Kids First: 2024

Tuesday, December 17, 2024

Keep that spin going...

Keep that spin going…

A few weeks ago, eleven students with autism and their seven teachers were denied service at a Cracker Barrell restaurant in Waldorf, Maryland. The teacher in charge had called the Cracker Barrel and asked if they needed a reservation or anything else. They were told no. The lunch visit is part of a program to assist kids with significant disabilities to participate in the community. Cracker Barrel had been part of the program. The students are all on the autism spectrum and moderately disabled.

Upon arrival at the restaurant, the students and teachers were told they could not be served. The teachers volunteered to break into smaller groups so that the grouping would be more typical. They were still refused by the server, the assistant manager and the manager. They waited 1 hour for carry out which they ate back in their classroom.

The incident went viral. The county superintendent wrote a strongly worded letter. Community groups were up in arms.

Corporate Cracker Barrel said the local staff would be spoken to, but the restaurant was too crowded to accommodate such a large group even though the group had asked in advance if it was ok.

So, on the one hand, corporate said “we did not refuse service to this student group, but operational breakdowns caused by staffing shortages and poor communication on our part led us to fall well short of our service standards”. Okay, service was not refused because that would be an admission of violating the Maryland public accommodation law.

On the other hand, Corporate said it was firing three employees at that Cracker Barrel including the general manager. And they would be “moving forward with specialized training for all employees at this particular store” and that it has a “zero-tolerance policy against any form of discrimination”. Makes sense, who wants to admit to breaking the law?

Representatives from Cracker Barrel have met with the school system and said they would like to continue to participate in the program.

So here is the confusion- your staff did nothing wrong but you fired them anyway??? Hmmm, that is curious.

Why not do a huge mea culpa and invite the kids to lunch, with the treat on Cracker Barrel? Oh because then all those funny looking kids would be in your restaurant. And so the spin goes on.

Wednesday, December 11, 2024

You don’t care about me soooo

We have known for a very long time that students learn more from teachers they like and who they perceive as liking them. Kids want to feel cared about by their teachers.

We also know that the students who have been involved in school aggression or violent assaults have all felt alienated from their schools.

We know so much and do so little…

A mere 22% of middle and high school students reported that many or all of their teachers cared about them, and/or made an effort to find out what their lives were like outside of school.

In the days before pacing guides, measuring learning with frequent tests and grading schools by test scores, people became teachers because they cared about kids and wanted to be a part of their successful future. Schools and teachers were measured by how many kids graduated, went onto college or a job. Schools seemed to recognize different values. High school students in Maryland could earn an academic diploma, a commercial diploma (for students who wanted to do office work) and a general vocational diploma for students who were going into the trades. The union really was a professional association that lobbied for more instructional materials, professional standards and better teacher training not higher salaries, shorter hours and protections for poor teachers.

Teachers are human and they will put their energies where the rewards are. Right now, the rewards are for test scores and keeping on pace with the pacing guide. Students have become cogs in the wheels rather than people with feelings and home lives.

Reasons for students feeling that no one cares about them have been offered up as the outcomes from teacher shortages and behavioral disturbances. Maybe this is a chicken and egg situation. If teachers cared about kids more, the teachers might enjoy their jobs more and not leave, hence not as much of a teacher shortage. If kids felt cared about, they wouldn’t be as disruptive and would learn more.

Tuesday, November 19, 2024

All the kids just got smarter!

All the kids, just got smarter

Everyone seems to agree that test scores need to move upward. The big question is exactly how do we do that.

Well several states have found a guaranteed way to improve test scores. Oklahoma and Wisconsin have just changed the “cut point”. So, by lowering the point score needed to be ranked basic, proficient or advanced, the same actual score, gives students a much better rating. Truly simple. This approach gives parents the impression that the schools and their child are improving; when, in fact, nothing has changed at all. Easiest approach of all.

Another approach is to reduce graduation requirements and inflate grades by banning failing grades and/or lowering the “fail” grade to 50% instead of the standard 60%. Both Washington state and North Carolina have used this approach to show that grades are improving since the pandemic.

The approach to the grading crisis seems to be to lower expectations down to where the kids are rather than work with the students to meet the higher standard.

Each state controls its own definition of proficiency and how students can achieve grade level performance. States aim for grade level proficiency based on their own standards. There is no gold standard in the sky of what equals 3^rd grade reading level. Consequently, what is 3^rd grade in one state might be 2^nd or 4the in another state. By moving bar on cut scores, states can automatically improve their proficiency scores. The alternative approach is to redesign the test to make it easier so kids will do better. Then tout how much better students are doing. New York won’t admit to lowering standards. Instead, they say they are adjusting the tests to what you would expect kids to learn today. Illinois is the next state to lower the cut off scores so that more students score in the proficient range.

Dr. Cathy Wright, the new superintendent in Maryland, says that approach is all wrong. She firmly believes that higher standards need to be set and teachers need to be trained to meet those standards. She has set a goal of a 5% improvement rate each year for the next three years. To achieve that goal, more students will be retained in 3^rd grade if they are not at grade level.

Dr. Wright’s approach is not as sure fire as the other states, but if it works, the kids might just not only be more proficient but even learn more.

Tuesday, November 12, 2024

What do principals have the right to know?

What do principals have a right to know?

