Patchwork Project

August 2010
As The School Year Approaches

The Patchwork Project plans to follow a number of children with disabilities throughout the 2010 – 2011 school year, with a focus on the experience of special education for the child with a disability from the perspective of families and family systems.

What is the state of special education today in northwest Ohio? How do things stand now, thirty-five years after federal law first afforded disabled children the right to attend public school at all, and twenty years after the 1990 passage of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (I.D.E.A.).

Our focus of attention with each of the families participating in the Patchwork Project is twofold. First, how are special education services being provided in various local school districts, particularly in terms of developing and implementing individual educational plans (IEP’s) for children with disabilities. Equally important, we are interested in assessing the degree to which parents are being afforded meaningful participation in the educational planning and decision making for their children.

Real names and personal identifiers of individuals and school districts will either be redacted or changed in all of the posted Patchwork Project narratives, reports, or exhibits. No actual names of individuals or entities will be identified until an as yet undetermined time following the end of the 2010 – 2011 school year.

2010 Perspective on the Anniversary of the ADA and the I.D.E.A.

Since the first American public school was founded in Boston in 1663, this nation has recognized and respected the educational rights of children.

Nevertheless, it took well over three hundred (300) years before American law extended similar educational rights to children with disabilities.
Within our own generation, various state laws designed to exclude disabled children from public schools were abrogated by federal courts in 1972. Then, in 1975, the Education for Handicapped Children Act (EHCA) established the right of all children with disabilities to receive a free public school education in an integrated environment.
In 1990, the same year the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) became law, the EHCA was amended and renamed the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA).

On the 35th Anniversary of the EHCA and 20th Anniversary of the IDEA, I celebrate the gains made. I must also observe, however, that the battle continues and remains an almost a day-by-day struggle to enforce the law and protect the educational rights promised to children with disabilities.

Broken Promises

FACT: Ohio has 1,839,683 public school students, of whom 246,605 receive special education services (13.4%) and
FACT: Ohio will receive $437,736,052 in IDEA Part B funds under the Recovery Act. These funds are in addition to the $435,055,616 the state will also receive as its regular FY09 IDEA Part B federal allotment. All Recovery Act funds must be spent by Sept. 30, 2011.
http://ideamoneywatch.com/states/oh/?page_id=2

Changes made to Ohio law in 2009, purportedly to provide school districts with more “flexibility”, now permit districts to divert money intended for the education of children with disabilities into other general education and district purposes. As Jennifer Smith Richard, Columbus Dispatch (January 2010), observed:

Ohio school districts are spending money meant for disabled students to stabilize their shaky budgets, and the state has made it easier for them to do so. Statewide, schools are receiving an extra $438 million in federal stimulus money just for special education. For most districts, the influx has doubled the federal dollars they received for special education.. . . vulnerable students are being cheated as the money is redirected, and . . . Ohio has taken the most extreme approach of any state that has paved the way for schools to use the money elsewhere. [Now] Districts don't have to meet the federal progress goal to divert funds anymore, nor do they have to prove that special-needs students are being educated in the "least restrictive environment," which often means in regular classrooms. (Emphasis added)
http://www.dispatch.com/live/content/local_news/stories/2010/01/24/specialmoney.html?sid=101

For years we have heard perennial complaints about special education being a drain on resources needed to educate typical students. Now it seems, with stimulus funds dramatically increasing special education funding, the Department of Education and school districts in Ohio have discovered and/or devised a way to tap into the resources intended to fulfill the promise of the IDEA to children with disabilities. Economic stimulus funding, in most cases, practically doubles the regular FY 2010 allocation of IDEA Part-B funds for special education. It is no accident that recent legal maneuvering and tweaking of the ODE rules and regulations has now opened the door for practically every school district in the state of Ohio to redirect at least half of their stimulus funds from special education to meet other needs in regular education or the general fund.
What kind of money are we talking about? In Northwest Ohio, for example, the numbers look like this:
District IRN District Name Total IDEA Part-B ARRA Allocation + Non-public Proportionate Share + Regular FY10 IDEA Allocation
048207 Anthony Wayne Local SD $ 882,340.46 $751,451.15
047589 Liberty Center Local SD $ 235,254.78 $205,026.16
044909 Toledo City SD $ 8,694,671.86 $ 40,366.87 $7,660,222.48
044602 Oregon City SD $ 828,082.06 $724,726.60
046813 Perkins Local SD $ 490,877.19 $433,936.16
045583 Perrysburg Ex.Village SD $ 889,435.66 $ 15,535.99 $765,851.49
044743 Sandusky City SD $ 1,066,085.11 $ 65,700.59 $947,359.09
050690 Lake Local SD $351,040.46 $3,250.37 $303,712.09
048215 Ottawa Hills Local SD $ 248,460.08 $ 91,058.21 $212,894.52
048231 Washington Local SD $ 1,684,576.88 $ 276,014.23 $1,465,072.83
049577 Woodmore Local Local SD $ 276,014.23 $241,417.32
044875 Sylvania City SD $ 1,829,924.43 $ 121,759.68 $1,610,744.77

A Bad Case of Widgets

A funny thing happened on my way back into this blog. I couldn't get into it because of some kinda malicious cyber-link that kept sending me off to other places, at least one of which I think was a Japanese anime site. At any rate, I was definitely not in Kansas anymore.

So... after much frustration, I finally resorted to looking for instructions and reading a few directions. For someone who likes to figure things out independently (read: stubborn) these are indeed desperate measures. But it turns out there are, apparently, all kinds of places out there in cyberville where people post questions and receive answers, some of which are helpful, many that aren't. Thus, in a way, I could sill explore finding the fix on my own. One thing I did discover almost immediately is that this problem is not unique.

