Teachers, would writing a letter to Dr. Reed do anything?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'm a SPED teacher who went back in October of 2021 before there was a vaccine. I love my job but I'm actively looking elsewhere. Central Office should be doing everything related to compensatory services, from digging through the data to figure out who is entitled to what, to scheduling and arranging the meetings, to providing and services as required. Putting this on the teachers who were following the orders we were given at the time is stupid. This, plus the Newport News shooting, plus the change of insurance companies to a worse provider is going to create an even more severe shortage than we already have. Intent forms are going out shortly and I believe some schools already sent them. I wish I could bookmark this post because there's going to be widespread panic when some schools lose their entire SPED departments next year and FCPS will claim they have no idea why.

100%. When we had our little staff meeting with the slides from central office about all of this, nobody was thrilled, but the sped teachers all had defeat and/or anger in their eyes. They’re already understaffed—we never filled one spot, one new teacher quit over winter break and never came back, and another is actively job searching outside of Ed. SPED is going to be decimated even more so than the general teaching pool.

Maybe Dr Reid’s bestie from her old district needs to roll up her sleeves and Experience and Engage this work her own self.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:It’s all such a mess.

We have services and when they contact us, I want to say no thanks. Don’t even have a meeting. Save yourselves some work. Is that an option? I really feel for these teachers.

My DC got a 504 last year. We just had our annual meeting and they told us we would have another one for compensatory services. We don't need compensatory services - I'd like to have a 5 minute virtual meeting where we tell them that. SMH

Im in the same boat with DC-I've told them I'll take a quick virtual(since it's mandatory) but we do not want services nor do we want educators wasting precious time on this.

Thank you! This sentiment is very much appreciated.

Unfortunately, we still have to create the entire file for your DC and hold the entire meeting. You can opt out of attending, but no time will be saved. It's really, really, frustrating how this settlement was written.

I am a PP and also an FCPS teacher who doesn’t have the time or coverage to take the meeting. Haha

SAME! LOL It's ridiculous all around.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm a SPED teacher who went back in October of 2021 before there was a vaccine. I love my job but I'm actively looking elsewhere. Central Office should be doing everything related to compensatory services, from digging through the data to figure out who is entitled to what, to scheduling and arranging the meetings, to providing and services as required. Putting this on the teachers who were following the orders we were given at the time is stupid. This, plus the Newport News shooting, plus the change of insurance companies to a worse provider is going to create an even more severe shortage than we already have. Intent forms are going out shortly and I believe some schools already sent them. I wish I could bookmark this post because there's going to be widespread panic when some schools lose their entire SPED departments next year and FCPS will claim they have no idea why.

100%. When we had our little staff meeting with the slides from central office about all of this, nobody was thrilled, but the sped teachers all had defeat and/or anger in their eyes. They’re already understaffed—we never filled one spot, one new teacher quit over winter break and never came back, and another is actively job searching outside of Ed. SPED is going to be decimated even more so than the general teaching pool.

Maybe Dr Reid’s bestie from her old district needs to roll up her sleeves and Experience and Engage this work her own self.

Who is her bestie?

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:It means that if a child didn't make "adequate" progress during the virtual part of the pandemic then they are in need of additional services. It could mean that they had trouble accessing virtual services due to lack of equipment, had trouble attending, did not learn in that manner, etc. The trouble is that you need to document for every student and hold a meeting and document in several places. It's very time consuming. It's a lot of work and then the services being offered are not much.

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Anonymous wrote:This is to make up for work that wasn’t done during the pandemic, right? So I guess it evens out.

The irony is that the superintendent and school board decided to keep schools closed while most of the country returned. And FCPS was dumb enough to put it into writing that they would fix this instead of just saying from the start that they will do their best.

And this affects All teachers even if these students weren’t in FCPS at the time. Even kids last year who had IEP and in school.

All students could return to school as soon as the teachers were vaccinated. What more could you want? Absolutely no one should have had to work in person until they were vaccinated. Absolutely no one.

Whatever. Most of the country was back in school that year.

And then last year most of the country wasn’t requiring masks, doing 10 day pauses and all the crap FCPS pulled.

I’m saying this as teacher. And no kids weren’t back until a few months after teachers were vaccinated and even then many schools could only offered 2 days in and 2 days out. No one was back in school 5 days a week.

NP. As a parent who wanted my kids to be back in the building, I was frustrated at how the 2020-2021 school year started - but it was clear that FCPS was complying with CDC guidelines with all the restrictions. Some states ignored the CDC, Virginia didn't.

