Mom upset over son's education before Kensington murder-suicide | Emily Babay | Local | Washington Examiner

...Jensvold was upset over educational options for Barnhard, who suffered from attention-deficit disorder and learning disabilities, the teen's father told the Associated Press. He said Montgomery County wouldn't pay for Ben to attend a school for special needs children...

Read more at the Washington Examiner: http://washingtonexaminer.com/local/2011/08/mom-upset-over-sons-education-kensington-murder-suicide#.TjtoWXpbnEo.blogger#ixzz1U9hSm2Jf

And from WTOP news:

Jamie Barnhard told The Associated Press on Thursday that his son, Benjamin, had been accepted to a school in Montgomery County that helps children with special needs and learning disabilities. But he says the county public school system would not agree to pay tuition for their son to attend the school and participate in an individualized educational program there.

A county schools spokeswoman declined to comment.

Special Education Students in MCPS

Information below taken from an extract off the MSDE website using the latest MSA data for 2011 which was made public June 29, 2011.

Schools shown on this list did NOT make Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) for Special Education students in the 2010/2011 school year.

Bob Astrove

School Name - Subject Title

A. Mario Loiederman Middle Math
A. Mario Loiederman Middle Reading
Arcola Elementary Math
Argyle Middle Math
Argyle Middle Reading
Bel Pre Elementary Math
Benjamin Banneker Middle Math
Bethesda Elementary Math
Bethesda Elementary Reading
Briggs Chaney Middle Math
Briggs Chaney Middle Reading
Brookhaven Elementary Math
Burning Tree Elementary Math
Cabin John Middle School Math
Cabin John Middle School Reading
Cannon Road Elementary Math
Cannon Road Elementary Reading
Captain James E. Daly Elementary Math
Captain James E. Daly Elementary Reading
Clopper Mill Elementary Math
Clopper Mill Elementary Reading
Col. E. Brooke Lee Middle Math
Eastern Middle School Math
Eastern Middle School Reading
Forest Oak Middle Math
Forest Oak Middle Reading
Francis Scott Key Middle Math
Francis Scott Key Middle Reading
Gaithersburg Middle Math
Gaithersburg Middle Reading
Galway Elementary Math
Galway Elementary Reading
Georgian Forest Elementary Math
Highland Elementary Math
John T. Baker Middle School Math
Jones Lane Elementary Reading
Judith A. Resnik Elementary Math
Kemp Mill Elementary Math
Kemp Mill Elementary Reading
Lakelands Park Middle Math
Lakelands Park Middle Reading
Martin Luther King Jr. Middle Math
Martin Luther King Jr. Middle Reading
Montgomery Village Middle School Math
Montgomery Village Middle School Reading
Neelsville Middle Math
Neelsville Middle Reading
Newport Mill Middle Math
Parkland Middle Math
Parkland Middle Reading
Ridgeview Middle Math
Roberto W. Clemente Middle Math
Roberto W. Clemente Middle Reading
Rosa M. Parks Middle Math
Rosemont Elementary Math
Sargent Shriver Elementary Math
Shady Grove Middle Math
Silver Spring International Middle Math
Silver Spring International Middle Reading
South Lake Elementary Math
Twinbrook Elementary Math
Twinbrook Elementary Reading
Waters Landing Elementary Math
Waters Landing Elementary Reading
Watkins Mill Elementary Math
Watkins Mill Elementary Reading
Whetstone Elementary Math
Whetstone Elementary Reading
White Oak Middle Math
White Oak Middle Reading
William B. Gibbs, Jr. Math
William B. Gibbs, Jr. Reading
Wood Acres Elementary Math

Springtime at Harvard!

Busy Busy Budget Season here in Montgomery County was just recently finished! Wouldn't you think that our highly-paid Superintendent Jerry Weast would be in town, feverishly reading through the budget books, looking for cost efficiencies and savings?

