Extremely uncomfortable lawsuit may be filed locally in two years... (Allen: private school, taxes)

[EDS_]

Originally Posted by BLDSoon

Fair question. But how would this lawsuit, that seeks to not educate these kids at all( or at least a whole lot less), fix the worksheet situation? My guess is the special ed kids would have to go elsewhere for school, the special ed teacher would be out of a job and the other teachers would still be hoarding paper.

Their regular education classes wont necessarily get more funding because the special ed classes are gone/ reduced because from my understanding those funds are treated separately are they not?

Would you please calm down at least enough to not misrepresent what the potential plaintiffs desire? Literally no one except you has implied the kids in question shouldn't be educated.

[MovingtoDFW]

Originally Posted by EDS_

1). They may never file any of these suits. Most of the people involved live in other states as well.
2). Where is the "inherent stupidity" and "evil"?
3). As a nation we a far beyond broke in great part due to a perpetual lack of pragmatism in public life.

1/ That is the only smart option here. Doubt any politicians will get on board with this.
2/ Stupidity part is public personalities partaking of this (if they do). Evil, is the underlying project- but could just be ignorance too (don't have the energy to make those long arguments at this time).
3/ Far-fetched to pin blame on a relatively tiny, vastly morally hazardous issue for the larger problem- much more pressing issues involved there, some of which have already been mentioned here.

[BLDSoon]

Originally Posted by MurphyPl1

Not finished reading this thread but my initial take is that perhaps this means we need to pull these special needs case out of the education world and include under medical. That way educators can educate and therapists and behavioral trainers can do their work.

I subbed a special needs PE class and there were kids in there that had no way to comprehend even the most basic instruction. Yes, all students have the right to a public education. But is sitting them in a room all day with someone there to make sure they don't hurt themselves truly providing education?

That is not what this suit is seeking to do.

They feel we (they... you) are "spending too much dang money on the dang kids when they cant learn nuthin no way". (I just channeled a boorish late uncle, excuse me)

I highly doubt that whoever 'they' are would go for sending this the medical route so it can cost 10 times more. This is about the money for them, not the environment these kids learn in.

[BLDSoon]

Originally Posted by EDS_

Would you please calm down at least enough to not misrepresent what the potential plaintiffs desire? Literally no one except you has implied the kids in question shouldn't be educated.

I'll need a minute....


Okay minute taken. What would be an acceptable dollar amount for educating a severely disabled( can we still say that?) child according to this group. What is that magic number? And how have they arrived at it? My guess is the current dollar amount today, is what it is, for a reason.

What solutions are they offering to offset/reduce that cost outside of not educating those kids.

[EDS_]

Originally Posted by MovingtoDFW

1/ That is the only smart option here. Doubt any politicians will get on board with this.
2/ Stupidity part is public personalities partaking of this (if they do). Evil, is the underlying project- but could just be ignorance too (don't have the energy to make those long arguments at this time).
3/ Far-fetched to pin blame on a relatively tiny, vastly morally hazardous issue for the larger problem- much more pressing issues involved there, some of which have already been mentioned here.

1). The beauty of going to court and winning even partially is that a group more or less bypasses politicians. Interests on the political left have been doing so for decades and effectively I might add.

2). As mentioned politicians may not be involved in any direct sense.
2A). Could it be that you don't have any good arguments but only emotion?

3). Not sure what you mean.

[EDS_]

Originally Posted by BLDSoon

I'll need a minute....


Okay minute taken. What would be an acceptable dollar amount for educating a severely disabled( can we still say that?) child according to this group. What is that magic number? And how have they arrived at it? My guess is the current dollar amount today, is what it is, for a reason.

What solutions are they offering to offset/reduce that cost outside of not educating those kids.

The current dollar amounts are what they are due mostly to past court decisions and some federal inducements.

I'm not going to get into how they derive reasonable funding per pupil but their methodology makes a heck of all to more sense - in a greater good kind of way - than current systems. The people involved in this portion have impeccable bonafides. You need to get past thinking these people are nuts they are not.

