My last post, Shadow Institutionalization, showed that the system of crisis containment is costly and leaves individuals lacking in options. The majority of people with significant intellectual and developmental disabilities live at home with family, or with family-provided supports. Most families aren’t told about a missing piece in community care.  ICF/IID stands for Intermediate Care … Continue reading From institutions to ICF/IID: What actually changed?

Infrastructure is the underlying framework for the resources that governments provide. Institutionalization means that some people, especially people with significant disabilities, have a different and limited access to housing, healthcare, education, work, and community life.  Instead of large state run institutions, institutionalization is now broken into smaller pieces. Medicaid has become proxy funding infrastructure. Provider … Continue reading Shadow Institutionalization

Rights vs Reality.  Disability services feel so unpredictable for adults because public education is an entitlement, and adults services are not.  An entitlement means if a person meets the eligibility criteria, the government has a legal obligation to fund the benefit or service. Social Security retirement and Medicare for eligible beneficiaries are also examples of … Continue reading Entitled to litigate at your discretion

After many different assessments, by the time my daughter turned two, she was diagnosed with autism, communication impairment and intellectual disability. She couldn’t reliably express her needs, or respond to questions or demands.  The only meaningful verbal sounds she made were reciting the alphabet and counting to ten. She could engage in a back-and-forth with … Continue reading The reading emergencies

When Congress passed IDEA in 1975, the assumption was that general education would successfully teach most children to read. Special Education existed for students whose disabilities prevented them from learning through standard instruction. It could be said that special education wasn’t originally designed to teach everyone to read. As explicit decoding instruction became less common, … Continue reading Wait to fail: When reading deficits become disability 

Literacy and disability policy have historically moved in sync, often compounding system failures. Looking at the history of reading instruction and special education helps illustrate the larger picture.  The 1970s: The right to read era. Our government funded the television show The Electric Company as an intervention to prevent the third grade reading cliff. They … Continue reading Fifty years of reading instruction and special education

City stabilization funds are often compared to a family’s rainy day fund, intended for unforeseen expenses. An actual savings account has more flexibility. If a family is saving for a new car and an unexpected medical expense comes up, they can still access their funds. City stabilization funds have restrictions on what the money can … Continue reading More than a reserve

If the laws that guarantee people with disabilities the right to public education and to live in the community are no longer meaningfully enforced, do these rights still exist?  There are 7.5 Million current students with IEPs, about 15% of public school students, and about 70 million disabled adults in the United States. Historically, enforcement … Continue reading What if we lose disability rights?

“We aren’t born to read — we’re born to speak. Reading is a code that can be taught,” Dorrie said. “I would like to see all Northampton students be able to read by third grade. What happens when they hit third grade and they’re really far behind, it’s called the ‘Matthews Effect’: the poor stay … Continue reading Data predicts student outcomes. It shouldn’t decide them.

Dear City Council,  It’s budget season, and again there are common misconceptions about school funding.  If children with high needs are prevalent state and nation wide, why is this a local government responsibility?  Government exists to take care of the people.  These are our neighbors: economically disadvantaged students, English language learners, students with disabilities and … Continue reading Common misconceptions about school funding