Although no one seems to know exactly why it happens, apparently it does happen occasionally. And not just to me. The experience is not unlike walking along a familiar trail, when POOOF, you're suddenly somewhere else in an unfamiliar universe.

The problem? As it turns out, it was widgets. Normally benign, it seems I had one rogue widget causing all of this distress. A pesky widget called the "realtime hit counter", which as you may notice is not longer present on the blogspot.
Of course, getting rid of this nasty little widget was far from easy and, as you may have noticed, required the sacrifice of most of our formatting and other bells & whistles as well. That darn counter widget fought like crazy to avoid being whacked with my edit button, and at one point even deactivated its own edit button. Ultimately and unfortunately, I was forced to delete all widgets and return to default formatting.

I suspect there is some kind of lesson in all of this.

Board Topics

On Saturday, February 20th, we met for our Promise Board Meeting at our home base in Sandusky. The meeting included reports, discussion on the issues, and updates on technical progress.
Topics included:
An afternoon colloquium at U.T.:

Providing Care for Children with Disabilities in NW Ohio: the Engler Family and the Development of the Sunshine Children’s Home, 1950-1964” Samuel Di Rocco II

Kathleen discussed some interesting things she learned from that presentation about the early history of the Sunshine Childrens' Home in Maumee. Among other things, she informed us that the Sunshine Childrens' Home is no more. It has now become the "Sunshine Foundation, Inc.".
We also discussed how some things have changed, and other things haven't, with respect to the struggle of parents attempting to care for their special needs children and to find adequate resources to do so. We are particularly interested in looking at the process by which many of the larger organizations of today grew from the roots of families, like the Englers, who did what they did and learned to care for their special needs children because there was no one else who could or would.

Other topics presented and/or discussed at the meeting will be elaborated upon in following posts, but include:
--Status of Research on Special Education due process cases in NW Ohio;
--The Catching Stories Oral History Institute being offered at Kenyon College in June, about which absolutely everyone expressed serious interest. Kathleen will follow up and request an application(s).
--The recent webcam case involving invasion of privacy by a suburban Philadelphia school district. This "just breaking" story hit a nerve with many of us,because it underscored existing anxieties and distrust that has become almost inescapable in relationships between parents and school districts.
--Need for MUCH more work establishing a working blogspot and learning how to get maximum benefit from it with respect to the story collecting project. Kathleen, Angie, and Carol will meet on March 2nd, to work exclusively on technical and blog issues. One thing we all agreed on, however, is that there is still a lot to learn about how to do this blog-thang.

A Connection

So. It's been awhile, and sometimes it takes me a little longer to get things done than others. Previously I suggested we would post some information and/or data from the Department of Educations' public records.
I had also mentioned and posted a link, I think, w/ respect to Susan Schweik's book, The Ugly Laws, N.Y. University Press, 2009.
Another time, I vented about health care and health care insurance.

Since then, I did conduct some research into special education due process cases and the decisions of DOE appointed hearing officers. I was not particularly surprised by what I found, but was rather overwhelmed by how much I discovered. So far, I've entered the data into an Excel workbook, and did some preliminary comparisons with charts & graphs. Putting it all together is something that will take more time than I realized.

Maybe, however, there's something to be learned here. A thread connecting individual experience (in this case, with special education and health care insurance) with the gatekeepers entrusted to distribute resourses and provide what is needed.
Some school districts seem more willing to spend significant amounts of money to oppose parents trying to get services for their children, than it would cost to provide the services which they consider unnecessary. A common concern, often implied but left unspoken, is that special education is a "drain" to the general population-- that providng special education to a child with a disability must be "at the expense" of their more deserving peers.

Why is opposition to providing services, including education, to persons with disabilities so pervasive, so vehement? In the big picture, how far has our community come in 2010?

Susan Schweik wrote, regarding the history of disability in the United States between 1867 and 1920:

Ugly law was begging law, although contemporary American disability activism did not know this. Unsightliness was a status offense, illegal only for people without means.

Think about it.

Questionable Practices

Smell anything fishy here..................?


The LURE

In the course of business, I needed a certain standard form. I could do it from scratch, like a homemade cake, or get the form ready-made. As luck would have it, just about then I noticed a link, to a website ..... offering . . . “free legal forms”.
Perfect. Download the form from Rocket Lawyer.com and save myself some time and money. After locating the exact form I want, and entering my name and email address . . .

The BAIT

Whoa. There’s more. Seems Rocket Lawyer.com is offering me a whole month of access, absolutely free. Must be my lucky day.


The HOOK

Next screen prompts me to enter all my credit card information.

So, I’m wondering, why does Rocket Lawyer.com need that kind of information to give me something free? Well, as it turns out, that question has been “frequently asked”, wouldn’t you know, and the answer was right there in the FAQ section at Rocket Lawyer.com. This is what I learned.


The BARB

Yes, the offer is true. Free forms for a whole month. No catch. However. However, at the end of the completely absolutely free month, the same access is available as a subscription…..and can be purchased, after the free month, at a very reasonable subscription rate. No pressure and I can opt out without penalty. In fact, it seems Rocket Lawyer.com won’t actually be using my credit card at all. They only need the information for security. Not only that, but I guess it saves time and avoids the hassle of filling out forms later.

LINE & SINKER

Oh, one more thing. The FAQ information did mention that if something happens to appear on the credit card statement—not to worry. In that unlikely event, it’s just something posted as a “pending” charge. Just in case I accept the offer, I suppose.