Recently, a student in a Howard County public school came to school with a gun and fatally shot another student. Turns out the student had a record of such offenses. The principal didn’t know that. The Superintendent knew the student had a record with the Department of Juvenile Services but was not told how serious the record was.

The question is-who benefits from this system? Some say it is not fair to the student to carry the burden of past offenses for everyone to know. How can he start over? Others say it is the primary duty of the local superintendent and the principal to keep the other students safe. Can these both be true?

Maryland had a rule that superintendents could share the specifics of reportable offenses (rape, murder, weapons charges) to the receiving superintendent. They were not required to. Some did, some didn't. Following the fatal shooting of a student in Columbia, Howard County things changed with lightening speed.

Citizens demanded action from their legislators. Turned out that wasn’t necessary. At the next State Board of Education meeting the State Board enacted emergency legislation that requires sending superintendent to notify the receiving superintendent of any transfer student with a reportable offense that has been charged or convicted. The receiving superintendent is then required to notify the receiving principal. School districts are required to provide an education to all children between the ages of 5-18 in Maryland. But that education does not have to be in the comprehensive school with other children. The measure was passed as an emergency regulation so it went into effect immediately without the usual period of public comment and an open hearing. The speed was lightening even for emergency rulings.

As usual there are three sides to every story. Some people are very concerned for the safety of the general population and do not want students with these kinds of past behaviors in the school. They are concerned about events such as the ones that have recently happened. Others think this will stigmatize these young people and not give them a chance to change. This situation will be particularly true if school districts chose to educate delinquents with serious offenses in segregated environments or virtually. Is there a third option that would protect both sets of kids, those who have offended and those who have not? Once you have the right to know, what do you do with the information?

Tuesday, November 5, 2024

Why so many?

The number of American children and adults diagnosed with autism increased 175% in roughly a decade. This information is according to new research that shows the uptick is particular to a few groups.

In a study published in the journal JAMA Network Open indicated that autism prevalence jumped from 2.3 per thousand to 6.3 per thousand in the roughly one decade studied.

The biggest jump was seen in adults ages 26-34 which saw an increase of 450%. This jump included a significant increase of female vs male children. The highest prevalence was found in children ages 5 to 8. Kids from racial and ethnic minority groups saw the biggest jump. But this trend did not hold to adults.

The big question is why??? Have you ever had the experience after buying a blue car to notice how many blue cars there are out there. Something similar is happening to diagnosing autism. There has been an expansion of universal development screening that accounts for some of the increase in diagnosis rates. There is also the notion of status. Many years ago, the formal diagnosis of learning disabilities became a reality. Suddenly, many children who had been diagnosed with mental retardation became learning disabled. As we learn more about autism, some historians are looking back at famous people and deciding that they too had autism. Perhaps autism has become a status diagnosis. People on the spectrum are featured in prime time TV shows. It has become sort of a boutique diagnosis.

Interestingly, the increase has been more in the higher functioning areas of the spectrum. Although the increases in the lower functioning areas sends out a call for society to be looking at adult care for these individuals who may not be able to live independently.

What you look for you will find. Is that true of autism?

Tuesday, October 29, 2024

Jump down, spin around, pick a bale of cotton

Gotta jump down, spin around, pick a bale of hay. Some of you might remember the old folk song. It seems it might be coming back to life.

A federal lawsuit claimed an Illinois teacher gave Black students a bag of cotton- and ONLY Black students- after a lesson on slavery.

The racial discrimination lawsuit was filed against a teacher at Julian Middle School in Oak Park Illinois. The lesson involved all students putting their hands into a box that supposedly contained raw cotton from cotton plants. The teacher then gave the 2 African American children a separate bag of cotton for them to take home. No white child was given the separate bag of cotton. The incident caused an outcry at a Board meeting. Numerous parents said their children had experienced racial discrimination in the district was this was the last straw or piece of cotton.

At the meeting, parents spoke about many different instances of overt racial bias. Representatives of the local NAACP were also at the meeting and said it was their intent to also file a compliant with the U.S. office of Civil Rights.

The lawsuit said that Oak Park school administrators held a meeting with the teacher after the incident. Administrators explained that the use of cotton in the lesson had not been “approved” by the school district. The teacher allegedly cried during the meeting with her principal and said she didn’t think it “would cause any harm”. It is difficult to figure out just what she thought it would do to those two students. And why were they treated any differently than the remaining white students?

Another question that needs to be asked is where has the local NAACP been during all these months when Black families have been complaining about racial bias and harassment. Are they just waking up to the need to do something?

The NAACP asked, “why are Black families not taken seriously when they report something?” The same question could be asked of the NAACP. What caused them to finally wake up to the issue?

Maybe the school district and the teacher are not the only ones ignoring feelings. Maybe folks need to jump down, spin around and pick up some good sense.

Tuesday, October 22, 2024

Promises Made, Debt Unpaid

The Blueprint for Maryland’s Future makes lots of promises for a great tomorrow in education. There are many areas where doubts are being expressed about the cost as they begin to come due in the next few years.

One of the areas of greatest need and least fulfillment is the promise of free early childhood education. With the number of kids in single parent homes and the number of children in families where both parents are working, early childhood education is critical. Not just for the child but for the family.

Child care usually falls to the mother in the family. Private early childhood education runs about $1,800 a month. If a family has more than one child, the cost can equal the net salary of the mother. Consequently, many women decide to give up or delay their careers to stay home and provide child care.