TBH, I don't understand what the compensatory services agreement is about, if it's just about virtual school or something else. I can see how the additional meetings are a burden. Will there also be additional services to make up for the learning losses from the pandemic? What does that even mean?

It means more services. I’m happy. FCPS screwed up big time. Time to make it right.

Can you explain further? What services are being offered? What are the metrics for progress?

Services being offered are individual to the student and what progress wasn’t made.

Johnny usually makes 1 year of growth in reading levels during a normal school year, but during virtual only grew half a year? Maybe an hour of private tutoring once a week after school to work on reading.

Suzy has an IEP for speech but didn’t get a physical person present because FCPS was not meeting in person and therefor made minimal progress in speech goals because no one was able to physically shape her mouth? She will qualify to have a SP come to her house on Saturday for an extra 30 minutes a week.

Larlo’s parents were worried he was going to fall behind during virtual so hired a math tutor (and have receipts to prove it?) They may be able to submit those receipts for reimbursement, if he didn’t get his math pull out accommodations.

A kid who usually makes minimal growth in reading and online made minimal growth in reading should not qualify. A child who usually keeps up with grade level expectations and online met grade level benchmarks won’t qualify. There has to be proof (through testing data, sol scores, IEP narratives) that less than normal progress was made that year.

THANK YOU! This is so much clearer than what they gave to parents.

How do they handle reimbursement? If a child did not receive 20 hours of speech, but you have 20 hours of private speech sessions, is this an automatic reimbursement?

That was not explained to staff. Teachers are to create a portfolio of documentation related to the goals that were in the IEP when the pandemic hit, and during. They will meet (with the family) to decide if similar progress was/was not made base on the student's typical amount of progress. They mark the file as "yes, compensatory" or "no, not compensatory". Then lawyers in central office will determine actual reimbursement.

It seems like much less annoyance to do none of that and take a job in Loudon or Arlington next year.

This all has to be done by JUNE!!!!

Our school only has 90 IEPS. Imagine schools with centers and more IEPS.

I’m at a secondary school. 540 IEPs. By the time documentation is assembled there will need to be 8-9 of these meetings every day. A short one (where parents say “we’re good” will last 30 minutes according to our sped chair. Plus regular IEPs?! When?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm a SPED teacher who went back in October of 2021 before there was a vaccine. I love my job but I'm actively looking elsewhere. Central Office should be doing everything related to compensatory services, from digging through the data to figure out who is entitled to what, to scheduling and arranging the meetings, to providing and services as required. Putting this on the teachers who were following the orders we were given at the time is stupid. This, plus the Newport News shooting, plus the change of insurance companies to a worse provider is going to create an even more severe shortage than we already have. Intent forms are going out shortly and I believe some schools already sent them. I wish I could bookmark this post because there's going to be widespread panic when some schools lose their entire SPED departments next year and FCPS will claim they have no idea why.

100%. When we had our little staff meeting with the slides from central office about all of this, nobody was thrilled, but the sped teachers all had defeat and/or anger in their eyes. They’re already understaffed—we never filled one spot, one new teacher quit over winter break and never came back, and another is actively job searching outside of Ed. SPED is going to be decimated even more so than the general teaching pool.

Maybe Dr Reid’s bestie from her old district needs to roll up her sleeves and Experience and Engage this work her own self.

Who is her bestie?

Lisa Youngblood Hall. Listen to this self-involved nonsense in her intro to the board in July: https://youtu.be/tbJ7AZSjFXE

[Anonymous]

I’m so sorry for the teachers who are going to feel the brunt of missteps FCPS (gatehouse and school board) made during the pandemic. As a parent, I feel for you - I really do. FCPS admin is just bloated and messed up. They should have opened schools earlier to minimize the impact to the students.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I’m so sorry for the teachers who are going to feel the brunt of missteps FCPS (gatehouse and school board) made during the pandemic. As a parent, I feel for you - I really do. FCPS admin is just bloated and messed up. They should have opened schools earlier to minimize the impact to the students.

Well we had certain teachers unions (aka Kimberly Adams) not wanting to open until certain unrealistic conditions were met (0% disease in the community lol).

[Anonymous]

There's now a huge group chat where FCPS special ed teachers, OTs, and SLPs are comparing and contrasting surrounding counties. Loudoun, Prince William, and Arlington just hit the lottery.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:There's now a huge group chat where FCPS special ed teachers, OTs, and SLPs are comparing and contrasting surrounding counties. Loudoun, Prince William, and Arlington just hit the lottery.

