Coffee, Chocolate, and Special Education
Welcome to Sunday Morning Coffee! Musings about educational opportunities for forgotten students and encouragement for the folks who serve them, all over your favorite cup o’joe (or whatever beverage gets you ready for your day). I’m enjoying my coffee this morning with some delicious chocolate leftovers from a chocolate walk I attended yesterday in Lilitz, PA. I’m not sure a Sunday morning gets better than this.
And that’s the whole bit about coffee and chocolate for this piece. I just added it to the title because I was afraid “Special Education” wouldn’t be sexy enough to lure you in. Now that you’re here, you might as well stay (hopeful smiley face insert here).
As a primer to this content, the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) is a federal mandate that ensures kiddos up to the age of 22 who have a diagnosed learning disability have everything they need to achieve a high school diploma. It levels the playing field for kids who, before IDEA, were kicked out or who dropped out of school. If you aren’t familiar with IDEA, it may surprise you to know that ALL students in the US are protected and served by IDEA, even if they’re incarcerated.
With one exception. We’ll get to that.
The struggle for correctional facilities to comply with IDEA is real. Mainly because they don’t understand the requirements and frequently because they don’t bother to understand them, thinking that penological needs usurp educational ones. Not so, actually. A federal mandate trumps state law and most definitely trumps organizational policy. Being compliant is pretty easy, but it seems so hard in some settings to get everyone on the same page.
The Local Education Agency in a correctional setting does all the same things they would do in a public school setting…there’s an IEP committee and an IEP for each eligible student, complete with what’s needed for each student to be successful. That committee has to be thoughtful about what’s possible in the correctional setting while absolutely meeting the student’s needs. This requires creativity, collaboration, and looking at every student individually instead of having blanket requirements on every IEP (thus the word Individual in IEP). Unless they’re also the LEA, the correctional facility generally has two jobs: provide access to the students at the times the LEA will serve them, and provide adequate space for the LEA to do their jobs. The other responsibilities of the facility are part of their daily duties: safety and security, and serving with compassion.
Seems straightforward. And easy. Success requires everyone working together, communicating, and following the law. So often, though, we see small and epic failures because one side or the other isn’t meeting the requirements, or someone thinks someone else should be doing more or less…these are systems failures that are easily rectified but frequently end up a court room, and the collateral damage are young people. Remember that since IDEA serves eligible students up to their 22nd birthday, many of these students are in adult prisons, where most people don’t think about “kids” still being eligible to get their high school diploma.
But they are eligible. And you can’t tell them they don’t have the opportunity. By federal law, you’re required to provide the services.
Unless you’re the Federal Bureau of Prisons, believe it or not. The irony is not lost on me, and I hope it’s not lost on you either. The ONLY place you are not covered under IDEA, a federal mandate, is if you’re incarcerated in a federal prison.
I’ll let you sit with that for a minute.
And after that minute, let’s raise our voices over the travesty of it.
If you’re an LEA providing services in a correctional setting, or you’re a correctional agency/facility working with an LEA providing services, and you need guidance, suggestions, or a compliance consultant, I’ve been on both sides of that fence to successfully provide high school diplomas to IDEA-eligible students. It’s not that difficult to come up with systems where everyone wins: the LEA, the correctional agency, and most importantly, the student. Contact me if you want to chat.
Back to my coffee and chocolate (see how I tied up the misleading title???). I hope you’re also having a sweet morning. Here’s to a great week where we all make the world a better place for each other!