The plan in the Blueprint is for there to be a public/private partnership to provide the free childcare. That plan isn’t working for multiple reasons.

Application for the funds by private providers is long and complex. Add that to the fact that the State Legislature does not end the session until mid-April so MSDE does not know how much money it has to allocate for the effort. Private providers do not know how many free seats they will have until sometime after the school year has begun. At the present time there isn’t a system for public programs that are full to refer candidates to the funded private providers. Consequently, private providers may have openings for funded students but are unaware of where those students are.

On the other hand, some private providers may chose not to do the lengthy paperwork required or to work with the state bureaucracy. Additionally, participants in the funding plan need to have staff with certain credentials and need to pay their staff at a going rate. Some private provides do neither. As a result, those private providers are finding their census down dramatically previously paying customers are going to free seats elsewhere. In some cases, threatening their viability of staying open; thereby decreasing the number of paid seats available to those families who can afford the cost.

The subsidy is currently $13,000 a year. It is set to increase to 14k next year and up to nearly $20,000 the following year.

But the piper must be paid. Already candidates for Boards of Education spots are worrying how the cost of the Blueprint is going to be paid. The Blueprint was passed without a funding plan. Public schools are fighting to find physical spots for public pre-K, in addition to the cost of pre-k teachers who need to be paid on the public teacher salary scale. Commitment to the Blueprint is showing signs of fragmenting.

Of all the pillars in the Blueprint, pre-k education for all of Maryland’s children is a debt that must be paid.

Tuesday, October 15, 2024

Big Change for SSI

Big Change has arrived for SSI

People with disabilities may receive Supplemental Security Income or SSI. Recipients of the benefit are required to report how they spend the stipend. Until recently if a recipient paid less than fair market value for his/her rent, the difference between the fair market value and the actual rent was deducted from the stipend.

This situation was most likely to occur when the recipient lived at home or with other family members. Yet, the benefit did not pay enough for fair market value in the open market AND the recipient’s disability often made it very difficult for him/her to live independently.

Recipients went to court in a number of states. As a result, there was variety around the country. In seven states, Connecticut, New York, Vermont, Illinois, Indiana, Wisconsin and Texas, monthly payments were not reduced if the recipient was paying more than a third of his/her income for housing even in those instances when it was less than fair market value.

With the new rule, Social Security will apply the less stringent standard nationwide. Social Security administration expects that as a result of the new rule about 41,000 people will see their SSI payments increase an average of $132 a month. An additional, 14,000 are expected to now qualify for SSI.

The new policy took effect on September 30.

This rule change is part of a wide-ranging effort to reconsider how the Social Security Administration is handling SSI payments. Earlier in the spring, the Social Security Administration said it would also stop counting food as part of the “in-kind support and maintenance” this fall. How Social Security views income from other public agencies is also being examined.

Martin O’Malley, Director of Social Security, explained that the plan not only had huge benefits for recipients but it also reduced agency time spent calculating and administering rental subsidy.

A win-win for people with disabilities and the bureaucracy that serves them.

Tuesday, October 8, 2024

7%- That’s Amazing

Only 7% of the 8^th graders taking the Maryland Comprehensive Assessment in math passed it last school year. That’s terrible. Well actually it is quite amazing if you take the trouble to look at some of the practice items that are published online. If you did that, you would not only be amazed that anyone passed the test but you would also have to ask the question – why on earth do we even TRY to prepare kids to pass this foolishness.

Sample question:

Which expression below is equivalent to +=

A= -8

B= -1/8

C= 1/8

D=8

Truly the above is a sample question for an 8^th grader. The vast majority of 8^th graders got this wrong. Probably the vast majority of job holding successful adults got it wrong too. Other questions on the test are similar.

Time is finite. Once elapsed you can never get it back. Teachers are working and wasting students’ time teaching them to try and do this foolishness. To what purpose?? Evidently so they will not be among the 93% who do not pass the test. How many more useful functional things could our students be learning instead of wasting their time on this.

One of the easier items is =49/16

Again, how useful is this?

Students need to pass these tests to get a high school diploma. Check around with people you know and see how many can answer the questions. Then ask yourself, are they relatively successful adults? Are they employed, self-supporting, have jobs, contributing to society? And yet they can’t do these math questions.

There is a lot of hype around the poor math scores of students. Very few people ask the question, what is being measured and is the juice worth the squeeze. Do we really care if our kids can do these things or not and isn’t there some better way for them to be using their time.

Sort of reminds me of the Emperor’s New Clothes. While we are arguing over the color of his cloak, we fail to acknowledge he isn’t wearing a cloak at all!

BTW, the answer to question 1 is D-8. The answer to question 2 is 1 ¾. Let me know if you can ever use this information.

Tuesday, October 1, 2024

Do we want to feed the kids or not

Maybe there is such a thing as a free lunch?

Eight states in our union have promised every student a free lunch. No paperwork, no forms, no how much money does your family have. Nope, everyone who comes to school gets a free lunch- or at least free to the student.

Governor Walz of Minnesota said that while other states were banning books, his state was banishing hunger.

The Federal meal program for k-12 students was created to provide food to children from low-income families while at school. The program is funded through the US Department of Agriculture. While originally created as a kind of stop-gap for hungry kids, it has become in many ways an entitlement program.

As with all things there are three sides to every story.