Instead, it appears he was at the Strategic Data Project at Harvard, giving a speech on:

Strategic Use of Data: Challenges and Opportunities in K-12 Education
Speaker: Jerry Weast, Superintendent, Montgomery County Public Schools
Wednesday, May 18, 2011

Wonder if he mentioned MCPS' own data from the Office of Shared Accountability that showed that student test scores tanked once he began the closure of the secondary learning centers?

A Teacher's Epiphany: Caught up in a world that does not look for the strengths they do have...

Washington Post's The Answer Sheet:
Special ed arts teacher walks in students' shoes


Pamela Michaels has worked for 28 years with at-risk special education students in four schools. She developed two art programs in schools for students with learning disabilities and taught numerous subjects, including Spanish and music. After years working with learning disabled students, Michaels suffered her own disability--severe hearing loss--that helped her gain a new understanding of the challenges her students had faced throughout the years. Here is her story.

By Pamela Michaels

...So much is written about the academic difficulties that students with learning differences have; not enough is shared about their creative strengths, nor the significant courage they exhibit by just showing up to school every day...

Five years later, I went deaf in one ear and started to develop some serious communication issues of my own and, simultaneously, I began to see, hear and feel things through the eyes of my students...


...I would like to ask readers to remember some of my points when you read about "at-risk" youth or "lazy" kids. Most are not lazy. They are caught up in a world that does not look for the strengths they do have...

Parents conflicted over superintendent's tenure | Washington Examiner

Parents conflicted over superintendent's tenure Washington Examiner

...Councilman Phil Andrews, the parent of a special needs student, said Weast's 2007 decision to shut down "learning centers," where certain special-ed students received a more tailored education, was the most harmful of his tenure.

"I think it was a huge mistake, and the negative consequences are already inherent," Andrews said.

Breaking News: Monocacy Parents Save School

This evening, a unanimous MCPS Board of Education rejected Superintendent Jerry Weast's sudden announcement to close Monocacy Elementary School.

Superintendent Weast's recommendation to close the school had been based on surprise enrollment data and a timeline that would have closed the school by next summer.

Board members rejected Superintendent Weast's proposal based on its violation of MCPS' Core Values and its failure to follow the Baldridge process for community involvement.  The proposal was seen as "disrespectful" to the community and creating an "awkward" situation for Board members. 

Board member Berthiaume made the point that long term decisions should not be made in order to support short term operating budget savings.

Board member Barclay said that these types of decisions "erode the trust the community has in us" and alluded to the surprise announcement made a few years ago to close programs. (That would have been Weast's surprise announcement to close the Secondary Learning Centers and the Kingsley Wilderness Center.)

UPDATE:  Video - Barclay: "I see a train wreck"

Tip of the Day for Dr. Weast

Many of us who follow local education politics in Montgomery County Education know how much our Superintendent, Dr. Jerry Weast, adores Harvard University. Look on the Montgomery County Public School's website, and you will see accolades and joint initiatives with the Cambridge, Massachusetts institution.

So, here is a management tip from HBR that should be of interest to the top brass at Carver. It's called: "Before You Call it "New and Improved," Be Sure it Really Is." Here is my favorite part:

Before you roll out a new service, feature, or product under the "new and improved" moniker, be sure to understand whether it is something customers want. Evaluate new innovations through the lens of the market — not just the lens of your organization.

While MCPS is "rethinking" GT identification, learning centers, high school plus, or [readers should insert their own favorite tossed MCPS program here], wouldn't it be nice if Dr. Weast and the Board of Education actually considered its customers?

Thanks Harvard, for the Tip of the Day. Next time you see the folks from MCPS, can you share some more of your wisdom?

988 people were right!

988 people signed a Petition to Save the Secondary Learning Centers in February of 2007. Those 988 people were opposed to the sudden, surprise announcement to close these special education programs in Montgomery County Public Schools.

Turns out, those 988 people had valid concerns.

The closing of the MCPS Secondary Learning Centers DID violate MCPS policy.
Read the State Board of Education decision here.

The closing of the MCPS Secondary Learning Centers DID evidence a lack of preparation. Read the MCPS report here.

