Support the Montgomery Virtual Academy (MVA) from Budget Cuts!

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:If you are dead set that your kid needs virtual education and you refuse to consider other options, perhaps move to Florida. Apparently they have a Va run by the state that fits what you are looking for

+1. It’s very strange to me that it’s all or nothing for the MVA advocates. Maybe it speaks to the fact that it was a very niche, small program with essentially private tutoring, and the other available programs won’t have that. If simply having a virtual education was their #1 priority, they’d be making arrangements for their child to attend another program.

+2 The alternative to MVA isn't IIS, it's an appropriate in-person placement. Depending on the child, that might take a lot of different forms.

If a child was in MVA because their family wanted to be able to travel freely to Disneyland on the off-season, that child can return to a regular classroom.

If a child was in MVA due to bullying, the answer might be a COSA, but it's also worth considering that a child who entered MVA in 1st grade would be entering 6th next year. That's a whole new peer group and dynamic.

If a child was in MVA due to anxiety/rigidity, there are accommodations, interventions, and in-school placements that can help move the needle on those issues.

You have no idea what you are talking about. If those options were viable, MVA families would have gladly used them. Having your child attend virtual school requires more work for the parent. It involves supervision and controlling gadgets/technologies, arranging social activities to ensure your child is not isolated. It is definitely much easier to just send them in person. Why do you think MVA families advocated so much for the school? They really do not have any other options other than private online programs, which not everyone can afford.

How is in-person school not viable for the mom quoted in recent press articles as needing MVA for her daughters because they would otherwise be too distracted by fashion if they went in-person?

Maybe, for that one family, an in-person option would work. But what about the girl with medically resistant epilepsy who had a seizure in the school building and fell down the stairs, injuring herself? Or the suicidal teen who wanted to drop out of high school but is now considering attending college? I can provide you with many examples and quotes. These are real families with kids who were in MVA for various reasons, but they all absolutely thrived. If you are an MVA teacher reading this, thank you for your amazing work. What happened is so terribly sad, but you have truly touched those kids' hearts and changed their lives.

So where do we draw the line? Serving 800 students is too expensive when the cohort includes the kids who are using MVA because it’s a nice option for them. Do we add some sort of medical criteria to make sure the kids who truly need it get it and we don’t spend money on a virtual program for kids who should be back in-person?

Making it smaller would make it even more expensive on a per pupil basis. And give it fewer stakeholders.

Maybe it would be more expensive, maybe not if you take out the costs associated with all the kids who didnt really need it and would return to school.

We spend more money on a per pupil basis on certain populations all the time anyway. Poor kids get wrap around services at community schools, for example. Recent immigrants get English language learning services. Special needs children get specialized instruction from separate staff. Delayed talkers and readers get speech therapy and literacy intervention. High achievers get separate magnet programs. None of that is free and all of it adds to the per pupil cost beyond the cost of educating your plain vanilla kid. But it sounds like if your child is born with a disability making in-person schooling impossible or highly risky to their health, the system says “sorry, here’s 4 hours per week of isolated instruction” even though we now have evidence of a virtual model that works much better.

Is there public data on the cost and effectiveness of wrap-around services? Depending on their needs, the MVA has a much higher likelihood of benefiting those children. They should probably consider cutting funding to wrap-around services in favor of keeping the MVA.

You know, if you are going to advocate BOE to restore funding for MVA, you should probably come up with some items to cut instead, so why don’t you propose this and see what they say? Never know.

So far, I've heard two options for cutting expenses.

1) Cut funding for schools with low test scores
2) Cut wrap-around services

Guess what those two ideas have in common?

Totally fits if they’re using MVA to escape low performing schools….

I looked through MCPS's report on MVA and did not see anything about why MVA students were placed at MVA. It would be interesting to see a breakdown. I suspect that few people are using it truly to escape low-performing schools. Just doesn't make sense to me. For kids who have been in it since the pandemic, does it still make sense for them to be in MVA. Is there any evaluation done to see if MVA is still the best placement after a year or two. The FARMS rate is high. 43.1% for an environment where presumably kids need parent support and help at home. As a social worker that works with low income families, this is a big red flag for me that something doesn't quite make sense.

This. The farms rate being high for the virtual academy is a red flag

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:If you are dead set that your kid needs virtual education and you refuse to consider other options, perhaps move to Florida. Apparently they have a Va run by the state that fits what you are looking for

+1. It’s very strange to me that it’s all or nothing for the MVA advocates. Maybe it speaks to the fact that it was a very niche, small program with essentially private tutoring, and the other available programs won’t have that. If simply having a virtual education was their #1 priority, they’d be making arrangements for their child to attend another program.

+2 The alternative to MVA isn't IIS, it's an appropriate in-person placement. Depending on the child, that might take a lot of different forms.

If a child was in MVA because their family wanted to be able to travel freely to Disneyland on the off-season, that child can return to a regular classroom.