The US House of Representatives has passed a budget package that would eliminate the community eligibility provision. This is a policy that allows entire school districts, groups of schools or a single school to provide all students with meals regardless of the income of any single child. Project 2025 and the US House of Representatives argue that the program should return to its original intent and only serve low-income kids.

California, Colorado, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, New Mexico and Vermont all join Minnesota in providing free lunch to all. Under the typical meal system, some students pay the full price, others pay a reduced price and still others get a free lunch. Universal free lunch dramatically reduces the paperwork and each child can feel good about him or herself. No more stigma for some kids if they want to eat. Under the typical system, some kids would rather go hungry than have to identify as poor enough for a free lunch. As Scrooge would say, “if they would rather go hungry then let them”. A bill sponsored in both houses of Congress calling for free breakfast and lunch has gained no traction among Republicans.

For many children, school lunches (and breakfast in some cases) provide the major food source for a child in a day. Some schools send home weekend bags too.

These lunches aren’t free. Someone is footing the bill. So, the questions are should all kids eat, should some kids eat, and who should be paying for the groceries, because there really isn’t a free lunch.

Tuesday, September 24, 2024

Let's Redshirt that boy!

Let’s Redshirt that boy!

More and more parents are “redshirting” their young children. College sports teams aren’t the only ones to “redshirt”.

Maryland law requires that kindergarten is the first compulsory year of school attendance. But the law also allows for caregivers to ask for a maturity waiver. Mostly this rule impacts boys who tend to mature more slowly than girls.

Many families do not feel their child is ready for kindergarten. But as in many benefits this bonus comes with several considerations.

First of all, kindergarten is free. And that includes free transportation. Providing your child with an extra year of child care is not free. It is not unusual for day care to cost around $235 a week. That’s a chunk of change. Maryland’s Blueprint for Education will eventually provide free pre-school as well, but the roll out of that program is just getting started and limited free spots fill quickly. Last year about 300 families in the Baltimore metro area took the maturity waiver. Not surprisingly these were mostly upper income families.

Another consideration is the maturity of the child. While Kindergarten begins at age 5, not all 5 year olds are ready to begin the more formal schooling. This situation is particularly true today when kindergarten has become more academic centered and not play centered. Summer birthday kids are particularly at risk. Kids with winter birthdays turning 5 have almost a full year before they need to start kindergarten. Whereas, summer birthdays are right on the cusp.

In making the decision, families need to talk with day care providers, sports team leaders and other trusted adults. How is the child doing on focus, communication with peers and setting boundaries?

When thinking about redshirting, families need to consider the here and now as well as the future. A child who is redshirted because of emotional immaturity may be academically on target or even ahead. What will that mean for the child who then starts kindergarten even more ahead of his class peers academically ? In an environment of pacing guides, teachers don’t slow down nor hurry up for differences in learning rate. Being academically ahead of classmates becomes hard on the teacher and the child.

Decisions need to be made carefully. And sometimes family economics make the decision. There is no need to rush childhood. And redshirting only benefits some athletes and kindergarten kids.

Tuesday, September 17, 2024

You don't learn much if you are not in school

You don’t learn much if you are not in school

Since the pandemic, chronic absenteeism has increased from 1 in every 6 students to 1 in every 3 students. And overall absentee rates remain higher than before the pandemic. Chronic absenteeism is defined as missing more that 10% of the school year regardless of the reason.

How many of us would keep our jobs if we missed 10% of the work year in addition to holidays.

Fact: students with higher absentee rates have lower achievement. So it doesn’t matter if you missed school because you were ill, went on a family vacation, needed a mental health day or just didn’t feel like coming to school.

According to reports 16% of Asian students, 24% of white students, 36% of Hispanic students and 39% of African American students were chronically absent. Reverse this list and you have rankings of the lowest achieving students in our schools.

School is a kid’s job. So besides not learning we are teaching our children that it’s perfectly ok to miss one’s job for whatever reason that comes up.

Fourteen states have joined an effort to cut down on absenteeism.

The plan is going to begin with a worksheet given to teachers to try to figure out why a child is chronically absent so that the root causes of the absence can be addressed.

The worksheet includes these questions: Has the child been struggling academically? Does the student have language or communication issues? Have there been any reports of bullying? Do parents and/or guardians recognize the importance of school attendance and do they support getting their children to school?

The Maryland State Board of Education is on the cusp of enacting a policy that will put into place some serious interventions to get students to read on grade level by the time the students finish 3^rd grade. Interventions include grade retention, intensive after school and summer tutoring.

Here’s the deal. If a child is not in school, all the interventions in the world aren’t going to work. School matters, now and in the future when the child is an adult and trying to get and keep a job.

Tuesday, September 10, 2024

Another Day, Another School Shooting

Horrific news that once again a child has killed other children in his school. Everyone has a solution. Arm the teachers, increase mental health services, lock those bad kids up for the rest of their lives, prosecute the parents- all such great ideas, few of which would prevent anything.

Again and again with every shooter, the same issue comes to the fore. These kids did not feel known. In fact, they were NOT known. In the case of the Georgia child, the administrator went to what she thought was his class but had the wrong kid with a similar name. Certainly, we can lock them up for the rest of their lives as Trump says of these “vicious, evil people”. But they aren’t vicious or evil people. They have done vicious and evil things, no question. They were once babies and little people in kindergarten that were known to teachers and family. What can we do to make kids feel known?

