Comments on: School leaders enumerate challenges on the eve of the new year

By: Shameful

Shameful — Fri, 07 Sep 2012 12:56:00 +0000

Your optimism is nice and all, but I am talking about reality here. You do not just throw kids into a new setting without preparation and expect everybody to do well. Inclusion CAN work (I have seen it myself), but the DOE does it all wrong. Honestly ask yourself if it is fair and realistic to have a kid who reads and writes on a second grade level to join a class where college level writing skills are introduced. This is like asking a baby to ride a bike before they can even crawl.

Quite frankly, your implication that I hold prejudice in my heart against students with disabilities offends me. I have younger relatives who have disabilities and IEPs and I love them very much. I’ve taught students with disabilities for years so I am not a general ed teacher going through culture shock. I am speaking on what I know, and what I know is that these “reforms” are rushed, and very poorly thought out.

By: Celia Oyler

Celia Oyler — Thu, 06 Sep 2012 23:55:00 +0000

Although deep prejudices against the disabled have been with European and U.S. cultures throughout most of our existence as humans, there is absolutely no evidence that segregation of the disabled is a successful strategy. This applies to housing (keeping them in institutions didn’t work out) and employment (keeping them in sheltered workshops turned out to be more expensive and very frustrating for the disabled; and disabled employees turn out to have better job performance than non-disabled). In education it turns out that students with disabilities actually learn a lot more when they are given access to the general education curriculum and provided with special education supports. (This is very undisputed after about 30 years of education research.) And the news gets better: when students with disabilities (yes, even those that read many, many years below grade level) are included in general education classes, the achievement outcomes of the non-disabled are not affected. Please do not let old prejudices against people with disabilities harden your heart against their enduring humanity. Students with disabilities are children first and there is ample evidence that self-contained settings produce seriously inferior long-term life outcomes for children. You may want to start with some autobiographical work by people with disabilities. They are people. More like you than not. Most teachers who open their classrooms to students with disabilities find that their teaching improves and that they learn some significantly important life lessons.

By: Shameful.

Shameful. — Thu, 06 Sep 2012 16:10:00 +0000

These special education reforms are a joke. In my school, there are students in inclusion classrooms who read at a second grade level, can barely write, and have serious behavioral issues. Dozens of students were placed into these classrooms regardless of whether or not they are ready. At least in a self-contained setting, these students had were more time to get their work done and learn in a small community without being judged. These reforms are about money, not what is best for the child. I suspect many kids who were in a 15:1 classroom will fall through the cracks because they are either lack the academic skills or cannot handle a large classroom emotionally. This is a set up, and a disgraceful lack of regard for kids that DOE claims they care about.

By: TeachmyclassMrMayor

TeachmyclassMrMayor — Wed, 05 Sep 2012 23:46:00 +0000

I am stunned. I can’t believe that the Chancellor & his deputy did not visit one of the 24 schools that they tried to close. Why does he never face the music? I guess he rally does not have an answer as to why they financially starve the schools that they want to get rid of in their continual attempts to bust the UFT (of course, the union management goes out of their way to help, but that is another rant for another day). Once again, I challenge you Mr. Chancellor, come by yourself to one of those schools, and face the music. Explain where all of the money goes, and perhaps even spend some time showing us how it is done.