@@@ Education lawsuits/ Carter case

[bronxgirl]

www.newyorker.com/news/annals-of-education/the-parents-who-fight-the-city-for-a-free-appropriate-public-education?fbclid=IwAR2lG58DLYvg23k0U_TrJYyfVU0q55Re9sE4PwQxAE5EoelzGPYnVygbzik 

We've had a few education posts recently and I found this article interesting. Although this article focuses on NYC public schools, I assume similar issues exists at other large metropolitan school districts.  I've heard of parents suing school districts for funding for special education, but I was unaware of the process and the term Carter Case.

[basilosaurus]

I'm not familiar with this case specifically, but when I lived in Hawaii there was a case of getting the state to pay for private education that the state could not provide.

In such a small and isolated state I assume this happens there frequently. But somehow this one case made my notice as a non parent and only there for a few years. The state paid, but it took apparently a lot of work.

I can somewhat related in a provider side. I managed one of 2 clinics allowed to prescribe a certain very necessary medication. We did telehealth whenever possible, but it necessitated a flight to first establish care. If people couldn't get a basic medication without flying, how are they going to access appropriate education for their child?

I'm sure this applies to a lot of rural America. And larger cities as well if you consider travel time.

[Jalapeñomel]

May 11, 2023 20:25:17 GMT -5 bronxgirl said:

www.newyorker.com/news/annals-of-education/the-parents-who-fight-the-city-for-a-free-appropriate-public-education?fbclid=IwAR2lG58DLYvg23k0U_TrJYyfVU0q55Re9sE4PwQxAE5EoelzGPYnVygbzik 

We've had a few education posts recently and I found this article interesting. Although this article focuses on NYC public schools, I assume similar issues exists at other large metropolitan school districts.  I've heard of parents suing school districts for funding for special education, but I was unaware of the process and the term Carter Case.

This is very common here.

At my school, we have several Yonkers kids who sued the district to attend a school that’s smaller, with smaller class sizes.

Schools are also required to provide busing for these SpEd students (and tangentially district students who attend private schools).

[imimahoney]

I work in a small district that is surrounded by wealthy towns that all pay very well.. my town does not. We've had a few families that I know of sue for an outside placement.

This year my school was unable to hire: 1 school psychologist, 1 specialized SPED teacher for our high risk students, 1 SPED teacher for more general population, and 1 speech pathologist.

I wouldn't be surprised if there were more law suits to come.

[sent]

Thanks for sharing. I've been hearing more about "hire a lawyer for your IEP" and I didn't understand why. This was a very informative article. I could empathize with parts of this as a Medicaid provider in my state. I feel for the social worker who took a risk to tell the mom about the lawyer. Sometimes I have kids whose cases get denied for treatment by their Medicaid HMO. I know they got denied because I know their HMO doesn't evaluate the kid's case fairly. I also know the kid would likely get covered if the family had a different HMO plan. The family is allowed to switch HMO plans at any time with no penalties, but I am ethically not supposed to suggest this to them. Also the part toward the end where the district gives vouchers for speech and occupational therapy but therapists don't accept them because the district pays too little and takes too long to pay their minuscule amount. Yup, that sounds accurate too for those of us who jump in and take Medicaid knowing it pays too little and can take too long while our colleagues say "I would never."

The part about "cosplay lawyer" who had to run to Ann Taylor Loft for outfits was funny. I decided like 5 minutes after I found out I was surprise pregnant that we had to leave NYC, one of the reasons being managing a kid through a small suburban school district would be simpler than the NYC public school system and the article acknowledged other parents do the same.

My conclusion is that I am really mad at my country that we are not focusing on giving the next generation their constitutional rights to education and instead obsessed with our constitutional right to guns.

[penguingrrl]

I had not heard that term, but we came close to suing to get our child placed in an out of district therapeutic school under that law, but right as we were about to hire a lawyer her autism diagnosis arrived and the school district offered the placement we wanted without a lawsuit (I suspect in NJ an autism diagnosis allows for other funding options). We have a tiny two-building K-8 district that couldn’t meet her needs. They tried to accommodate by putting her in a 5 person MD classroom, but it wouldn’t have solved the overwhelming number of people and noise in hallways, etc. nor would it have met her educational needs (she has agoraphobia, autism, selective mutism and ADHD, but no learning disabilities). In her current OOD placement there are 40 kids total and no more than 5 kids in a classroom, and 12 social workers to 40 kids, so there’s always a LCSW available for a kid in distress and everything about the environment is designed for kids with disabilities to thrive in a way a public school couldn’t do.