Where? I'm interested in this chat.
FCPS SPED teacher

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm a SPED teacher who went back in October of 2021 before there was a vaccine. I love my job but I'm actively looking elsewhere. Central Office should be doing everything related to compensatory services, from digging through the data to figure out who is entitled to what, to scheduling and arranging the meetings, to providing and services as required. Putting this on the teachers who were following the orders we were given at the time is stupid. This, plus the Newport News shooting, plus the change of insurance companies to a worse provider is going to create an even more severe shortage than we already have. Intent forms are going out shortly and I believe some schools already sent them. I wish I could bookmark this post because there's going to be widespread panic when some schools lose their entire SPED departments next year and FCPS will claim they have no idea why.

100%. When we had our little staff meeting with the slides from central office about all of this, nobody was thrilled, but the sped teachers all had defeat and/or anger in their eyes. They’re already understaffed—we never filled one spot, one new teacher quit over winter break and never came back, and another is actively job searching outside of Ed. SPED is going to be decimated even more so than the general teaching pool.

Maybe Dr Reid’s bestie from her old district needs to roll up her sleeves and Experience and Engage this work her own self.

Who is her bestie?

The new Chief Experience and Engagement Officer, a position she created almost immediately after starting and just happened to hire her close friend from her previous district to fill. I don’t think anyone knows what she actually does.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:What would moving to PW do? These IEPs have to be done by the end of THIS school year. Then it’s over.

FCPS will be providing services (and looking for teachers to do it or pay private vendors) well into the summer and next year.

We haven’t had the training yet, but I’ve heard this and also before/after school. I haven’t heard anyone say they are willing to do it though.

Many teachers had the training over the teacher workdays. Before/after school, weekends, summers seem to be the days/times that FCPS is communicating.

PP here. Yes, that’s what we are hearing, but the teachers I know have so far said, “Not me”. I heard the pay is $60 something per hour, but I wonder if that will just pull people away from teaching summer school and then they’ll end up even more short staffed there.

Parents aren't going to sign up for it either.

Parent here- the compensatory services are two years too late and I am sure they will stink. And parents are like teachers- basically forced to go to more meetings that are a total waste of time. We know FCPS doesn’t care about our kids and they proved it when they basically said no services given/IEPs won’t be followed for over a year. I am glad someone is trying to hold FCPS accountable but it is poorly executed (as expected).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm a SPED teacher who went back in October of 2021 before there was a vaccine. I love my job but I'm actively looking elsewhere. Central Office should be doing everything related to compensatory services, from digging through the data to figure out who is entitled to what, to scheduling and arranging the meetings, to providing and services as required. Putting this on the teachers who were following the orders we were given at the time is stupid. This, plus the Newport News shooting, plus the change of insurance companies to a worse provider is going to create an even more severe shortage than we already have. Intent forms are going out shortly and I believe some schools already sent them. I wish I could bookmark this post because there's going to be widespread panic when some schools lose their entire SPED departments next year and FCPS will claim they have no idea why.

100%. When we had our little staff meeting with the slides from central office about all of this, nobody was thrilled, but the sped teachers all had defeat and/or anger in their eyes. They’re already understaffed—we never filled one spot, one new teacher quit over winter break and never came back, and another is actively job searching outside of Ed. SPED is going to be decimated even more so than the general teaching pool.

Maybe Dr Reid’s bestie from her old district needs to roll up her sleeves and Experience and Engage this work her own self.

Who is her bestie?

Lisa Youngblood Hall. Listen to this self-involved nonsense in her intro to the board in July: https://youtu.be/tbJ7AZSjFXE

Pretty unbelievable that we need this position AND Chief Equity Officer. What a waste of time and taxpayer dollars.

[Anonymous]

Why is FCPS being singled out? Every other county did the exact same thing. Did Arlington, Loudoun, Alexandria, falls church, Prince William send providers to student houses to do speech or PT during the pandemic?

As far as I can remember, all the counties were essentially doing to same thing.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Why is FCPS being singled out? Every other county did the exact same thing. Did Arlington, Loudoun, Alexandria, falls church, Prince William send providers to student houses to do speech or PT during the pandemic?

As far as I can remember, all the counties were essentially doing to same thing.

Size and money. Same reason they went after LAUSD.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why is FCPS being singled out? Every other county did the exact same thing. Did Arlington, Loudoun, Alexandria, falls church, Prince William send providers to student houses to do speech or PT during the pandemic?

As far as I can remember, all the counties were essentially doing to same thing.

Size and money. Same reason they went after LAUSD.

Yup. Wasn’t this inquiry initiated by DeVos’s DoE?