SPECIAL EDUCATION SPENDING REDUCTION TO NATIONAL MEDIAN COULD SAVE DISTRICTS $10 BILLION
Huffington Post | http://huff.to/TslPFc
09/05/2012 2:46 pm :: A study released Wednesday by the Thomas B. Fordham Institute has found that if high-spending public school districts reduced their special education staffing levels to align with the national median, the country could save $10 billion annually.
The study, authored by Managing Director at the District Management Council and former school superintendent Nathan Levenson, analyzed information -- including staffing patterns and spending -- from 1,411 public school districts representing 30 percent of the nation’s K-12 schoolchildren.
From there, Levenson’s team reduced the sample into 10 pairs of comparable districts in five states — Florida, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Ohio and Texas. In each pair, one district spent less on special education but boasted higher achievement levels, as measured by scores on the 2011 National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP). On average, the higher-achieving districts within the pairs placed 25 percent more special education pupils at the proficient level, while their lower-achieving counterparts spent 22 percent more on special ed, when adjusted for total student enrollment.
Overall, the study determined that spending and staffing for special education varies considerably more than it does for regular education, and this wide variation primarily stems from differences in staffing levels among districts, even when total enrollments are held constant.
According to the study, the “vast majority” of special education spending in districts goes toward staff, which represents as much as 95 percent of total special ed costs in some locations, and rarely less than 70 percent. Some districts employ nearly three times more special ed teachers -- per thousand students -- than others, not to mention many districts employ additional paraprofessionals like teachers’ aides and specialists.
Ultimately, Levenson calculated that districts with above-average special education staffing would save over $10 billion a year collectively if they were to reduce their staff to keep with the national norm.
In order to improve special education quality and efficiency, the author maintains that districts should focus on hiring more effective teachers, instead of simply more personnel including teachers, specialists, aides, etc. He also rejects the notion that more spending equals higher academic achievement.
According to Levenson’s report, there are federal law barriers that prevent officials from making special education more cost effective. For instance, the “maintenance of effort” provision of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) prohibits districts from considering cost when selecting services and interventions provided under a disabled child’s Individualized Education Program (IEP). As such, the costs are not shared with the staff making special education decisions, thereby impeding them from choosing the more efficient option.
Levenson outlines four additional policy recommendations for improving special education outcomes and efficiency — three at the federal/state level, and one at the local level.
- An end to maintenance of effort requirements.
- Preserving and strengthening the Elementary and Secondary Education Act’s (ESEA) subgroup accountability and reporting, including those provisions pertaining to students with special needs. While the current accountability mechanisms of the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) have many shortcomings and unintended consequences, it is important not to throw out the baby with the bath water. It is critical to measure the achievement of students with disabilities and hold districts accountable, lest we return to complacency regarding low achievement.
- Permitting greater flexibility in the use of Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) funds.
- At the local level, that districts carefully manage pupil loads for special education teachers.
“Special-education spending can’t be exempt from efforts to improve educational outcomes and efficiency,” Fordham Institute President Chester E. Finn, Jr. said in a statement. “Kids with special needs deserve better and districts literally can’t afford not to do better.”
The Fordham report comes after July Senate findings reporting that sequestration, set to take effect January 2013, would cut a combined $2.7 billion over 10 years from Title I funds, state grants for special education and Head Start public pre-school programs. An estimated 10,000 special education workers would be laid off as a result.
COULD CUTTING SPECIAL ED. SPENDING IMPROVE STUDENT ACHIEVEMENT?
By Nirvi Shah , Ed Week | http://bit.ly/Rf1Haf
September 6, 2012 9:17 AM :: A new analysis of the cost of special education concludes that by cutting special education personnel in high-spending districts to the national average, the country could save up to $10 billion a year and improve educational outcomes for students with disabilities.
In "Boosting the Quality and Efficiency of Special Education," former Arlington, Mass., Superintendent Nathan Levenson analyzed spending and staffing patterns in 43 percent of all school districts with at least 3,000 students, looking closely at how those districts spend money on students with disabilities.
He found that the median district has 7.6 special education teachers for every 1,000 students with disabilities. So districts that employ more special education teachers collectively employ about 70,000 more special education teachers than they would if they staffed at the average[or median?-dv] level. Using the national average teacher's salary of $54,800, plus 32 percent of salary for benefits, he said districts could save $5.1 billion a year by reducing their special education teaching staff to the average.
Levenson made a similar conclusion about paraprofessionals, estimating a savings of about $2.3 billion a year.
Especially recently, special education spending has come under scrutiny by districts and states floundering because of the economic downturn. Federal laws prevent districts and states from cutting special education budgets without good reason, a provision of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act called "maintenance of effort" that is intended to buffer services for students with disabilities from ups and downs in education budgets. Some states have cut spending anyway, and some districts are cutting services and offerings for other students because of their special education obligations. Some districts have found creative solutions to cutting costs, including outsourcing services.
In addition, Levenson, a managing director at the for-profit District Management Council in Boston, used pairs of demographically similar districts in Florida, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Ohio, and Texas, to show that districts that spend less on special education often produce better academic outcomes for special needs students than their higher-spending counterparts. Paired districts had socioeconomically similar student populations, a similar number of students, and roughly the same percentage of students with disabilities.
In nine of the 10 pairs, while one district spent between 11 percent and 57 percent more on special education, the other had 10 percent to 110 percent more students reach proficiency on state assessments. In only a single pair of districts in Florida, Levenson found, did more spending go hand in hand with a greater percentage of students with disabilities who were proficient on state tests.
"We do not imply that these relationships are causal. And we're mindful that the district pairs were chosen to illustrate the inverse relationship between special education inputs (spending) and outcomes (achievement)—so it's not surprising that they did, in fact, illustrate that relationship," Levenson wrote in the report.
Levenson has several recommendations for improving educational outcomes for students with disabilities and the efficiency of special education. He says districts, should employ more-effective general education and special education teachers—not just more of them or more staff—and carefully manage student loads for special education teachers.
BoostingtheQualityandEfficiencyofSpecialEducation20120905BoostingtheQualityandEfficiencyofSpecialEducationF...At the federal and state level, the report recommends that:
• Federal maintenance-of-effort requirements that keep states and districts from reducing spending on special education should be done away with;
• No Child Left Behind's subgroup accountability and reporting requirements, including those for special education students, should be preserved; and,
• Greater flexibility in the use of federal special education dollars should be permitted.
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