If a child was in MVA due to bullying, the answer might be a COSA, but it's also worth considering that a child who entered MVA in 1st grade would be entering 6th next year. That's a whole new peer group and dynamic.

If a child was in MVA due to anxiety/rigidity, there are accommodations, interventions, and in-school placements that can help move the needle on those issues.

You have no idea what you are talking about. If those options were viable, MVA families would have gladly used them. Having your child attend virtual school requires more work for the parent. It involves supervision and controlling gadgets/technologies, arranging social activities to ensure your child is not isolated. It is definitely much easier to just send them in person. Why do you think MVA families advocated so much for the school? They really do not have any other options other than private online programs, which not everyone can afford.

How is in-person school not viable for the mom quoted in recent press articles as needing MVA for her daughters because they would otherwise be too distracted by fashion if they went in-person?

Maybe, for that one family, an in-person option would work. But what about the girl with medically resistant epilepsy who had a seizure in the school building and fell down the stairs, injuring herself? Or the suicidal teen who wanted to drop out of high school but is now considering attending college? I can provide you with many examples and quotes. These are real families with kids who were in MVA for various reasons, but they all absolutely thrived. If you are an MVA teacher reading this, thank you for your amazing work. What happened is so terribly sad, but you have truly touched those kids' hearts and changed their lives.

So where do we draw the line? Serving 800 students is too expensive when the cohort includes the kids who are using MVA because it’s a nice option for them. Do we add some sort of medical criteria to make sure the kids who truly need it get it and we don’t spend money on a virtual program for kids who should be back in-person?

Making it smaller would make it even more expensive on a per pupil basis. And give it fewer stakeholders.

Maybe it would be more expensive, maybe not if you take out the costs associated with all the kids who didnt really need it and would return to school.

We spend more money on a per pupil basis on certain populations all the time anyway. Poor kids get wrap around services at community schools, for example. Recent immigrants get English language learning services. Special needs children get specialized instruction from separate staff. Delayed talkers and readers get speech therapy and literacy intervention. High achievers get separate magnet programs. None of that is free and all of it adds to the per pupil cost beyond the cost of educating your plain vanilla kid. But it sounds like if your child is born with a disability making in-person schooling impossible or highly risky to their health, the system says “sorry, here’s 4 hours per week of isolated instruction” even though we now have evidence of a virtual model that works much better.

So, that's not exactly right, at least according to MCPS. The MCPS argument is that the district served before COVID, and continues to serve, children with disabilities with a variety of in-person options. Not every wheelchair user is in MVA, for example. So, yes, they might be adding another kid to a classroom that focuses on children with social emotional disabilities, but at least they won't be standing up an entire administrative structure around it.

That’s not what I was talking about when I used the words “impossible” in the words of mine that you bolded. MCPS’ claim that it served and continues to serve kids with disabilities with a variety of in-person options is nice, but doesn’t mean much to the kid whose parents testified the other day about their kid who can’t go to in-person school, who previously received 4 hours of isolated instruction per week, who thrived under MVA but will now lose that because it was too costly to use MVA for all the other kids who were there but didn’t actually need it.

MVA costs far less per student than in person.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:If you are dead set that your kid needs virtual education and you refuse to consider other options, perhaps move to Florida. Apparently they have a Va run by the state that fits what you are looking for

+1. It’s very strange to me that it’s all or nothing for the MVA advocates. Maybe it speaks to the fact that it was a very niche, small program with essentially private tutoring, and the other available programs won’t have that. If simply having a virtual education was their #1 priority, they’d be making arrangements for their child to attend another program.

+2 The alternative to MVA isn't IIS, it's an appropriate in-person placement. Depending on the child, that might take a lot of different forms.

If a child was in MVA because their family wanted to be able to travel freely to Disneyland on the off-season, that child can return to a regular classroom.

If a child was in MVA due to bullying, the answer might be a COSA, but it's also worth considering that a child who entered MVA in 1st grade would be entering 6th next year. That's a whole new peer group and dynamic.

If a child was in MVA due to anxiety/rigidity, there are accommodations, interventions, and in-school placements that can help move the needle on those issues.

You have no idea what you are talking about. If those options were viable, MVA families would have gladly used them. Having your child attend virtual school requires more work for the parent. It involves supervision and controlling gadgets/technologies, arranging social activities to ensure your child is not isolated. It is definitely much easier to just send them in person. Why do you think MVA families advocated so much for the school? They really do not have any other options other than private online programs, which not everyone can afford.

How is in-person school not viable for the mom quoted in recent press articles as needing MVA for her daughters because they would otherwise be too distracted by fashion if they went in-person?

Maybe, for that one family, an in-person option would work. But what about the girl with medically resistant epilepsy who had a seizure in the school building and fell down the stairs, injuring herself? Or the suicidal teen who wanted to drop out of high school but is now considering attending college? I can provide you with many examples and quotes. These are real families with kids who were in MVA for various reasons, but they all absolutely thrived. If you are an MVA teacher reading this, thank you for your amazing work. What happened is so terribly sad, but you have truly touched those kids' hearts and changed their lives.

