Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums General Discussion Closing the Achievement Gap

From your link:

"In addition, a great many students within the other four categories (multiple disabilities, mental retardation, traumatic brain injury, and developmental delay) are also able to function at grade level on the tests with or without approved modifications or accommodations."

I think that is bunk. If students with mental retardation are able to function at grade level, that's a strong sign "grade level" is not being defined in a way relevant to average IQ students, much less gifted ones.

Said in this forum, where it seems that everybody's kid has special educational needs, I find that idea troubling.

One of the problems seen by parents with mentally handicapped kids in our district is that the standards set for these children are so low that the school is barely required to teach them anything at all. That is, a kid with Down's who has the capacity to learn to read is not required to be helped to learn that skill, so the school won't bother putting in the effort.

If you think your kid has the right to reach their educational potential, please consider seriously the possibility that everyone's kid has that right.

DeeDee

I don't think that there is a single poster on this forum who believes that their child has a 'right' for the school to provide them with the opportunity to 'reach their educational potential.'

Most of the kids here are never going to reach their educational potential and no one would want them too! It's a scary thing. What I see here is parents wanting schools to put their child where the child will have a chance to learn in their 'readiness to learn zone' and learn good work ethic. In other words, don't force my kid to sit in a classroom where there is no chance of learning something new because she is X years old.

(And yes, I do want that for every child.)

Let's take all the 'preconceived notions off' what children a X age, or what children with X label are supposed to be able to learn, and develop tools and methods to see exactly where each child's readiness to learn level is - such as the MAP test is attempting. And then let's use that information for placement, with supports as needed, in as efficient a manner as possible.

Make sense?
Grinity

One thing I know about Special Ed funding is that it is mandated by law. If there is a child who is profoundly autistic (for example) and needs a 1:1 aide to be able to be in the classroom, that has to be paid for and set up by law. That money to cover that comes out of the general ed fund. Or if the child is blind and needs everything translated into Braille, etc. That must be done and paid for.
To me, it would be cheaper/better in the long run to find out why kids have these disabilities and work early on to prevent them. For example, pay for early intervention to help at-risk autistic children not become profoundly autistic (you get the idea).
My son is very gifted and hearing impaired. He's a "special Ed" student- the county bought him an FM system for $1500. The teacher wears a Mike and it puts her voice wirelessly into his hearing aid. I was invited to join the county's board of education committee for Special Ed, which is how I have learned about all of this.

Jack'smom, yep, that's how it's supposed to work. We have, however, seen some shocking violations of law in our district. And to my knowledge, the federal government has never fully funded IDEA, which means that districts have financial incentives to spend less on kids with disabilities than they should-- even though they will never acknowledge those incentives.

Many schools and districts are doing the best they can. And some really aren't.

DeeDee

Yes, that is so true. Here in California, we rank dead last out of the 50 states for funding IDEA.
All we wanted/needed for my son's hearing loss was the FM system, which is relatively cheap for them to pay for, and the school did. His IEP doesn't address his giftedness, but we have an excellent gifted program that starts in 4th grade that he will hopefully get into.
I mention the above things since I didn't understand how it works. There is one educational pot of money. Funding for special ed comes out of it, leaving less for the general ed fund.

Just wanted to point out that services for children who are disabled under IDEA are at least partially funded with Federal dollars granted to the states, and those dollars are earmarked specifically for such use. Acceptance of those funds is actually what binds the states to provide FAPE for children with disabilities.

I couldn't agree with this more.

The differences in school culture are staggering, with many sincerely interested in helping children learn, and others interested primarily in maximizing the pot of money available for administrative salaries.

IDEA funds are disbursed through grants to the states, which then use some of them for state-level disability-related services, and flows the rest though to LEAs (local education agencies). I would be really surprised if only one percent of disability-related spending in your district was funded through IDEA. Your district might be counting the state-distributed IDEA grant money as coming from the state, or the document you were referencing might be looking at Federal dollars as a percentage of the overall district budget, in which case I would not be surprised to see a fairly low percentage funded through IDEA, since the majority of students aren't disabled, and the majority of students with disabilities don't need special education and related services (IDEA), just accommodations and modifications (504), which generally cost the school system nothing. The regular education budget really dwarfs the special education budget in most districts.

It is a tough situation.