Also many kdis who don't plan to go to college or want to go to the local Virginia schools don't have to take SATs or ACTs. How much difference could that be having? It was expensive and a lot of work to prepare for these tests (my daughter took the SATs two years ago).

Assessments in most McLean single-family neighborhoods in 22101 were up this year, so if the overall assessments were down in McLean it may be due to larger declines in the assessments in homes and condos in 22102.

On your other point, I think the increasing taking of ACTs just underscores that students are trying to get into good schools, and recognize that, comparatively speaking, their ACT scores may look better than their SAT scores.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Ugh, sorry, should say "AAP doesn't cost much extra money."

neither does immersion.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Over the past ten years FY08 - FY18 (note fiscal years end/begin June 30)

Spending on General Education students (this includes ESOL) has declined by 7% in real (inflation adjusted) dollars. In FY08 FCPS spent $11,400 on a GenEd student - in real terms today that is $10,600.

Spending on Special Education students has increased by 9% in real (inflation adjusted) dollars. In FY08, FCPS spent $20,200 on a SpecEd student - in real terms today that is $21,800.

There were 4,015 unaccompanied children resettled in Fairfax County over the past 4 years (https://www.acf.hhs.gov/orr/unaccompanied-children-released-to-sponsors-by-county). At an average cost of $16,390 - ($12,640 avg cost/GenEd student + $3,750 ESOL expense) that is an incremental cost to FCPS of at least $66M every year.

Fairfax County is very generous to Special Needs children and to refugees and immigrants - and I am proud of that generosity.

Is there a point at which spending differences on various groups becomes inequitable or inappropriate and/or unsustainable? Are people leaving FCPS (and Fairfax County) to go to Loudoun, Arlington, Montgomery Counties seeking more money spent on Regular Kids? Loudoun population grew 3% last year by 11,386 residents - Fairfax added zero.

Can FCPS become ever more efficient, to help ensure that the money that is available is effectively spent? If people move out and businesses don't relocate here (or move away), the 'burden' of paying for school falls on fewer and fewer households. House values in McLean, Great Falls and Vienna are declining - in much of the rest of the County, house values are stagnating.

How can we, as a community, balance the needs of various groups and remain an attractive option for people looking for good schools for their kids, reasonable taxes, good services, safe neighborhoods and a place they might be able to retire? What choices must be made - especially when the economists and budget analysts look forward and estimate future growth at 2% per year?

I am actually OK with spending on special needs kids and esol. I DO resent spending on all the not so special snowflakes in AAP and language immersion. But even more, I resent the spending on all the things that have nothing to do with kids. Fairfax is not a lean mean fighting machine - it is a bloated bureaucracy where teaching and learning are at the bottom of a very large, fat totem pole. Take a look at admin salaries, and the salaries of the gadjillion people who work in non-teaching jobs in non-school buildings. No one talks about cutting them, because you don't see them or know about them, and they are pretty much the ones in charge of deciding who gets cut. And how about the money Fairfax pays to outside consultants? It pays enough to contractors to fund many teaching positions, and moreover, a lot of the time those contractors are doing things that FCPS didn't really need. They have whole departments where they pay people to be in charge of developing curriculum, but then they hire an outside company and pay hundreds of thousands for a group of outsiders who are no more qualified than FCPS teachers and administrators to come in and tell us what to do. If anyone is going to cut services for children, we need to first shine a light on central admin and contractors. That's where the waste and inefficiency are.

the problem with your statement above is that it implies those "snowflakes" are special. What is unfortunate about AAP is that there are many many children who would benefit from the curriculum but don't get it because they just missed the cutoff. And with immersion, there are just limited slots because the county hasn't expanded the program. In both cases, an expansion would benefit all children. We should think about how we can give all children these opportunities and stop thinking about who is and who isn't benefitting. All kids should benefit from these opportunities if they want them.

[Anonymous]

For 16:48's sake, can we please add on AAP level IV children to the list of children who get less spending than any child in Loudoun or Arlington? What this person doesn't seem to realize is that the kids who just miss the cutoff are the ones getting the extra services.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why don't you mosey on over to the special needs board and tell all those moms and dads that you resent spending on their kids?

Problem is--that we also spend extra money on the AAP programs. The only ones that don't get extra are the "gen ed"......

This. I have no problem spending extra on special needs kids. AAP kids are *not* special needs.

For the love of God. AAP kids get LESS than general ed kids. LESS. Less than all other kids. Find something else to be upset about.

How can you even say this, and with a (presumably) straight face? AAP kids do not get *less* than Gen Ed kids. How absurd.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why don't you mosey on over to the special needs board and tell all those moms and dads that you resent spending on their kids?

Problem is--that we also spend extra money on the AAP programs. The only ones that don't get extra are the "gen ed"......

This. I have no problem spending extra on special needs kids. AAP kids are *not* special needs.

For the love of God. AAP kids get LESS than general ed kids. LESS. Less than all other kids. Find something else to be upset about.

Really? Then why is AAP always listed as one of the items to potentially cut whenever FCPS goes through its annual "we're broke" spiel? In addition, one thing AAP kids absolutely get is the freedom to choose their base school or a center - even when both schools offer LLIV. A choice of school is something Gen Ed kids do NOT get.