So where do we draw the line? Serving 800 students is too expensive when the cohort includes the kids who are using MVA because it’s a nice option for them. Do we add some sort of medical criteria to make sure the kids who truly need it get it and we don’t spend money on a virtual program for kids who should be back in-person?

Making it smaller would make it even more expensive on a per pupil basis. And give it fewer stakeholders.

Maybe it would be more expensive, maybe not if you take out the costs associated with all the kids who didnt really need it and would return to school.

We spend more money on a per pupil basis on certain populations all the time anyway. Poor kids get wrap around services at community schools, for example. Recent immigrants get English language learning services. Special needs children get specialized instruction from separate staff. Delayed talkers and readers get speech therapy and literacy intervention. High achievers get separate magnet programs. None of that is free and all of it adds to the per pupil cost beyond the cost of educating your plain vanilla kid. But it sounds like if your child is born with a disability making in-person schooling impossible or highly risky to their health, the system says “sorry, here’s 4 hours per week of isolated instruction” even though we now have evidence of a virtual model that works much better.

So, that's not exactly right, at least according to MCPS. The MCPS argument is that the district served before COVID, and continues to serve, children with disabilities with a variety of in-person options. Not every wheelchair user is in MVA, for example. So, yes, they might be adding another kid to a classroom that focuses on children with social emotional disabilities, but at least they won't be standing up an entire administrative structure around it.

That’s not what I was talking about when I used the words “impossible” in the words of mine that you bolded. MCPS’ claim that it served and continues to serve kids with disabilities with a variety of in-person options is nice, but doesn’t mean much to the kid whose parents testified the other day about their kid who can’t go to in-person school, who previously received 4 hours of isolated instruction per week, who thrived under MVA but will now lose that because it was too costly to use MVA for all the other kids who were there but didn’t actually need it.

We've heard from parents that don't want to send their kids to school. We've heard from kids that faced challenges in schools and preferred a virtual environment. And we've heard about students that have done well in MVA.

We haven't heard about kids that simply *can't* go to school.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:https://m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=pfbid0bUaE2WCFHiF4t1u873Ykf5ZnjAunTYFY67Vv4jwvF82nMX86xrXqkh5VrHrHeEn4l&id=100063712594468
State reps wrote to Dr.F requesting she reconsider, closing The program.

Sad that these politicians are playing a game of CYA by sending letters about things they know can't change. What's Felder going to do? Have the BOE re-vote on the budget? It's done, and a letter like this only serves to try to satisfy constituents that "well, I did my best for you, but it was that guy's fault and not mine"

Here is what I would like my state reps to do: Either fully fund Maryland's Blueprint for Education, or repeal it. If we thought the budget cuts were painful this year, wait until free pre-k kicks in for our school district. We don't have the physical school capacity or money for the personnel for the Blueprint. The planning for the Blueprint that was cancelled by the BOE this year? $8 million, just for planning. We're going to have to throw money at this next year to ramp up. So that conundrum is what I would like my state reps to consider, not the MVA.

Amen. Free pre-K for all is nuts. We already provide free pre-k to income eligible students (and MCPS's definition of income eligible is more generous than the federal govt--which is good). Some of the richest people in America live in MCPS. We do not all need free pre-k.

You boomers can afford the taxes necessary to fund prek. Kindergarten expectations have increased to a point where every child is expected to have preschool. It should be part of the public school offering.

WTF are you even talking about. I'm a genx mom who has had 4 kids go through MCPS (my youngest is a senior this year, my oldest started K in 2004). I have watched MCPS decline during this period as they spend money on useless curricula, consultants, central office administrators. If you think MCPS has budget problems this year, just wait for next year. Taxes will only be going up, and the middle and UMC boomers are getting the hell out, just raising the county poverty rate.

Maybe if you had fewer kids there would be money for our.

Don't worry. I sent my last one to private HS (no way was I dealing with MCPS's disaster during COVID). I'm still paying all my taxes plus private tuition.

Yea you. So why are you posting here worrying about the MVA. No one cares about your tax dollars. You choose private and four kids. You are clearly very comfortable. Not everyone is as comfortable as you are.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:If you are dead set that your kid needs virtual education and you refuse to consider other options, perhaps move to Florida. Apparently they have a Va run by the state that fits what you are looking for

+1. It’s very strange to me that it’s all or nothing for the MVA advocates. Maybe it speaks to the fact that it was a very niche, small program with essentially private tutoring, and the other available programs won’t have that. If simply having a virtual education was their #1 priority, they’d be making arrangements for their child to attend another program.

+2 The alternative to MVA isn't IIS, it's an appropriate in-person placement. Depending on the child, that might take a lot of different forms.

If a child was in MVA because their family wanted to be able to travel freely to Disneyland on the off-season, that child can return to a regular classroom.