I’m fortunate that it didn’t take a lawsuit, and am on a fb page for parents with kids in these placements and stories I hear from other districts are awful. I don’t blame the districts, I blame a society that doesn’t value public education and doubly doesn’t value the disabled community at all. So many folks on there are in low income districts and their kids need help and their districts fight it despite it being obvious that the child is failing in so many ways. And most classroom teachers are absolutely not equipped to handle these kids, especially in an overcrowded classroom.

[Velar Fricative]

I’m an NYC public school parent (and very happy with my kids’ education, though they are in general education programs), am married to and related to many DOE teachers, and one relative is actually a DOE attorney who adjudicates cases like this.

Particularly with my attorney relative, he sees a mix of legitimate cases of where the DOE simply doesn’t have the resources to adequately educate a child, and one where it is clear the system is being gamed. There is a whole industry of suburban private school administrators and bus companies who work together to bring in Carter cases (in one partnership, a husband runs the private school and his wife runs the bus company to the school). They can charge whatever they want because they’ll get their money. And the relative sees that many cases come from white families in gentrifying neighborhoods where the public schools are considered “bad” for racist reasons. He ends up showing the judges that the DOE can indeed provide their children with the educations and services required in their community schools, but the families balk for what he suspects are racist reasons to ensure their kids can go to private school.

Not to mention, the DOE has a huge budget and some pretty reputable SpEd programs. I’ve known more than one family with children with special needs who move back to NYC from NJ because the DOE has more to offer than smaller school districts. I also have a really hard time believing that given how much better the DOE pays its teachers, there are more qualified teachers who would much rather make much less teaching in a private school for children with severe behavioral challenges when they can make more in similar settings (plus obtain valuable state pension benefits and have a strong union). There is a reason DOE teachers haven’t left en masse from education like in other areas - they are compensated pretty well here.

Flame away, but even if the cases in the article are legitimate, that’s not the case for everyone. Having said all that, one way to fix this is for the DOE to build out more specialized schools that can keep more taxpayer money within our public school system.

[msmerymac]

May 13, 2023 6:18:52 GMT -5 imimahoney said:

I work in a small district that is surrounded by wealthy towns that all pay very well.. my town does not. We've had a few families that I know of sue for an outside placement.

This year my school was unable to hire: 1 school psychologist, 1 specialized SPED teacher for our high risk students, 1 SPED teacher for more general population, and 1 speech pathologist.

I wouldn't be surprised if there were more law suits to come.

Tangentially, I heard that the University at Buffalo is working on AI speech language pathology applications to help address the shortage of SLPs. Which makes me sad in a way, since my grandmother was an SLP at an elementary school in suburban Buffalo, but hopefully that will help kids get what they need. 

[sent]

May 13, 2023 9:45:28 GMT -5 Velar Fricative said:

I’m an NYC public school parent (and very happy with my kids’ education, though they are in general education programs), am married to and related to many DOE teachers, and one relative is actually a DOE attorney who adjudicates cases like this.

Particularly with my attorney relative, he sees a mix of legitimate cases of where the DOE simply doesn’t have the resources to adequately educate a child, and one where it is clear the system is being gamed. There is a whole industry of suburban private school administrators and bus companies who work together to bring in Carter cases (in one partnership, a husband runs the private school and his wife runs the bus company to the school). They can charge whatever they want because they’ll get their money. And the relative sees that many cases come from white families in gentrifying neighborhoods where the public schools are considered “bad” for racist reasons. He ends up showing the judges that the DOE can indeed provide their children with the educations and services required in their community schools, but the families balk for what he suspects are racist reasons to ensure their kids can go to private school.

Not to mention, the DOE has a huge budget and some pretty reputable SpEd programs. I’ve known more than one family with children with special needs who move back to NYC from NJ because the DOE has more to offer than smaller school districts. I also have a really hard time believing that given how much better the DOE pays its teachers, there are more qualified teachers who would much rather make much less teaching in a private school for children with severe behavioral challenges when they can make more in similar settings (plus obtain valuable state pension benefits and have a strong union). There is a reason DOE teachers haven’t left en masse from education like in other areas - they are compensated pretty well here.

Flame away, but even if the cases in the article are legitimate, that’s not the case for everyone. Having said all that, one way to fix this is for the DOE to build out more specialized schools that can keep more taxpayer money within our public school system.

I don't think this is flameful. I was thinking while reading the article that this system is set up to be gamed in the exact way you described. Probably because workarounds at the expense of the government are just another thing about life in this area so my mind immediately went to that. Then the part came where the mayor said the system is being gamed but the lawyer said her cases were far from it so I wasn't sure which way to lean. 

