14:06:45 >> Jolene: Before I get started today, I did want to go ahead and introduce one of our guests, one of our good friends and experts in all things special education or education in general. I'm going to put you on the spot, Steven, if you want to go ahead and introduce yourself. 14:06:59 >> Steven: Good afternoon. This is Steven with disability rights Texas. I'm happy to join as a guest and look forward to the program. 14:07:24 >> Jolene: Thanks for joining us, Steven. Before we get into content, as Laura said, you know, we all come in with different levels of familiarity with certain topics. So we wanted to kick it off with a poll just to kind of see how familiar you are with the concept of vouchers or what vouchers are, you know. We're going to -- I think Laura is 14:07:50 going to go ahead and launch a poll for us. I'll read it. The question is, what is your knowledge or comfort level with this topic? I know the issue of vouchers very well, I know the basics but am not an expert, I know a little bit about vouchers, or what are we talking about? What are we talking about again? So we'll take a little bit of 14:08:13 time so that everybody has an opportunity to respond to that. 14:08:28 >> Can you help me? 14:08:37 >> Jolene: Laura, did everybody have an opportunity to respond? 14:08:42 >> Laura: Still answers coming in, and I think Michael might be sending in his response. 14:08:44 >> Jolene: Gotcha. We'll wait, Michael. 14:08:51 >> Can you hear me? 14:08:56 >> Jolene: Yes. 14:09:04 >> Then say I know a little bit. 14:09:18 >> Jolene: Gotcha. Thanks, Michael. Okay. Laura, did we want to publish the responses? 14:09:32 >> Laura: Sure, just to give everyone an idea of where we're at and add one to only know a little bit. 14:10:03 >> Jolene: It looks like 15% know the issue pretty well. 38% know the basics, but not an expert. Another 38 or maybe a little bit more than 38 with Michael's vote only know a little bit about vouchers. What are we talking about again, 8%. Okay. Go ahead and close that out. What are we talking about today? So when we think about public schools, 14:10:27 we often think about our community, our neighborhood schools. These schools are funded by the government, the federal and state government. So there's certain guidelines that have to be followed, specifically for students with disabilities, the Individuals With Disabilities Education Act or IDEA, one of those acronyms, they set forth 14:10:52 certain requirements for free appropriate public education for all students, all eligible students with disabilities. So what is a voucher? First of all, I guess let me ask any of you if you want to go ahead and put it in the chat. How would you describe a voucher? While you guys are doing that, to be real clear, public schools we often think 14:11:13 of our local school districts. They also include charter schools. They are public schools. They are open enrollment public schools, and they cannot charge tuition. So a lot of times there's confusion about whether charter schools are private, if they're part of the school district. They are similar to our public school district in 14:11:39 the fact they have to comply with those state and federal laws as well because they are funded by our government. Now there are a few different types. There's the typical school voucher program that sets aside money and allows parents to access that money for private school tuition. There's also tax credit scholarship programs. Some states 14:12:08 offer these as a credit to businesses, to individuals to donate to scholarship granting organizations, which then can give money to award scholarships to students for private school. Then we have education savings accounts. This has come up a number of times especially over the last few sessions specific to students with disabilities. 14:12:35 This kind of -- this allows parents to access an account where they can pay for certain things. They can home school and kind of cobble together an educational program for their kids. The bottom line is, all of this money comes from our budget. Right? And so instead of funding public schools, we may be, you know, offering money for certain 14:13:00 populations that already might be accessing private education, but it's really difficult and really impacts specific communities, rural communities, low income students, students with disabilities, and the number one reason it's disproportionately impacting students with disabilities is being a private school, going back to not -- if you 14:13:26 receive federal funds, you have to comply with IDEA. Private schools may not receive federal funds. There's no obligation to provide that free appropriate public education for students with disabilities. There are a number of states, a little less than 20, I believe, last time I checked, who have a voucher program. There have been a number 14:13:58 of studies over the years that show that they don't necessarily improve educational outcomes for students. Sometimes actually they may actually decrease student outcomes because there may be flooding of private schools into the market to try and compete for those dollars, and they may not be these high quality private schools. Steven is our 14:14:24 special education expert, and I want to just ask a few questions. Steven, first of all, in terms of the state budget, can you kind of give us an overview of how that would work if, for instance, Texas was to adopt a voucher program and what that might mean for public schools? 