If a child was in MVA due to bullying, the answer might be a COSA, but it's also worth considering that a child who entered MVA in 1st grade would be entering 6th next year. That's a whole new peer group and dynamic.

If a child was in MVA due to anxiety/rigidity, there are accommodations, interventions, and in-school placements that can help move the needle on those issues.

You have no idea what you are talking about. If those options were viable, MVA families would have gladly used them. Having your child attend virtual school requires more work for the parent. It involves supervision and controlling gadgets/technologies, arranging social activities to ensure your child is not isolated. It is definitely much easier to just send them in person. Why do you think MVA families advocated so much for the school? They really do not have any other options other than private online programs, which not everyone can afford.

How is in-person school not viable for the mom quoted in recent press articles as needing MVA for her daughters because they would otherwise be too distracted by fashion if they went in-person?

Maybe, for that one family, an in-person option would work. But what about the girl with medically resistant epilepsy who had a seizure in the school building and fell down the stairs, injuring herself? Or the suicidal teen who wanted to drop out of high school but is now considering attending college? I can provide you with many examples and quotes. These are real families with kids who were in MVA for various reasons, but they all absolutely thrived. If you are an MVA teacher reading this, thank you for your amazing work. What happened is so terribly sad, but you have truly touched those kids' hearts and changed their lives.

So where do we draw the line? Serving 800 students is too expensive when the cohort includes the kids who are using MVA because it’s a nice option for them. Do we add some sort of medical criteria to make sure the kids who truly need it get it and we don’t spend money on a virtual program for kids who should be back in-person?

That would be a good approach, in my opinion. It's important to understand that while some families may have used MVA for convenience, the VAST MAJORITY were there out of absolute necessity.

That doesn't line up with the fact that most kids don't even have IEPs, much less IEPs that specify needs precluding placement in an MCPS school.

MVA might have been a better environment for some kids, but it wasn't an "absolute necessity" for the vast majority of them. Said another way, the vast majority of them were not kids that would have been eligible for IIS.

Who decides if it is necessary? We could reduce costs by sending the majority kids virtually as is it really "absolutely necessary" to have all kids in person.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:If you are dead set that your kid needs virtual education and you refuse to consider other options, perhaps move to Florida. Apparently they have a Va run by the state that fits what you are looking for

+1. It’s very strange to me that it’s all or nothing for the MVA advocates. Maybe it speaks to the fact that it was a very niche, small program with essentially private tutoring, and the other available programs won’t have that. If simply having a virtual education was their #1 priority, they’d be making arrangements for their child to attend another program.

+2 The alternative to MVA isn't IIS, it's an appropriate in-person placement. Depending on the child, that might take a lot of different forms.

If a child was in MVA because their family wanted to be able to travel freely to Disneyland on the off-season, that child can return to a regular classroom.

If a child was in MVA due to bullying, the answer might be a COSA, but it's also worth considering that a child who entered MVA in 1st grade would be entering 6th next year. That's a whole new peer group and dynamic.

If a child was in MVA due to anxiety/rigidity, there are accommodations, interventions, and in-school placements that can help move the needle on those issues.

You have no idea what you are talking about. If those options were viable, MVA families would have gladly used them. Having your child attend virtual school requires more work for the parent. It involves supervision and controlling gadgets/technologies, arranging social activities to ensure your child is not isolated. It is definitely much easier to just send them in person. Why do you think MVA families advocated so much for the school? They really do not have any other options other than private online programs, which not everyone can afford.

How is in-person school not viable for the mom quoted in recent press articles as needing MVA for her daughters because they would otherwise be too distracted by fashion if they went in-person?

Maybe, for that one family, an in-person option would work. But what about the girl with medically resistant epilepsy who had a seizure in the school building and fell down the stairs, injuring herself? Or the suicidal teen who wanted to drop out of high school but is now considering attending college? I can provide you with many examples and quotes. These are real families with kids who were in MVA for various reasons, but they all absolutely thrived. If you are an MVA teacher reading this, thank you for your amazing work. What happened is so terribly sad, but you have truly touched those kids' hearts and changed their lives.

So where do we draw the line? Serving 800 students is too expensive when the cohort includes the kids who are using MVA because it’s a nice option for them. Do we add some sort of medical criteria to make sure the kids who truly need it get it and we don’t spend money on a virtual program for kids who should be back in-person?

Making it smaller would make it even more expensive on a per pupil basis. And give it fewer stakeholders.

Maybe it would be more expensive, maybe not if you take out the costs associated with all the kids who didnt really need it and would return to school.

We spend more money on a per pupil basis on certain populations all the time anyway. Poor kids get wrap around services at community schools, for example. Recent immigrants get English language learning services. Special needs children get specialized instruction from separate staff. Delayed talkers and readers get speech therapy and literacy intervention. High achievers get separate magnet programs. None of that is free and all of it adds to the per pupil cost beyond the cost of educating your plain vanilla kid. But it sounds like if your child is born with a disability making in-person schooling impossible or highly risky to their health, the system says “sorry, here’s 4 hours per week of isolated instruction” even though we now have evidence of a virtual model that works much better.