I was impressed by some of the programs the city put in described in the article that are working but then disappointed to read about the busing problem. The lack of drivers for buses are a problem in the suburbs too. 

[basilosaurus]

Re more specialized schools mentioned above... I thought the trend was for more inclusion. Obviously that doesn't work for so many people as pp mentioned issues like noise. But how does that conflict play out in real life, not just in funding?

I briefly had to observe an inclusive 1st grade class. They had a cardboard dog house for the child to run to and hide. Apparently child, parents, teacher, specialist were on board with this plan. The teacher was a former roommate of my sister, and I talked with her about this because my brain was saying wtf.

It struck me as both odd and entirely reasonable. I used to hide under a teachers aides desk in a particularly difficult year and banished myself to the solo punishment desk (wtf that this existed) for long periods. This was accepted and for me necessary. But, there were obviously other major issues not addressed.

What is the trade off here between inclusion and appropriately addressing needs that maybe require exclusion?

[penguingrrl]

May 13, 2023 21:27:54 GMT -5 basilosaurus said:

Re more specialized schools mentioned above... I thought the trend was for more inclusion. Obviously that doesn't work for so many people as pp mentioned issues like noise. But how does that conflict play out in real life, not just in funding?

I briefly had to observe an inclusive 1st grade class. They had a cardboard dog house for the child to run to and hide. Apparently child, parents, teacher, specialist were on board with this plan. The teacher was a former roommate of my sister, and I talked with her about this because my brain was saying wtf.

It struck me as both odd and entirely reasonable. I used to hide under a teachers aides desk in a particularly difficult year and banished myself to the solo punishment desk (wtf that this existed) for long periods. This was accepted and for me necessary. But, there were obviously other major issues not addressed.

What is the trade off here between inclusion and appropriately addressing needs that maybe require exclusion?

It’s so hard, and the definition of “least restrictive environment “ is often bullshit in my experience. My son is in a mainstream classroom but recently mentioned that they often have him work in the hallway because other kids noises distract him and his stimming distracts other kids. So he’s in a gen Ed classroom except not really. But he doesn’t qualify for resource or MD classroom because he’s in the top tier groups for math and reading, so instead they send him to the hallway.

There’s no easy answer that meets all students needs. And the definitions for most/least restrictive are outright odd. And there’s little accommodation for kids who are academically gifted but also have disabilities that impact learning. And I know any parent with a kid who doesn’t fit the mold in one way or another is struggling to have their kids needs met because the American school system only works with kids inside a very narrow box (my eldest fits in that box and has thrived, my other two have not and it’s been a struggle that cost me my career).

[imimahoney]

May 13, 2023 21:27:54 GMT -5 basilosaurus said:

Re more specialized schools mentioned above... I thought the trend was for more inclusion. Obviously that doesn't work for so many people as pp mentioned issues like noise. But how does that conflict play out in real life, not just in funding?

I briefly had to observe an inclusive 1st grade class. They had a cardboard dog house for the child to run to and hide. Apparently child, parents, teacher, specialist were on board with this plan. The teacher was a former roommate of my sister, and I talked with her about this because my brain was saying wtf.

It struck me as both odd and entirely reasonable. I used to hide under a teachers aides desk in a particularly difficult year and banished myself to the solo punishment desk (wtf that this existed) for long periods. This was accepted and for me necessary. But, there were obviously other major issues not addressed.

What is the trade off here between inclusion and appropriately addressing needs that maybe require exclusion?

The students who have been out placed in my district fit into 2 categories...

1. The student's caretakers don't care about inclusion, they want the place where there student can succeed the most and a specialized private school might be that place.


Or 2. The student simply can not make it through a school day successfully. Students who fall into number 2 usually have so much trauma influencing their daily life that going to geometry class simply can not happen.

Inclusion can be a great model but it takes a lot of support and training. And sometimes even with the most trained teachers, a student can not succeed in an inclusion model.

[1yeartogo]

@@@i read this and it made me personally have all the feels. Without revealing too much we never went this route but basically ask each year if we make the right call staying public. Even now after years of IEPs/dxs it is always a battle with the school district and as soon as there are any improvements services are promptly cut.

Just this year we had a particular service cut when my kid was doing so well, they didn’t scale back just 100% cut. My kid had so many issues with in 4 week period after this that they had to do an emergency meeting and bring back the service more than he even had it before. They were never doing what was in his best interest it was 100% a way to try and save costs, and it was a huge fail. They have to realize not every kid is going to age out if services and support children so they can be successfully educated instead of looking at every opportunity to cut back.