Those 988 people are a problem! They did a better job of understanding MCPS Policy than the Board of Education, and a better job of understanding how important preparation is to a major program change in a school system. And so, the MCPS Board of Education went on a "retreat" on Friday, May 8, 2009, to discuss how to deal with those 988 people. From the "retreat" agenda:

How can “reframing the terms of engagement” with our community, including both our vocal critics and our “silent” constituents, help us to move from where we are now, to where we want to be, in a way that is aligned with (“stays true to”) our core values?

Don't expect to read the minutes from this "retreat" to find out how the Board answered this question. The two year Navarro Board of Education didn't put out minutes from retreats, and the Brandman Board of Education hasn't put out any from its first January retreat either.

Maybe instead of "reframing the terms of engagement" the Board of Education should just start listening to what parents and guardians are saying, and start discussing program changes in public, at the Board table, before the changes are made.
Petition Slc

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Mason Mum at SEAC Meeting

At the March 26 meeting of the Special Education Advisory Committee, the Montgomery County Public Schools Director of Special Education, Gwen Mason, informed the committee that she would not answer any questions concerning the evening's discussion topic – the Office of Shared Accountability Report on the Closure of the Secondary Learning Centers. Ms. Mason stated plainly to those in attendance, including many parents and Board of Education member Phil Kauffman, that they could ask questions, and she would write them down, but she would not answer them. Ms. Mason went further to say that she had been advised to deploy this strategy. When challenged, Ms. Mason refused to identify who within the MCPS administration had provided that advice. Ms. Mason went further to state that she had discussed this approach, relying only upon one way public communication, with the current President of the Board of Education, Shirley Brandman. A member of the Advisory Committee spoke this morning to Ms. Brandman. Ms. Brandman claimed that Ms. Mason's conversation with her was only in passing while they were both at a conference. Furthermore, it was Ms. Brandman’s understanding that while Ms. Mason may be unable to answer some of the questions, Ms. Mason would attempt to be as responsive as possible. Two years ago when the closure of this major special education program, the Secondary Learning Centers, was first approved by the Board of Education, there was a major negative public reaction, and legal action, specifically centered around the lack of public input concerning the decision. Since that time the Board of Education has claimed to make improved communication with the Disability Community a focus area, and pledged to do better. Based upon Ms. Mason's performance last night, it is clear that there is a major disconnect between those wishes of the Board of Education and the School System Administration. One cynic wonders whether Mason's action in refusing to answer questions about the Learning Center report is specifically to avoid talking about the rampant problems with the new model until after Spring IEP season is finished. And of course, some of the first questions for Mason, when she decides she's good and ready to answer questions, are (1) "Why was the report 'sat on' for six months after it was finished before being released to the community?" and (2) "When BOE member Laura Berthiaume specifically asked for a copy of this report before the vote on the next year's budget, why wasn't it released to the public at that time?" ----complied by report from Bob Astrove

Jerry Weast's Budget Video

For everyone who has followed the issue of the Secondary Learning Centers being phased out and closed:

As you may know, this year Superintendent Jerry Weast did not have the big budget presentation at Rockville High School (complete with taxpayer-purchased poinsettias). Instead, he did a video presentation. CLICK HERE to watch the Superintendent's video of his budget sales pitch is featured on the MCPS website.

It is a short video, only three or four minutes, but interestingly, during the discussion of the employee unions who agreed to forego their cost-of-living increase in order that MCPS can serve 2800 more students, a clip of a student, working at a computer with an adult, is shown.

How ironic, Dr. Weast! Did your video editors realize that the clip is an old one of a SECONDARY LEARNING CENTER STUDENT at Walter Johnson (the very program you are trying to phase out, and close)!

Did your video editors realize that the clip of the secondary learning center student was shot in the "Loft" at Walter Johnson....one of the unique qualities of the secondary learning center at Walter Johnson that enabled students to have access to assistive technology, and ongoing adult support?

The "Loft" was the unique thing about Walter Johnson and its Learning Center that made the program so different than inclusion programs at other high schools. The "Loft" in fact is a model that is used in college settings with students who continue to need accommodations, assistive technology, scribes, quiet test rooms, etc.