So, that's not exactly right, at least according to MCPS. The MCPS argument is that the district served before COVID, and continues to serve, children with disabilities with a variety of in-person options. Not every wheelchair user is in MVA, for example. So, yes, they might be adding another kid to a classroom that focuses on children with social emotional disabilities, but at least they won't be standing up an entire administrative structure around it.

That’s not what I was talking about when I used the words “impossible” in the words of mine that you bolded. MCPS’ claim that it served and continues to serve kids with disabilities with a variety of in-person options is nice, but doesn’t mean much to the kid whose parents testified the other day about their kid who can’t go to in-person school, who previously received 4 hours of isolated instruction per week, who thrived under MVA but will now lose that because it was too costly to use MVA for all the other kids who were there but didn’t actually need it.

MVA costs far less per student than in person.

Disingenuous. The question isn't whether MCPS will have in-person school or virtual. It is whether MCPS will have virtual school *in addition to* in-person school.

Running a separate program is more expensive for the district as a whole than sending kids to their home schools or SPED placements.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:If you are dead set that your kid needs virtual education and you refuse to consider other options, perhaps move to Florida. Apparently they have a Va run by the state that fits what you are looking for

+1. It’s very strange to me that it’s all or nothing for the MVA advocates. Maybe it speaks to the fact that it was a very niche, small program with essentially private tutoring, and the other available programs won’t have that. If simply having a virtual education was their #1 priority, they’d be making arrangements for their child to attend another program.

+2 The alternative to MVA isn't IIS, it's an appropriate in-person placement. Depending on the child, that might take a lot of different forms.

If a child was in MVA because their family wanted to be able to travel freely to Disneyland on the off-season, that child can return to a regular classroom.

If a child was in MVA due to bullying, the answer might be a COSA, but it's also worth considering that a child who entered MVA in 1st grade would be entering 6th next year. That's a whole new peer group and dynamic.

If a child was in MVA due to anxiety/rigidity, there are accommodations, interventions, and in-school placements that can help move the needle on those issues.

You have no idea what you are talking about. If those options were viable, MVA families would have gladly used them. Having your child attend virtual school requires more work for the parent. It involves supervision and controlling gadgets/technologies, arranging social activities to ensure your child is not isolated. It is definitely much easier to just send them in person. Why do you think MVA families advocated so much for the school? They really do not have any other options other than private online programs, which not everyone can afford.

How is in-person school not viable for the mom quoted in recent press articles as needing MVA for her daughters because they would otherwise be too distracted by fashion if they went in-person?

Maybe, for that one family, an in-person option would work. But what about the girl with medically resistant epilepsy who had a seizure in the school building and fell down the stairs, injuring herself? Or the suicidal teen who wanted to drop out of high school but is now considering attending college? I can provide you with many examples and quotes. These are real families with kids who were in MVA for various reasons, but they all absolutely thrived. If you are an MVA teacher reading this, thank you for your amazing work. What happened is so terribly sad, but you have truly touched those kids' hearts and changed their lives.

Then you can pay for a private program that will work better for your child, or move to a state with a public virtual option. Look, I do have empathy for your position, because we ended up enrolling my oldest in private school for several years, and yes, I was frustrated that the best option for him ended up costing $$$ we weren’t planning on. But we did what we had to do. Parents have to make tough choices about schooling all the time, including moving to a new district or downsizing/taking an extra job to pay for private.

Children are entitled to a free and appropriate education. Not everyone can downsize especially if they have a small inexpensive house, more or take a second job. Check your privilege.

Note that "free and appropriate education" does not mean it will necessarily be your preferred form of education. You might prefer virtual, but there are other appropriate models that MCPS can support.

Get out of your bubble. Many of those other programs are far more expensive. That's ok?

[Anonymous]

MCPS is not offering alternative placements right now for kids who need it. Parents have to redo their IEPs which isn't going to happen immediately and then find placements. Otherwise they will be dumped at the home schools without the appropriate supports.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:If you are dead set that your kid needs virtual education and you refuse to consider other options, perhaps move to Florida. Apparently they have a Va run by the state that fits what you are looking for

+1. It’s very strange to me that it’s all or nothing for the MVA advocates. Maybe it speaks to the fact that it was a very niche, small program with essentially private tutoring, and the other available programs won’t have that. If simply having a virtual education was their #1 priority, they’d be making arrangements for their child to attend another program.

+2 The alternative to MVA isn't IIS, it's an appropriate in-person placement. Depending on the child, that might take a lot of different forms.

If a child was in MVA because their family wanted to be able to travel freely to Disneyland on the off-season, that child can return to a regular classroom.

If a child was in MVA due to bullying, the answer might be a COSA, but it's also worth considering that a child who entered MVA in 1st grade would be entering 6th next year. That's a whole new peer group and dynamic.

If a child was in MVA due to anxiety/rigidity, there are accommodations, interventions, and in-school placements that can help move the needle on those issues.