A principal at a California high school says he treats the first day of school like the first episode of a Netflix show he wants his students to binge on. “The minute they walk through the door, I want to hook them so that they come back for more.” On the first week of school teachers take it slow. They don’t rush to introduce the syllabus or course requirements. (What NO course pacing guide that makes everyday a milestone!!) They play a version of beach volleyball. Each colored section of the ball features questions- like “pet’s name”, “what movie do you want to act in”, “what’s your favorite ice cream”. Kids answer according to the section of the ball that faces them. It’s fun, an ice breaker and a way for children to identify as something else besides a number on a seating chart.

Another thing to do is to believe what we learn from research. The bigger the school the more anonymous the student. Stop building high schools that hold several thousand kids.

Students are very happy to be back in school in person. And now that they are, the anxieties of fitting in are growing. School leaders have to be intentional about getting kids to feel they fit in the school. Students need to feel that their well being matters. They need to be seen for being really nice kids who are perhaps a bit different, and they need to fit in as well.

When they don’t get the attention they need from positive sources, they sure will from being that “evil” kid.

Another day, another shooting will happen unless you notice me before rather than after, you know me for being bad.

Tuesday, September 3, 2024

STOP! That's mine!

You can’t take my property!

School systems and private schools are disallowing cell phones in the school. As with all things there are three sides to every story. My side, your side and the right side.

Students say that the phone is their private property and the system cannot take it away. One could split hairs and remind students that in almost all cases the phone itself is the property of the parent or whomever is paying the cell phone bill, most likely not the student. Of course, we have a history of taking kids’ private property if it is not appropriate to school or we made a rule against it. You cannot smoke on school property or we will take the tobacco away, ditto alcoholic beverages. No weapons, no drugs. Taking things from students we don’t want them to have has a long history.

What if there is an emergency, how can I contact my parents. Depends on the emergency but most likely the school officials will contact your parents if it’s a true emergency.

I am a parent and I need to be able to reach my child! Exactly why? Do you allow your child to call you at work to chat? School is your child’s job. He/she needs to be left alone to do that job. And if you really need to get a message to your child, just call the front desk. It will get through.

Data show that kids get hundreds of messages a day on their phone during school hours. No, that was not a typo. It’s very hard for kids to attend to their job (i.e. learning) when they also have to respond to all of those pings. And if you are a student, the pings may have more value than what the teacher is trying to do. Teachers don’t need children to do a constant dialog with their parents on what the teacher is doing. Just one more reason teaching has lost a lot of its fun.

Teachers and school administrators say kids don’t need phones in school. Important messages to families can go through the office. And then there are the not so important messages kids are sending- photos of bodily parts that are best left covered, insinuation about which students are dating (or not), having sex (or not) and just generally gossiping about what’s happening now.

Most great compromises please no one and have something for everyone. Put student phones in a safe place every morning so they can see where the phone is going, lock it up AND put the phone on the charger. Teachers/administrators get peace to do their jobs. Kids get a fully charged phone at the end of the day to use on the bus on the walk home. See something for everyone. And everyone gets something to be annoyed about too.

Oh, and by the way, the property isn’t the students and the school administrators can indeed take it.

Tuesday, August 27, 2024

New literacy policy- crazy or what?

Crazy is continuing to do the same thing and expecting a different result.

The Maryland State Department of Education has backed down a bit on its requirement that all students must be competent readers by the end of grade 3 or be retained until they are. Competence in reading is defined as a score of 375 on the MCAP test. There was significant push back from the State Board of Education and the public.

Now there is a compromise. Parents will have gained the right to challenge a school district’s decision to retain a poor reading third grader. Districts must inform parents within 15 days from the time the decision to retain a 3^rd grader has been made. BUT, parents have the option to insist that their child move onto 4^th grade as long as they agree to use additional help from the school district such as summer school or before or after school tutoring that happens outside of the school day. The State Board will decide at its September meeting on whether or not it will approve the compromise plan.

Maryland has developed a 3^rd grade English test called the Maryland Comprehensive Assessment Program or MCAP. It is administered near the end of the school year. A student who scores 375 or above is considered proficient. Starting in the 2025-26 school year, districts would need to screen children three times for reading proficiency. They will also be screened once a year for dyslexia beginning in kindergarten. That’s a WHOLE lot of testing going on and those tests do not include all of the other academic testing. According to the plan the retention policy would go into effect at the end of the 2026-2027 school year.

The instructional portion of the policy will go into effect as soon as the State Board approves the plan as early as its September meeting. Under the new instructional policy, ALL reading instruction will be based on what is being called the Science of Reading, which is essentially a phonics-based approach to reading instruction which teaches students the sounds of letters and how they come together to make words. Don’t let it bother you that English is one of the LEAST phonetically regular languages. The policy bans reading instruction that has kids guess words based on sentence context. But WAIT, how do adults figure decode words they don’t know- or right by the context of the sentence. Hmmm, so is that word read or read? We can't use the context of the sentence right? So teachers are no longer allowed to teach this mature reading habit.

And just in case, kids are still not scoring 375 on the MCAP in the 4^th grade they will be put on an “intensive reading program”. Crazy is continuing to do the same thing and expect a different result. Could it be that the so-called science of reading doesn’t work for some kids?

Tuesday, August 20, 2024

How many special educators does it take to teach a child?

How many special ed teachers does a school district need?