An important item I missed/misstated earlier is this is not an effort to cut school funding. These people want $ for $ accounting - most money saved on one hand would be redirected towards other special needs kids whenever available and on general education kids when not.

Again these people are not crazy. They are looking to maximize a horribly inefficient portion of our educational system.

[Waterdragon8212]

I'm somewhat surprised that there is this much money that is reportedly being spent on these kids. My sister was a special ed teacher for 8 years. During some of her early years, she had only 3 kids in her class, but they were all non-verbal, non-ambulatory, 12 year olds in diapers. Bless her soul, she tried everything in the world to help these kiddos. The parents claimed she made great strides, but to anyone only familiar with neurotypical kids, it would be hard to see. It was just her (no aid) and she was essentially a teacher that was required to do speech, occupational, and physical therapy as well as changing diapers. The school didn't spend anything on these kids apart from her salary - and she spent her own money on therapeutic aids for them. The parents had to supply the diapers and any feeding equipment (many were on G-tubes). As the years went by, her class size increased from 3 to 14 - still with no therapists, but with one aid who had only a GED. I have no idea how much they paid the aid, but I'm guessing not much. I think she was hourly. My sister would have LOVED to have a room full of kids with Down's syndrome - in fact, it's the reason she went into teaching in the first place. Many kids in special ed aren't as profoundly disabled as the kids that ended up in her class and could have benefited from good teachers and/or therapists. However, at least in her experience, she was the only person the school was paying.

All this to say, the school was in a very highly regarded district in the area. I know that having 3-14 kids vs. the 26 or so you might have in a regular classroom means more is being spent per kid. But one of the reasons she quit was because the school said she would be the only special ed teacher regardless of how many kids were in the room (the year after she quit there were supposed to be 22). I'm just curious whether her experience is an anomaly or if the numbers are skewed just because there are fewer kids per class...

[BigDGeek]

Originally Posted by BLDSoon

Okay but isn't that funding statewide? It isn't as if the individual school would have to foot that bill alone. Or would they? Doesn't Robin hood, thats so frequently complained about here, offset that? And which small districts are these that can't handle the financial aspect of educating two special needs kids? They'd have to be very tiny and possibly rural.

Aren't these the same schools posters on CD complain about due to 'their' money being sent to these districts by Robin Hood? Are we now concerned about their lack of funding?

I'm not an expert on school funding by any means.

I do, however, see the pragmatism on not spending hundreds of thousands of dollars on "educating" a child who is so severely disabled that school is essentially free daycare.

[BLDSoon]

Originally Posted by EDS_

The current dollar amounts are what they are due mostly to past court decisions and some federal inducements.

I'm not going to get into how they derive reasonable funding per pupil but their methodology makes a heck of all to more sense - in a greater good kind of way - than current systems. The people involved in this portion have impeccable bonafides. You need to get past thinking these people are nuts they are not.

An important item I missed/misstated earlier is this is not an effort to cut school funding. These people want $ for $ accounting - most money saved on one hand would be redirected towards other special needs kids whenever available and on general education kids when not.

Again these people are not crazy. They are looking to maximize a horribly inefficient portion of our educational system.

How can, what i assume is a small group of unelected people decide that they know what the greater good is without asking the people they are doing this good for?

If their methodology is sane, and they have some valid, verifiable points and solutions, why not bring the issue up for ballot especially in the districts they feel would be most impacted?

Why circumvent the system enacted by the people they claim to be doing good for? How did they come to that conclusion? ( That it's for the greater good)

[BLDSoon]

Originally Posted by BigDGeek

I'm not an expert on school funding by any means.

I do, however, see the pragmatism on not spending hundreds of thousands of dollars on "educating" a child who is so severely disabled that school is essentially free daycare.

School is essentially free daycare for lots and lots of kids... many that are not disabled in any way. Is the issue then that it costs too much money to 'watch' these kids? Because if it is, I'd say we tackle the daycare that is our prison system first.