I don’t usually read the Huffington Post– but this entry caught my eyes. (Our children in crisis).

Stephen R. Covey–we need parents to parent, teachers to teach, children to learn–we need to build trust, community, leadership. Sound familiar?

Yes, a very good read.

My angle to fix special education? It’s not about getting more money… In my view, rather than more at this time–we need to spend what we have (already 20-40% of school budgets!) much better. Right now, too much goes for process, compliance, regulations, lawyers, etc. One of my special education director colleagues informally surveyed her teachers to find that special ed teachers spend about 19% of their time actually teaching! That is scary. We need to “educate, not litigate!”

My angle? We need what I call “trust-based special education.” The current 35+ year old system is built on an adversarial footing, relying on parents to “advocate” for their children AGAINST the schools! Parents have to file complaints, due process hearings, etc. Through my book and the talks I’m giving, I hear a lot of “Thank you for saying what we all know. You have courage. Etc.” We need to rebuild trust–without it, no one can teach effectively. Let’s be honest about that!

Right now, some of us are working to build (slowly, slowly…) on the notion that teachers need time to teach, not time to document everything and worry about getting sued (practicing defensive education). We need to focus on education–not litigation. Procedures Lite seems to have caught people’s attention. I’m happy to give you more info on this. As well, we (Special Education Day Committee) launched an alternate dispute resolution model, funded by the Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education, called “SpedEx.” Alas,it seems not to have yet found willing partners. We’re working on it. Little steps and persistence. We’ll get there!

At this time, my approach is to use small steps to make a big difference. As in Malcolm Gladwell’s Tipping Point and Chip and Dan Heath’ Switch books… I call my approcah “back door [and legal!] strategies/solutions!” I gave a talk two weeks ago in San Antonio–much interest in this approach. And will do several talks here in New England in May/June…. Join us! Let me hear of your ‘little steps to big effects’ ideas! Together, let us finally fix special education and improve learning for ALL students!

Life is great, isn’t it. Every day brings new ideas!

So here is Dr. Richard Selznick’s book, The Shut-Down Learner–Helping your Academically Discouraged Child. (Shut down learner). This psychiatrist is trying to help kids without labeling them as disabled. So, it’s SDL, not SLD! I love it!
It reminds me of my own book, Fixing Special Education–we need to focus on what kids can do, not just what they struggle with, etc. etc. etc. Not just dicing and splicing weaknesses that lead to discouraged learners. It also reminds me of one of my favorite books, Mindset–also the psychology of success, not labels.

Let’s see how far SDL goes. We surely need all the new voices we can get for positive approaches.

It’s been said before and I’ll say it again–it’s tough being a student today. Getting into college used to have some benchmark certainty. For many elite colleges, there used to be ‘Early admission’ in January and regular admission in the middle of April. But now, we learn that colleges are hedging their bets and adding more high school students to their wait lists… no YES or NO on the first round for many. It’s a tough year out there. (Colleges expanding waiting lists)

And it’s been said before, at the end of the day, it’s more about what students make of the college experience than which college they attend.

Good luck to all in the class of 2014!

I always sit up and take notice when E.D. Hirsch sends out an alarm. He’s the Core Knowledge guru–students need to learn basic knowledge about the world. Let’s call that stuff. It turns out that reading cannot be taught in a vacuum as a series of discrete skills that are supposedly transferable.

It turns out that students who know stuff, can comprehend what they read better. Students who don’t, can’t comprehend the material before them–even if they can decode and have phonemic awareness. Isn’t that plain as day? So obvious? Why has that been so hard to explain to a generation of educators? In math, too, students who don’t know number facts (even if they have a calculator) are way behind. They are missing the basic building blocks of knowledge. Stuff. Obvious again.

(E.D. Hirsch on standards).

Too often, special education, as well, focuses on skills in isolation. Decoding, phonics, vocabulary, comprehension, etc. With all the focus on skills, too often, these students are not exposed to a rich curriculum and learning stuff. So, E.D. Hirsch’s warnings apply to students with disabilities as well. We need to teach stuff as well as skills. One without the other is unsatisfying. And it doesn’t work well.

I was just reading about this! How amazing– a state law that actually encourages schools to develop programs to improve student outcomes–and to obtain waivers from policies that would get in the way of innovation! Wow. It’s about time! Schools that are drowning in paperwork have a reprieve when they design effective programs for student learning.

That is exactly what we need in special education.
(Colorado’s Innovation Schools Act)

For example, Procedures Lite, a Massachusetts program, should be expanded to schools nationwide! For information about Procedures Lite, please visit (Special Education Day)

Maybe there is hope. Let’s hope.

Schools need to cut budgets. State funding is down. We all know that.

Special education is an entitlement program–the only one in our schools.

With tight budgets, what do we do about special education?

Maintain programs? Well, what of other students.

Cut programs? Well, what of the entitlement?

Cut the number of students covered? Easier said than done.

Any ideas?

(Discussion on Fixing Special Education at Accept Collaborative).

Would love to have you join the discussion in Natick, MA.

The theme…..Celebrating what’s right; fixing what’s not.
Let’s build Trust-Based Special Education through Back Door (but legal!) Solutions.

See you on May 27!

As my loyal readers know, I was a member of the NAGB (National Assessment Governing Board) panel of experts about the testing of students with disabilities on the NAEP (National Assessment of Educational Progress). We worked to tighten the exclusion of too many students and the need for accommodations that maintain the NAEP’s validity. HOPEFULLY, the new policy, newly adopted by the NAGB, will solve the challenges pointed out below by Richard Innes. If we can’t compare apples to apples, then the NAEP truly loses its shine.

(Kentucky vs California and exclusions).

It’s hard to know what the NAEP scores mean for students with disabilities–since we don’t have a handle on the exclusion rates and accommodations policies that differ from town to town and state to state. Hopefully, once NAGB’s new and improved (!) policy is implemented these test results will be more consistent and easier to interpret. At the end of the day, we would expect the scores of students with disabilities to be lower than those of their general education peers, due to their disabilities, but I’m not a statistician and can’t estimate what the different ranges should be.