You have no idea what you are talking about. If those options were viable, MVA families would have gladly used them. Having your child attend virtual school requires more work for the parent. It involves supervision and controlling gadgets/technologies, arranging social activities to ensure your child is not isolated. It is definitely much easier to just send them in person. Why do you think MVA families advocated so much for the school? They really do not have any other options other than private online programs, which not everyone can afford.

How is in-person school not viable for the mom quoted in recent press articles as needing MVA for her daughters because they would otherwise be too distracted by fashion if they went in-person?

Maybe, for that one family, an in-person option would work. But what about the girl with medically resistant epilepsy who had a seizure in the school building and fell down the stairs, injuring herself? Or the suicidal teen who wanted to drop out of high school but is now considering attending college? I can provide you with many examples and quotes. These are real families with kids who were in MVA for various reasons, but they all absolutely thrived. If you are an MVA teacher reading this, thank you for your amazing work. What happened is so terribly sad, but you have truly touched those kids' hearts and changed their lives.

So where do we draw the line? Serving 800 students is too expensive when the cohort includes the kids who are using MVA because it’s a nice option for them. Do we add some sort of medical criteria to make sure the kids who truly need it get it and we don’t spend money on a virtual program for kids who should be back in-person?

That would be a good approach, in my opinion. It's important to understand that while some families may have used MVA for convenience, the VAST MAJORITY were there out of absolute necessity.

That doesn't line up with the fact that most kids don't even have IEPs, much less IEPs that specify needs precluding placement in an MCPS school.

MVA might have been a better environment for some kids, but it wasn't an "absolute necessity" for the vast majority of them. Said another way, the vast majority of them were not kids that would have been eligible for IIS.

Who decides if it is necessary? We could reduce costs by sending the majority kids virtually as is it really "absolutely necessary" to have all kids in person.

Use that argument at the next BoE meeting.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:MCPS is not offering alternative placements right now for kids who need it. Parents have to redo their IEPs which isn't going to happen immediately and then find placements. Otherwise they will be dumped at the home schools without the appropriate supports.

Welcome to the work of IEPs. MCPS central office staff couldn't comprehend why I wanted to know placement for my child with special needs more than a week before classes started. This isn't unique to MVA kids.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:If you are dead set that your kid needs virtual education and you refuse to consider other options, perhaps move to Florida. Apparently they have a Va run by the state that fits what you are looking for

+1. It’s very strange to me that it’s all or nothing for the MVA advocates. Maybe it speaks to the fact that it was a very niche, small program with essentially private tutoring, and the other available programs won’t have that. If simply having a virtual education was their #1 priority, they’d be making arrangements for their child to attend another program.

+2 The alternative to MVA isn't IIS, it's an appropriate in-person placement. Depending on the child, that might take a lot of different forms.

If a child was in MVA because their family wanted to be able to travel freely to Disneyland on the off-season, that child can return to a regular classroom.

If a child was in MVA due to bullying, the answer might be a COSA, but it's also worth considering that a child who entered MVA in 1st grade would be entering 6th next year. That's a whole new peer group and dynamic.

If a child was in MVA due to anxiety/rigidity, there are accommodations, interventions, and in-school placements that can help move the needle on those issues.

You have no idea what you are talking about. If those options were viable, MVA families would have gladly used them. Having your child attend virtual school requires more work for the parent. It involves supervision and controlling gadgets/technologies, arranging social activities to ensure your child is not isolated. It is definitely much easier to just send them in person. Why do you think MVA families advocated so much for the school? They really do not have any other options other than private online programs, which not everyone can afford.

How is in-person school not viable for the mom quoted in recent press articles as needing MVA for her daughters because they would otherwise be too distracted by fashion if they went in-person?

Maybe, for that one family, an in-person option would work. But what about the girl with medically resistant epilepsy who had a seizure in the school building and fell down the stairs, injuring herself? Or the suicidal teen who wanted to drop out of high school but is now considering attending college? I can provide you with many examples and quotes. These are real families with kids who were in MVA for various reasons, but they all absolutely thrived. If you are an MVA teacher reading this, thank you for your amazing work. What happened is so terribly sad, but you have truly touched those kids' hearts and changed their lives.

So where do we draw the line? Serving 800 students is too expensive when the cohort includes the kids who are using MVA because it’s a nice option for them. Do we add some sort of medical criteria to make sure the kids who truly need it get it and we don’t spend money on a virtual program for kids who should be back in-person?

Making it smaller would make it even more expensive on a per pupil basis. And give it fewer stakeholders.

Maybe it would be more expensive, maybe not if you take out the costs associated with all the kids who didnt really need it and would return to school.

