TN House IEA Bill (Special Ed Vouchers)

These are notes from the final House debate on the IEA bill (sometimes called IEP vouchers), on April 22, 2015, and is not meant to serve as minutes or a full transcript.

A list of those voting for and against is available at the bottom of the page.


 

Representative Calfee asks whether this is a voucher bill.
Representative Moody says it is not.

Calfee asks whether there is a list of approved vendors.
Moody says there is no list of approved vendors.

Calfee asks about established rules for vendors
There is no list of rules for vendors. The sponsor, Moody, says she “believes there will be” rules.

Calfee: “Is there a plan, for when the child returns to the school system, and the money has been spent?”
Moody says that giving the money in quarterly installments will solve that.

Representative Matthew Hill Notes that it comes out to $550 per month – and that you “cannot get hardly any services” for that.

Hill spoke with a parent who is spending $20,000 per year, out of pocket, in ADDITION to public school services. He is concerned that parents will see this as a “golden ticket” and take students out, later returning to the school system, and causing the child to possibly regress in their therapy.

Moody says 1-5% of eligible students choose to use the program… noting statistics, studies… but NEVER says that anything shows how it impacts the CHILDREN.

Questions about how these disabilities in the list were chosen.
Moody says Gresham’s research analyst chose the 7 disabilities listed.

Was the health department consulted? No.

Several from Moody’s party are saying things like: “You’re my friend, and I support you, but I can’t support this bill.”

Representative Roger Kane calls this bill a “supplemental health plan.”

Representative Harry Brooks discusses mainstreaming. He says that sometimes the child is in an exclusive environment, and sometimes he/she is slowly moved from an exclusive environment to a less exclusive environment. Brooks says that he knows a parent who is traveling from Knoxville to Nashville, daily, for services. He says that, for services that are not offered, under IDEA, the parent can sue to get those services… and he wants to give that money to the parents, to avoid lawsuits for the LEAs!

[It sounds like Brooks would rather have parents sign away their rights, under IDEA, than either give them the resources they need, or risk a lawsuit for the school district.]

Representative Andy Holt: “This is a great opportunity, for two classes of people…” parents, students, and those who have been called into this ministry, of working with these students.

Representative Hulsey asks what parents are waiving.
Moody can’t answer him.
Rep Roger Kane begins reading the bill out loud.

Representative Joe Pitts – asks HOW individual buying power allows a parent to get more services than as part of a group.
Moody says that it is because parents will look far and wide.

Pitts is concerned that we are subjecting our most vulnerable citizens to predatory companies, since parents are also required to waive their rights, under IDEA.

Moody’s answer is that they will be sure “that kind of company” doesn’t get on the approved list, although she doesn’t have an approved list.

Representative Courtney Rogers (Goodlettville) compares public schools to “State control” and says that she has seen more freedom in her studies, as a Soviet analyst.

Representative Forgety is reminded of a country song: “There ain’t no good guys; there ain’t no bad guys, and we just disagree.” He talks about the law that requires inclusion and mainstreaming, and research showing that students flourish, when they are included. He says that parents know best, and that is why the law includes the IEP, with parents as the major player in that process

Forgety notes that the program in Florida has NO data on students in a similar program and that has no accountability.

Moody says that teachers are “very frustrated, working with these children,” and that teachers say the students would do better in another setting.
[What a terrible characterization of teachers.]


 

Passed 52. Nay 43.

Ayes – 52

Brooks, H.
Brooks, K.
Butt
Carter
Casada
Daniel
DeBerry
Dunn
Durham
Faison
Goins
Gravitt
Hawk
Haynes
Hazlewood
Hill, T.
Holsclaw
Holt
Howell
Johnson
Kane
Kumar
Littleton
Lundberg
Lynn
Marsh
Matheny
Matlock
McCormick
McManus
Moody
Pody
Powers
Ragan
Reedy
Rogers
Sargent
Sexton, J.
Smith
Sparks
Spivey
Terry
Todd
Van Huss
Weaver
White, D.
White, M.
Wilburn
Williams
Wirqau
Womick
Speaker Harwell

NOES – 43

Akbari
Alexander
Armstrong
Beck
Byrd
Calfee
Camper
Carr
Clemmons
Coley
Cooper
Doss
Dunlap
Eldridge
Farmer
Favors
Fitzhugh
Forgety
Gilmore
Halford
Hardaway
Hill, M.
Hulsey
Jones
Keisling
Lollar
Love
McDaniel
Miller
Mitchell
Parkinson
Pitts
Powell
Ramsey
Sanderson
Shaw
Shepard
Stewart
Swann
Towns
Travis
Turner
Windle
Present, not voting: 0
Not voting:      4        Harrison         Lamberth         Jernigan,         E. Sexton, C.

2 comments to TN House IEA Bill (Special Ed Vouchers)

  • shannon

    I am very excited about the possibility of using this “voucher” program. My son is 5 but is developmentally only about 3. He is not ready for kindergarten in a large school (even though we love the special ed team there) and he needs WAY more than 3-4 part time days in an exclusive special ed setting (where he is now in our county). With this voucher, I will be able to put him in a small, happily integrated private school where he can learn at his own pace, spend his day with typical peers and have individual attention for meals and potty time. He may go back to the public school the following year or we may find a program that can accommodate him for another year before he returns.
    Parents who are educated advocates for their children know that there are individualized services they can get for their children outside of the public schools without having a fight a system and wait “60 days” while the school “collects data” to support adding in the services that the parent KNOWS the child needs NOW. It is a win- win situation!

    • JenOwen

      Sadly, that isn’t how this program works. Parents are required to sign away ALL of their child’s rights to services that the federal government included in IDEA. The purpose of IDEA was to protect students and ensure schools were required to supply appropriate services. However, once a parent accepts this payout, they also have to sign away those rights. There is NOTHING in the law that reinstates those rights when the parent realizes the money isn’t enough to cover all of the services that would have been supplied by the public school district and returns to the public school. When the child enrolls in public school, the parent has signed off that the school district is no longer responsible for supplying those services. The parent is fully responsible.

      The bill serves to do two things: to segregate special needs students from the general education population and to save money by giving parents a smaller amount than the school districts would otherwise spend to meet the needs of the child. It is a shameful way to trick parents into thinking they are doing something good for children, when it ends up doing exactly the opposite.

Leave a Reply

You can use these HTML tags

<a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <cite> <code> <del datetime=""> <em> <i> <q cite=""> <s> <strike> <strong>