How many teachers for children with disabilities does a school system need? The answer to that question depends on who is asking the question and how are they figuring it.

In Calvert County Maryland, the school district believes that 1 special ed teacher for every 175 students enrolled in the district is just right. Given that most experts believe that the incidence of disabilities in the general population of a school is about 15%, that staffing pattern would yield one special ed teacher for every 26.4 children with disabilities. That is quite remarkable because the average class size for plain kids in Calvert County grades k-3 is 20 and for grades 3-5, it’s 25. So if you are an elementary aged child in Calvert County and you have a disability, you might be better off in general ed rather than getting the appropriate education you are guaranteed by both federal and state law.

In spite of those difficult staffing ratios, Calvert County is still short 16 special ed teachers as the start of the 24-25 school year approaches.

The head of special ed for Calvert County was challenged by several Board members regarding this ratio. Two members of the Board did not think the ration was sufficient. The special ed department director said that this was the ratio she inherited two years ago when she took over. Somehow this situation seemed to make her think she wasn’t responsible for it two years later.

One Board member compared the vacancies and the staffing ratios to neighboring counties on both the western and eastern shores of Maryland. All of the comparable school districts had lower staffing shortages and a better staffing ratio.

The special ed department director felt that all systems were dealing with a state-wide shortage of special ed teachers, even if other systems were reporting better numbers.

What is interesting is that even with the staffing shortages, and the poor staffing ratios, Calvert County still insists that it is able to provide the free, appropriate public education to children in the district. When parents disagree and ask for an approved non-public program, they are in for a fight.

How does that logic work? On the one hand, the system acknowledges they don’t have the staff or the staffing to do the job. And on the other hand, they insist they can provide an appropriate education for their students with disabilities. Interesting logic?

Tuesday, August 13, 2024

Does Maryland have the best school system?

Well not quite the best but depending on whom you ask it might be the third best school system in the country.

WalletHub compared all 50 states and DC schools across 32 key metrics. The analysis looked at funding, safety, class size and instructor credentials as key indices of greatness.

By this evaluation, Massachusetts has the best school system in the country. That isn’t particularly new news as most state rating systems rank Massachusetts highly. One of the differences in this evaluation is that the hard focus was not just on test scores but rather making sure students feel safe, comfortable and cared for.

In the ranking, Maryland came in at 3^rd, just after Massachusetts and Connecticut. Louisiana was #47. Guess those 10 Commandments that are supposed to be in every classroom are to help the kids pray for a better school system. Dead last at 51 (remember 50 states plus DC) was New Mexico. The lowest drop-out rate went to West Virginia; the highest was DC.

Maryland has the 3^rd best school system according to these rankings. It is one of only seven states with laws making digital content and instructional materials available outside of the classroom. It has the 7^th highest share of students scoring at least 3 on AP exams. It also has the 10^th-best share of public schools that rank in the top 700 nationwide, at about 6.2%. Maryland was one of the top spending states.

Other variables usually not considered in these kinds of rankings include reports of being threatened or bullied while attending school, feeling unsafe at school or in transit to and from school. The availability of illegal drugs on school property was also a factor in measuring school safety as was the number of school shootings. The rankings looked at aggregate data for each state. So in Maryland the lower rankings on the Eastern Shore and Western Maryland would be offset by the higher rankings in the DC Maryland metro area and in the school systems surrounding Baltimore City.

This ranking is unique in the weight it gives to environmental safety factors in measuring the quality of a school system. From the student’s perspective, those factors may well be the most important.

TUESDAY, AUGUST 6, 2024

Keep the littlest buggers in school!

Maryland banned out-of-school suspension in 2017 for kids in pre-K through grade 2 unless a student was a threat to others and was evaluated by a school counselor or psychologist. So what difference did it make?

Educators have long argued that suspension is not an effective tool for dealing with negative behaviors and it is highly correlated to poor graduation rates and involvement with the criminal justice system. Of course, correlation does NOT mean causation and it just might mean that the same kids with bad behavior keep having those bad behaviors all their lives.

What we do know is that suspension seems to be more a protection for the school system than it is for preventing future bad behaviors of kids.

Most bans on suspension have been at the district level, Maryland is unique by having a state level ban.

One would think that a ban would mean none. Not so. Although suspensions did drop a great deal for the targeted grades. In the first year of the ban, suspensions dropped 58% but there were still 1,409 suspensions in these low grades. There also seemed to be an impact on 3^rd graders as there was a slight reduction in that grade as well.

And it seems kids of color still seem to be suspended at a disproportionate rate. Teachers don’t want to give up this tool.

Here is what we do know that should be impacting the use of suspensions. Children from lower socio-economic homes regardless of race and/or disability, have poor expressive language skills. Humans who cannot speak their frustration and anger with language, do so with physical acting out. Perhaps what we need to do act prophylactically is teach kids language skills with which to express anger. In more basic terms, we need to teach kids how to speak their anger rather than aggressively show their anger behaviorally.

Instead we keep responding to the outcome rather than to the cause. Suspension really doesn’t work to change kids’ behavior. It just gives the teacher a bit of short- term relief.

Better aggressive (yes aggressive) language skills could circumvent the aggressive acting out behaviors.

The little buggers and the big kids are better off in school.

TUESDAY, JULY 30, 2024

A Failure by 3rd Grade

A Failure by 3^rd Grade

Generally, kids are fairly successful readers with good word attack skills by the end of third grade. Good thing too, because in fourth grade reading begins to be used to acquire information in other subject areas.