There is a list of about 100 possible cuts this year and the only one they thought would save any money was changing the class size for AAP students. The proposal was to increase the class size greater for AAP than general ed making them officially unequal in terms of funding. It already is unequal in size because principals already try to give their additional teachers to general ed and students in those classes rarely leave for special ed or ESOL services and never leave to go with the AART. You are correct they do get that freedom, but there isn't an additional cost associated with it.

At our center, the AAP classes are consistently smaller than the Gen Ed classes. And there may not be a monetary "cost" to giving AAP kids the choice to switch schools, but there certainly is an "equity" cost. This is a public school. Opportunities available to one group should be made available to all students.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I found the Fairfax County Appraisal site that shows property assessments (values) dropping in McLean -0.475 and Great Falls -2.83%, up 0.29% in Vienna (I think this is different from the Town of Vienna) and up 0.68% for the whole County. Just to help see it all in perspective. http://www.fairfaxcounty.gov/news2/2017-real-estate-assessments/ If you go down the page there's a map that shows the different districts and the change in assessments. Not good news for my retirement plans.

The SAT numbers are interesting. My son is taking ACTs this morning and I hear that more and more kids are taking ACTs rather than SATs. I don't know what effect this has. Also many kdis who don't plan to go to college or want to go to the local Virginia schools don't have to take SATs or ACTs. How much difference could that be having? It was expensive and a lot of work to prepare for these tests (my daughter took the SATs two years ago).

I'm not aware of any VA colleges that don't require either the SAT or ACT.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why don't you mosey on over to the special needs board and tell all those moms and dads that you resent spending on their kids?

Problem is--that we also spend extra money on the AAP programs. The only ones that don't get extra are the "gen ed"......

This. I have no problem spending extra on special needs kids. AAP kids are *not* special needs.

For the love of God. AAP kids get LESS than general ed kids. LESS. Less than all other kids. Find something else to be upset about.

How can you even say this, and with a (presumably) straight face? AAP kids do not get *less* than Gen Ed kids. How absurd.

Then there's the fact that Sped kids get much more in the way of chances when disrupting and being aggressive toward the others. So much money spent on them and look what's let go all in the name of "inclusion." I'd rather see the money go toward AAP and the general education population.

[Anonymous]

Inclusion is much less expensive than other alternatives.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Inclusion is much less expensive than other alternatives.

Many when counting dollars and cents. Not when GenEd kids keep coming home with bruises from the kids with IEPs, and the administration looks the other way. The GenEd kids and their families "pay" for inclusion differently. I say this as a parent and as a teacher.

[Anonymous]

-maybe when, not many

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I found the Fairfax County Appraisal site that shows property assessments (values) dropping in McLean -0.475 and Great Falls -2.83%, up 0.29% in Vienna (I think this is different from the Town of Vienna) and up 0.68% for the whole County. Just to help see it all in perspective. http://www.fairfaxcounty.gov/news2/2017-real-estate-assessments/ If you go down the page there's a map that shows the different districts and the change in assessments. Not good news for my retirement plans.

The SAT numbers are interesting. My son is taking ACTs this morning and I hear that more and more kids are taking ACTs rather than SATs. I don't know what effect this has. Also many kdis who don't plan to go to college or want to go to the local Virginia schools don't have to take SATs or ACTs. How much difference could that be having? It was expensive and a lot of work to prepare for these tests (my daughter took the SATs two years ago).

I'm not aware of any VA colleges that don't require either the SAT or ACT.

I know GMU is score optional for majors other than computer science and engineering. There may be other Virginia colleges that are score optional.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Inclusion is much less expensive than other alternatives.

Many when counting dollars and cents. Not when GenEd kids keep coming home with bruises from the kids with IEPs, and the administration looks the other way. The GenEd kids and their families "pay" for inclusion differently. I say this as a parent and as a teacher.

I thought this thread was about spending $$$$, not how gross you are.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Inclusion is much less expensive than other alternatives.

Many when counting dollars and cents. Not when GenEd kids keep coming home with bruises from the kids with IEPs, and the administration looks the other way. The GenEd kids and their families "pay" for inclusion differently. I say this as a parent and as a teacher.

I thought this thread was about spending $$$$, not how gross you are.

Then, why do they "team teach" with the IEP kids in high school only in gened classes? You don't find them in the honors classes. My Gened DS switched to honors classes after one of those team taught classes. And, believe me DS was no goody twoshoes. He said it was awful.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why don't you mosey on over to the special needs board and tell all those moms and dads that you resent spending on their kids?

Problem is--that we also spend extra money on the AAP programs. The only ones that don't get extra are the "gen ed"......

This. I have no problem spending extra on special needs kids. AAP kids are *not* special needs.

For the love of God. AAP kids get LESS than general ed kids. LESS. Less than all other kids. Find something else to be upset about.

How can you even say this, and with a (presumably) straight face? AAP kids do not get *less* than Gen Ed kids. How absurd.

They get less money once they are in the LLIV program because they receive less services from specialists and have larger classes.