We spend more money on a per pupil basis on certain populations all the time anyway. Poor kids get wrap around services at community schools, for example. Recent immigrants get English language learning services. Special needs children get specialized instruction from separate staff. Delayed talkers and readers get speech therapy and literacy intervention. High achievers get separate magnet programs. None of that is free and all of it adds to the per pupil cost beyond the cost of educating your plain vanilla kid. But it sounds like if your child is born with a disability making in-person schooling impossible or highly risky to their health, the system says “sorry, here’s 4 hours per week of isolated instruction” even though we now have evidence of a virtual model that works much better.

So, that's not exactly right, at least according to MCPS. The MCPS argument is that the district served before COVID, and continues to serve, children with disabilities with a variety of in-person options. Not every wheelchair user is in MVA, for example. So, yes, they might be adding another kid to a classroom that focuses on children with social emotional disabilities, but at least they won't be standing up an entire administrative structure around it.

That’s not what I was talking about when I used the words “impossible” in the words of mine that you bolded. MCPS’ claim that it served and continues to serve kids with disabilities with a variety of in-person options is nice, but doesn’t mean much to the kid whose parents testified the other day about their kid who can’t go to in-person school, who previously received 4 hours of isolated instruction per week, who thrived under MVA but will now lose that because it was too costly to use MVA for all the other kids who were there but didn’t actually need it.

We've heard from parents that don't want to send their kids to school. We've heard from kids that faced challenges in schools and preferred a virtual environment. And we've heard about students that have done well in MVA.

We haven't heard about kids that simply *can't* go to school.

Why do you think you are owed a justifications from CHILDREN on why they prefer virtual? Are you ok publicly parading your child to justify why they prefer in person?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:MCPS is not offering alternative placements right now for kids who need it. Parents have to redo their IEPs which isn't going to happen immediately and then find placements. Otherwise they will be dumped at the home schools without the appropriate supports.

Welcome to the work of IEPs. MCPS central office staff couldn't comprehend why I wanted to know placement for my child with special needs more than a week before classes started. This isn't unique to MVA kids.

No, but what is unique is they shut down the school with no notice or plan for these kids. So, imagine if you cannot get a placement and you are at that school and they know your kid, how hard it will be for parents to get a new IEP over the summer and an appropriate placement by August. And,t that's assuming there are spots.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:If you are dead set that your kid needs virtual education and you refuse to consider other options, perhaps move to Florida. Apparently they have a Va run by the state that fits what you are looking for

+1. It’s very strange to me that it’s all or nothing for the MVA advocates. Maybe it speaks to the fact that it was a very niche, small program with essentially private tutoring, and the other available programs won’t have that. If simply having a virtual education was their #1 priority, they’d be making arrangements for their child to attend another program.

+2 The alternative to MVA isn't IIS, it's an appropriate in-person placement. Depending on the child, that might take a lot of different forms.

If a child was in MVA because their family wanted to be able to travel freely to Disneyland on the off-season, that child can return to a regular classroom.

If a child was in MVA due to bullying, the answer might be a COSA, but it's also worth considering that a child who entered MVA in 1st grade would be entering 6th next year. That's a whole new peer group and dynamic.

If a child was in MVA due to anxiety/rigidity, there are accommodations, interventions, and in-school placements that can help move the needle on those issues.

You have no idea what you are talking about. If those options were viable, MVA families would have gladly used them. Having your child attend virtual school requires more work for the parent. It involves supervision and controlling gadgets/technologies, arranging social activities to ensure your child is not isolated. It is definitely much easier to just send them in person. Why do you think MVA families advocated so much for the school? They really do not have any other options other than private online programs, which not everyone can afford.

How is in-person school not viable for the mom quoted in recent press articles as needing MVA for her daughters because they would otherwise be too distracted by fashion if they went in-person?

Maybe, for that one family, an in-person option would work. But what about the girl with medically resistant epilepsy who had a seizure in the school building and fell down the stairs, injuring herself? Or the suicidal teen who wanted to drop out of high school but is now considering attending college? I can provide you with many examples and quotes. These are real families with kids who were in MVA for various reasons, but they all absolutely thrived. If you are an MVA teacher reading this, thank you for your amazing work. What happened is so terribly sad, but you have truly touched those kids' hearts and changed their lives.

Then you can pay for a private program that will work better for your child, or move to a state with a public virtual option. Look, I do have empathy for your position, because we ended up enrolling my oldest in private school for several years, and yes, I was frustrated that the best option for him ended up costing $$$ we weren’t planning on. But we did what we had to do. Parents have to make tough choices about schooling all the time, including moving to a new district or downsizing/taking an extra job to pay for private.

Children are entitled to a free and appropriate education. Not everyone can downsize especially if they have a small inexpensive house, more or take a second job. Check your privilege.

Note that "free and appropriate education" does not mean it will necessarily be your preferred form of education. You might prefer virtual, but there are other appropriate models that MCPS can support.

Get out of your bubble. Many of those other programs are far more expensive. That's ok?

No, some of your *preferred* programs are far more expensive.

The reality is that the vast majority of kids that were in MVA do not require special placements. Most don't need any supports at all.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:MCPS is not offering alternative placements right now for kids who need it. Parents have to redo their IEPs which isn't going to happen immediately and then find placements. Otherwise they will be dumped at the home schools without the appropriate supports.