But what happens to kids who are not successful readers by the end of third grade. Well, that depends on whom you ask.

Some folks believe those children should pass on to fourth grade and receive remedial work to catch up on those reading skills. Other people have taken a different approach.

There is a very strong movement to retain children in 3^rd grade if they are not up to grade standard in reading by that time. The wisdom behind this approach is that the children will learn more both from the repeat and from increased maturity. A policy to retain third graders in 3^rd grade was presented to the Maryland State Board of Education at its recent meeting. There were both strong support and strong concerns.

Those in support of the measure argued that without basic reading skills, children would not progress in the other academic areas as they moved into the intermediate grades. It was also argued that some children perhaps because of immaturity or just needing more time would do better if they had another run at basic reading.

Folks in opposition to the plan countered that it wasn’t the kids’ fault if they failed to gain the required skills in reading. It could be lack of support from parents. Or it could be poor teaching on the part of the teacher. Maybe both. Why make the children suffer for the failure of others.

Both sides argued that their position would create more high school graduates. The side for retaining said that sending children into fourth grade with good reading would ensure future academic success and thereby foster graduation.

The side against retaining said that failure at such a young age would forever embarrass the child and make school a place they would want to get out of and make him/her always too old for each grade peer group.

Then there was the elephant in the room. What if a second run at third grade didn’t work either? How many times would a child be retained.

Maryland is about to be knee deep in the “science of reading”, a method that puts heavy emphasis on phonic-based word attack. In the plans, for children to be retained there is no mention of switching to a different method for the rerun, just exactly that, a re-run of what failed the previous year.

Whatever your reasoning, eight years old seems very young to be a failure.

TUESDAY, JULY 23, 2024

Would be nice if you stopped by?

The rate of chronic absenteeism in Baltimore City schools has dropped to 45% and they feel they are making progress. Individuals with chronic absenteeism get lower grades, lower test scores, and lower graduation rates. But it isn’t just the individual that is impacted. When half of a class is absent, the teacher can hardly afford to move forward with the curriculum material. Lessons are repeated and the kids who did come to school have to suffer the repeats.

In Baltimore City, charter schools and magnet schools had the lowest rates of chronic absenteeism.

What’s the reason? First of all, these schools tend to be smaller. Smaller schools have teachers with better connections to kids. Never mind that despite all of the evidence regarding the benefits of smaller schools, we are still building bigger ones. Students with connections to their teachers feel wanted and understood, and they often are. Also by coming to school more, students build relationships with their peers so they want to come to school for the socialization. Schools that had admission criteria also had lower absenteeism.

One the other hand, schools with large populations had the highest absentee rates. Alternative schools regularly have the highest number of chronic absenteeism. One alternative school in the City had a chronic absentee rate of 95%!! What was the point of having the school?

Students are missing school to take care of younger siblings, earn money to help their families or they just don’t think it’s valuable for their future. There are also gang issues so that some kids don’t feel safe at school.

One strategy that is very expensive is calling or visiting the homes of kids who are chronically absent. One school starts calling kids homes and then follows up with a visit after 3 days of absence. Some schools offer rewards for good attendance. But overall, the most the most significant factors and check-ins at home AND check ins at school. Attendance plans that require students to check in at school with a preferred adult.

Progress is s l o w. And it’s being made. The question is, can the schools meet the added expense along with the rest of the higher budget expectations.

COVID gave kids an excuse to stay home, now we need to give them a reason to stop by. Who knows with enough buy-in they might enjoy it.

TUESDAY, JULY 16, 2024

Do you need an ID for that?

Do You Need an ID for that?

People with developmental disabilities are seven times more likely to have a negative encounter with law enforcement than are typical people according to the U.S. Department of Justice. Add that to the fact that law enforcement receives little to no training on the best ways to interact with these individuals AND they often cannot identify that a disability even exists. Many of these disabilities are invisible to the untrained eye.

It is not unusual for people with disabilities and particularly people with disabilities of color to receive inappropriate treatment from law enforcement. There have even been instances of accidental death when law enforcement over reacts to what is typical behavior for someone on the autism spectrum.

One solution to this problem is the issuance of an ID card indicating that the individual has a disability that is invisible to the eye but is just as real. The idea being proposed to the state legislatures is that drivers’ licenses be marked with a code indicating the disability in the case of a traffic stop. And that an official ID card be developed to show law enforcement if stopped in other situations. Proponents of the bill are VERY clear that if passed the process should be entirely voluntary.

The idea has received a great deal of support but there are questions being offered. One of the first questions is whether having either the ID or the noted drivers’ license will require the expense of a medical exam. Another issue is will acknowledging that an individual has a disability prevent him or her from getting the license. People were also concerned that the ID cards could be easily duplicated and that a number of people would benefit that should not. There was also the concern that if the designation were to be on a driver’s license there would be a requirement for a medical exam prior to receiving a license.

The people who are strongly advocating for this opportunity say that the important element is that it be entirely voluntary; therefore, if the designation was too onerous on the person, then they could choose not to participate. There was also the concern that this would be another benefit available only to those people who could afford it and that many people with disabilities are among the lower income strata of society.

The bill did not get out of committee in the 2024 Maryland legislative session. Advocates are pushing hard for it to move towards passage in the 2025 session. Maybe soon there will be an ID for that.