So, Dr. Weast, you use a video clip of a successful Learning Center student, in the Loft, doing well, in a program that you are trying to phase out and close in this year's budget.

How do I know this?

The student in your budget video is my son, who is now a junior in college on the Dean's List.

Lyda Astrove

Report: Special ed integration fails expectations

by Leah Fabel Examiner Staff Writer

In the Montgomery County schools, phasing out of segregated classrooms for students with significant learning disabilities has been met with a districtwide report raising serious questions about its success.
The report showed that 100 percent of the students in transition out of the segregated classrooms scored at the lowest level on the Maryland state math exam, and 81 percent of them fared equally poorly on the reading portion...A mandatory training for teachers receiving special-needs students into regular classrooms saw little more than 50 percent attendance... (Click here to continue reading Examiner article.)

Read Parents' Coalition of Montgomery County, Maryland blog articles on Secondary Learning Centers Report.

"One-Size-Fits-Nobody"

Testimony given February 23, 2009 to MCPS Board of Education by Eric Marx, Co-President of Gifted & Talented Association of Montgomery County, MD

Good evening.

As Co-President of the Gifted and Talented Association of Montgomery County, I strongly urge you to include in the Committee on Special Populations' work plan a serious review of MCPS' failure to meet the educational needs of gifted and talented and high-achieving students.

Second, I also implore you to postpone the Policy Committee's consideration of Policy IOA until that review has been completed.

It's been more that two years since the Board received the DSAC Report on Gifted and Talented Education -- two years without the Board even publicly addressing the report.

It's been almost a year since the Committee on Special Populations was given a mandate to address GT education -- almost a year without any action.

Many parents say that MCPS is currently gutting GT education -- that's not quite true. Outside of math, in most schools, there is virtually no GT education left to gut. Particularly in elementary and middle schools, the norm long ago became "one-size-fits-nobody."

Instead, MCPS is just attempting to gut the GT POLICY -- ironically, for no reason -- it has ignored the policy since it was adopted. Even under the current policy, MCPS has been more than able to make sure that, in most schools, "no child gets ahead."

In addition to being highly divisive, MCPS' plan to gut the GT Policy would be a repeat of the travesty of the secondary learning centers' closings -- again based only on MCPS' disingenuous promises to provide instructional services that never quite happen -- here as well, there will continue to be no real differentiation in local schools, and no appropriate curricula and training, and real students will really suffer.

This time, please study first and act second, instead of the other way round.

Thank you.

What MCPS said THEN vs. what they say NOW

CLICK HERE to see a question and answers sheet about the phase-out of the secondary learning centers that made the following promises:

"During the summer of 2007, 3 days of mandatory training will be provided to general and special education teachers who will be working with grade 6 students coming from learning centers. (page 2)

Did parents of the transitioned students have a right to expect that "mandatory" meant "mandatory?" Apparently not! See page 17 of the OLA report on the LC phase-out, where it is reported:

"An item on the survey of classroom professionals asked teachers if they had attended the mandatory summer training. Sixty one of the 132 Grade 6 teachers who responded to the survey indicated that they did not attend the mandatory summer training...." (page 17, OSA report)

And what happens when classroom professionals either don't go to the "mandatory training" or the training is not productive?

Almost half of all the survey respondents rate themselves as only "somewhat prepared" to meet the needs of these students. See Table F-5, on page 93 of the OSA report:

"How prepared are you to:"

Implement assistive technology in your classroom: Somewhat prepared: 56%
Implement co-teaching strategies: somewhat prepared: 45%
Provide differentiated instruction: somewhat prepared: 47%
Understand characteristics of disabilities: somewhat prepared: 47%
Implement behavioral strategies: somewhat prepared: 47%

Did parents and students have the right to expect that the receiving classroom professionals would be "fully prepared" to implement assistive technology, and provide differentiated instruction? Advocates urged the Board of Education to delay the plan, saying that three days of training were not enough. Apparently, the advocates were correct.