Welcome to the work of IEPs. MCPS central office staff couldn't comprehend why I wanted to know placement for my child with special needs more than a week before classes started. This isn't unique to MVA kids.

No, but what is unique is they shut down the school with no notice or plan for these kids. So, imagine if you cannot get a placement and you are at that school and they know your kid, how hard it will be for parents to get a new IEP over the summer and an appropriate placement by August. And,t that's assuming there are spots.

What do you think happens with incoming kindergartners each year? Or students transferring into the district? Again, this isn't unique to MVA.

But MCPS should really have staff available over the summer for IEP meetings. For all kids- not just MVA kids.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If you are dead set that your kid needs virtual education and you refuse to consider other options, perhaps move to Florida. Apparently they have a Va run by the state that fits what you are looking for

+1. It’s very strange to me that it’s all or nothing for the MVA advocates. Maybe it speaks to the fact that it was a very niche, small program with essentially private tutoring, and the other available programs won’t have that. If simply having a virtual education was their #1 priority, they’d be making arrangements for their child to attend another program.

+2 The alternative to MVA isn't IIS, it's an appropriate in-person placement. Depending on the child, that might take a lot of different forms.

If a child was in MVA because their family wanted to be able to travel freely to Disneyland on the off-season, that child can return to a regular classroom.

If a child was in MVA due to bullying, the answer might be a COSA, but it's also worth considering that a child who entered MVA in 1st grade would be entering 6th next year. That's a whole new peer group and dynamic.

If a child was in MVA due to anxiety/rigidity, there are accommodations, interventions, and in-school placements that can help move the needle on those issues.

You have no idea what you are talking about. If those options were viable, MVA families would have gladly used them. Having your child attend virtual school requires more work for the parent. It involves supervision and controlling gadgets/technologies, arranging social activities to ensure your child is not isolated. It is definitely much easier to just send them in person. Why do you think MVA families advocated so much for the school? They really do not have any other options other than private online programs, which not everyone can afford.

How is in-person school not viable for the mom quoted in recent press articles as needing MVA for her daughters because they would otherwise be too distracted by fashion if they went in-person?

Maybe, for that one family, an in-person option would work. But what about the girl with medically resistant epilepsy who had a seizure in the school building and fell down the stairs, injuring herself? Or the suicidal teen who wanted to drop out of high school but is now considering attending college? I can provide you with many examples and quotes. These are real families with kids who were in MVA for various reasons, but they all absolutely thrived. If you are an MVA teacher reading this, thank you for your amazing work. What happened is so terribly sad, but you have truly touched those kids' hearts and changed their lives.

So where do we draw the line? Serving 800 students is too expensive when the cohort includes the kids who are using MVA because it’s a nice option for them. Do we add some sort of medical criteria to make sure the kids who truly need it get it and we don’t spend money on a virtual program for kids who should be back in-person?

Making it smaller would make it even more expensive on a per pupil basis. And give it fewer stakeholders.

Maybe it would be more expensive, maybe not if you take out the costs associated with all the kids who didnt really need it and would return to school.

We spend more money on a per pupil basis on certain populations all the time anyway. Poor kids get wrap around services at community schools, for example. Recent immigrants get English language learning services. Special needs children get specialized instruction from separate staff. Delayed talkers and readers get speech therapy and literacy intervention. High achievers get separate magnet programs. None of that is free and all of it adds to the per pupil cost beyond the cost of educating your plain vanilla kid. But it sounds like if your child is born with a disability making in-person schooling impossible or highly risky to their health, the system says “sorry, here’s 4 hours per week of isolated instruction” even though we now have evidence of a virtual model that works much better.

So, that's not exactly right, at least according to MCPS. The MCPS argument is that the district served before COVID, and continues to serve, children with disabilities with a variety of in-person options. Not every wheelchair user is in MVA, for example. So, yes, they might be adding another kid to a classroom that focuses on children with social emotional disabilities, but at least they won't be standing up an entire administrative structure around it.

That’s not what I was talking about when I used the words “impossible” in the words of mine that you bolded. MCPS’ claim that it served and continues to serve kids with disabilities with a variety of in-person options is nice, but doesn’t mean much to the kid whose parents testified the other day about their kid who can’t go to in-person school, who previously received 4 hours of isolated instruction per week, who thrived under MVA but will now lose that because it was too costly to use MVA for all the other kids who were there but didn’t actually need it.

We've heard from parents that don't want to send their kids to school. We've heard from kids that faced challenges in schools and preferred a virtual environment. And we've heard about students that have done well in MVA.

We haven't heard about kids that simply *can't* go to school.

Why do you think you are owed a justifications from CHILDREN on why they prefer virtual? Are you ok publicly parading your child to justify why they prefer in person?

You were asking MCPS and tax payers to fund a special program for you. Yes, you should have expected that justification would be required to have any chance of success.