TUESDAY, JULY 9, 2024

The Strike is on!

The Strike is On

What union president receives a salary greater than that of the President of the United States or the Governor of Maryland? It is probably surprising but that union is the National Education Association or NEA. The union that represents over 3 million teacher members. It seems the folks that work for the Union believe that their employer has violated the rules and has filed a complaint with the National Labor Relations Board. It has also gone out on strike.

Employees for the Union have formed a union to protest the treatment they are receiving from the Union. 😅 The staff union say that the Union has wrongly halted overtime pay for holidays and it is contracting out over fifty million dollars worth of work that should have gone to full-time staff. The NEA union calls for a strike when local school districts do that, now they are doing what they charge against others.

The NEA is in a pickle. Their convention was supposed to have been held this month. Wanting to avoid the embarrassment of the NEA asking union members to cross a picket line of its own union workers, the NEA threatened to go to a virtual convention. President Biden canceled his scheduled appearance. Lots of delegates also canceled their intent to attend.

The Union itself has strayed from its stated intent of supporting education and teachers and has begun to engage in progressive political speak. Some Union members are demanding the NEA call for a cease fire in Gaza. There is conflict between the Union, Union workers and Union members.

It is interesting to see the rank-and-file union workers calling out the well-paid Union bosses for collective-bargaining abuses. The Union membership might be learning something about their leadership’s values when it comes to the leadership’s pocketbooks. The President of the United States earns $400,000 a year. The Governor of Maryland earns $150,000 a year. But if you were president of the NEA, you would receive a salary of $495,787! And there are other perks too.

Union employees are calling for fair labor relations. Is no one worried about falling public schools? No wonder The Strike is ON!

TUESDAY, JUNE 25, 2024

Can we still afford special education

Can we still afford special education?

As more children qualify for special education, more school systems are deciding the provision of special education is a hill too high to climb.

In the 22-23 school year a record 7.5 million students accessed special education services in the United States.

Several factors are playing into the increase. The pandemic left many kids at home with parents. Sometimes the parents were doing school lessons and were discovering that the issues in learning their kids had were very real; they weren't all the teacher's or school's fault. Secondly, the stigma for some disabilities is going down. Autism spectrum disabilities are on the rise as are people on the spectrum being shown as very smart and maybe just a bit quirky so what’s so bad about that.

Schools don’t have the money to provide the services and when they do, they can’t find the teachers. Three in five special ed teachers leave in the first five years. Then there is the issue of all those wonderful federal pandemic funds that are going away.

In Maryland the Blueprint for Maryland’s Future is pumping lots of new state money into local school systems. But that is not a free lunch. The new money may only be spent in specific areas for the purposes of legislation. And money begets money so, the local jurisdictions are required to increase their spending in those areas beyond the Maintenance of Effort amounts already established.

There is only so much money to go around. Somethings are happening in Maryland that have seldom happened before. Teachers are being laid off. From the smaller systems such as Cecil County to the largest one, Montgomery county. Programs are being cut; positions are eliminated in the Baltimore metro area as well. All of this means involuntary teacher transfers if teachers want to keep their jobs.

Money being pumped into school systems is being allocated on a per pupil basis and that money goes to the schools where the kids are. The money is not for general overhead to run the district.

Special education is more expensive than general ed. Now that there is less money all around, the hard question of can we still afford special education has left the whisper stage and is being asked out loud.

TUESDAY, JUNE 11, 2024

We can end dropouts right now

All men are not created equally. And neither are students. So why is it that we insist on pushing every child through the same knot holes in order to get a high school diploma?

Baltimore City has been working very hard to get students who have dropped out during the pandemic and the virtual not instruction to return to school. It is sending folks to homes and to student workplaces trying to convince them it is worth their time and energy to come back to school.

But is it really? What will they get in high school that will change their lives besides a high school diploma. For a teenager, a high school diploma is in never never land and now they can get $15 an hour in the service sector and that looks like big time earning.

If they return to school, they can get algebra 1, Shakespeare, and another foreign language. What exactly are they going to do with that? How will that make their lives better?

We talk a good game about college and career readiness. In reality all we are preparing students for is college and there are lots of kids whose abilities and interests do not require college.

We need to drop many of the academic classes that we currently require kids to take. Students need to learn to read and write grammatically correct English, would be good if they could speak it too. They need some heavy coursework in financial literacy and civics so they can learn how the government is run and how to avoid being scammed by bad actors who want their money. Current history would be valuable as well. Some science in how to manage and take care of the body that they live in. Beyond that we need to start training kids for the jobs that are out there right now. For some those jobs require college. But for lots of other jobs, no college required.

Look around at the jobs that are going begging. Georgia has an entire training program to prepare kids for the TV production industry. Georgia is about to outpace California in that field. Why, because they have skilled labor and they are preparing more and better skilled support staff for all of the theatre union performers.

Maryland has huge vacancies in the construction trades and in commercial drivers. We should be teaching students those skills and they might see some purpose in coming back to school.

We could eliminate dropouts in just a few years if we made school relevant to the students and to their interests and skill set instead of pandering to the politicians who are in white collar jobs that don’t require dirty hands. Let’s take a giant step backwards to the olden days when there were academic (heading to college), commercial (heading to the business world) and vocational-technical (heading to skilled employment) diplomas. More students finished high school because it was worth their time.