Differentiated Instruction Doesn't Happen, MCPS Reports

When Superintendent Jerry Weast, and Board of Education members Nancy Navarro and Shirley Brandman moved full steam ahead with their plan to phase out and close the Secondary Learning Centers, parents of affected students were given lots of promises about how regular classroom teachers would be trained to provide "differentiated instruction" in order to meet the needs of students whose reading abilities could be two or more years below grade level.

Promises, Promises.

The Montgomery County Public Schools Office of Shared Accountability has now released their report on the evaluation of the phase out of the secondary learning centers. Page 14 of their report contains this electrifying statement:

"With the inclusion of the transition students, it was expected that teachers would need to provide more differentiated instruction (e.g., different activities, formats, or outcomes). Only 27% of the grade 6 classes and 27% of the grades 7-11 classes displayed any differentiated activities at any time during the lesson. Only 8% of the grade 6 classes and none of the grade 7-11 classes included differentiated activities throughout the lesson."

Even worse, knowing that the students in their classrooms did not have grade-level reading abilities, less than one third of classroom professionals responding to the OSA survey reported that their students had access to materials re-written at an appropriate reading level (page 15).

According to the OSA, "very little differentiation was observed in classrooms." (page 32)

And what was the outcome of the Weast-Navarro-Brandman plan?

Maryland School Assessment scores (MSA scores) tanked for these students. According to the report,

"Achievement of the transitioned students on standardized tests was weaker than that of students with similar disabilities. Their mean scores were lower than comparison students on the MAP-R reading test and on the MSA tests in Mathematics and reading. Also, a higher percentage of transitioned than comparison students scored at the basic level on each MSA test. (page 33).

It is time to end the experimentation with our students and make available a full continuum of special education options once more.

Lyda Astrove

Serious Problems with Phase Out of Secondary Learning Centers

The long awaited Montgomery County Public Schools report on the phase out of the Special Education - Secondary Learning Centers has finally been released and presents a picture far from that of a glowing success.

MCPS made the decision to close the Secondary Learning Centers two years ago, despite loud community protest. The decision was made without community input or involvement, using a process later found by the State Board of Education to have violated MCPS policy. This report is the first to look at how well the phase out of the Learning Centers has progressed.

Among the group of students transitioned from the Learning Centers to their home schools in 2007/2008, despite all the focus and extra attention showered upon this group, fewer than 1 in 5 achieved proficiency on the statewide assessment (MSA). By contrast, among the group of disabled students MCPS selected as comparable more than ½ achieved proficiency and 1 in 14 scored as advanced on the same assessment. In other, words the transitioned Learning Center students performed much worse than expected.

Given these test scores we should not be surprised to read from the accompanying survey of teachers that almost half of 6th grade teachers failed to attend the MANDATORY summer training designed to support this program closure. The report included no information as to how this failure of management and oversight has been addressed.

Further, direct classroom observations by assessors reveal differentiated instructional activities were found in only 1 out of 4 of the observed Grade 6 classrooms. The report also noted widespread failure to take advantage of technology, including the Kurzweil Readers.

The MCPS report noted multiple times that co-teaching was not properly implemented. In addition, 7 out of 10 Guidance Counselors and 1 in 3 Principals indicated they received little or no support for the inclusion of the transitioned Students.

In the one apparent bright spot parents were quite pleased with the Case Management services provided by the Central Office. However a very low response rate was noted in the report, as well as staff resorting to telephone calls in order to pump up this response rate. Such practices may seriously bias survey results.

Of particular interest in assessing the quality of Case Management only 36% of teachers indicated the Case Manager attended the IEP meeting, while 95% of parents responded that the Case Manager was at the IEP meeting. This can only mean that parents must have been confused or misinformed as to who was providing this central office case management. In stark contrast to the parents positive impression, the survey of staff shows sizeable dissatisfaction with the central office Case Management and support.

But don’t just take my read of this report. Check it out for yourself;

http://www.montgomeryschoolsmd.org/departments/sharedaccountability/reports/2009/LC%20Transition%20Final%20Report%20Feb%2009%2009.pdf

Bob Astrove