14:14:51 >> Steven: Thanks, Jolene. So Texas has historically provided just the bear minimum of state funding for special education services. In fact, the U.S. Department of Education has found that in at least three recent school years, that Texas did not meet the minimum spending requirements of state aid for special education. Suffice to say if we 14:15:13 divert limited state resources to private vouchers, it just jeopardizes all the more public funding for special education services for all of those students with disabilities who remain in our public education system. 14:15:36 >> Jolene: I guess I'll ask you another question, Steven. You've worked on this issue for a number of sessions as well. What would you say is kind of -- what are we anticipating this legislative session around vouchers, and maybe specifically for students with disabilities? 14:16:06 >> Steven: Sure. So those of who you have followed the legislature in the past know that there have been several attempts to pass a voucher program or education savings account program, which is akin to a voucher in the past several sessions. So I think all of the observers of public education issues believe that once again those proposals will 14:16:33 surface. Most likely in the Texas senate, but possibly as well in the Texas house regardless of the source of the legislation and certainly depending upon the outcome of the coming election, those pieces of legislation could gain even more traction than they have in the past. To be clear that the Texas house of representatives has generally stood 14:17:00 firm against voucher proposals, and I do want to credit the leadership in the Texas house for knocking past efforts to enact vouchers in Texas, but, again, we're probably looking at a different dynamic in the Texas house this coming session for any number of reasons including redistricting, retirements, among other factors. So what could happen 14:17:10 this coming 88th legislature is hard to state at this point. 14:17:41 >> Jolene: It's all up in the air. But yeah. We have already begun hearing the buzz around vouchers and even expanding supplemental special education services grants that were funded last legislate everybody session. I'm going to look in the chat because some of you have made really excellent points. Jennifer, private schools, 14:18:09 that's another thing, they can be very selective. Charter schools and typical ISDs, they are open enrollment. They can't charge any fees. They serve everybody. Private schools can kind of decide and be selective about whether or not they will accept the student. They're also fairly nonexistent especially in rural 14:18:35 areas. You may have seen a representative who represents a rural district has been strongly, strongly opposed for that reason because if you think about rural areas like out in Lubbock or East Texas, there isn't necessarily the kind of availability of private schools that, say, you may have in a larger metropolitan area. Then, 14:18:47 again, they don't necessarily have to take your kid or keep your kid. So those are some of the problems that we see with the idea of adopting a voucher system. 14:19:04 Laura, sorry. I just want to check and make sure we're okay on time because we are going to do some breakout rooms and have a little more conversation about vouchers, the good, the bad, the ugly. 14:19:08 >> Laura: We're doing great on time. 14:19:21 >> Jolene: Okay. Well then, I guess Steven, is there anything else you want to add? I may not have timed this very well. We might be a little early going into breakout rooms. 14:19:48 >> Steven: Well, one interesting thing to point out for those who may not have been following the Texas commission on special education funding, the Texas commission on special education funding, as the name suggests, is an interim advisory committee that was created last legislative session to focus on how we better support public schools in serving 14:20:17 students with disabilities with adequate financial resources. I raise this in the context of this conversation this afternoon to let our attendees know that I would say unfortunately. One of the hearings of the Texas commission on special education funding was, in facts, devoted to vouchers. In fact, the commission brought in out of state expert 14:20:58 witnesses, so to speak, to address voucher proposals and programs in other states. I presume only that the intention to attempt to gain a foot hold for proponents of these ideas. So there are active efforts focused specifically on students with disabilities and voucher plans, and so I -- this is not just a theoretical discussion, 14:21:29 if you will. The prospects of these proposals coming forward are real, and it will be, of course, of interest to all of us to follow. But if you are by chance interested in what was said at the Texas commission on special education funding about vouchers, their meetings are recorded because they do happen at the Texas capital, and they are using 14:21:58 the recording system as you may be familiar with of recording legislative hearings. You can find that meeting listed in the past, and also those presentations from that day are posted on the Texas Education Agency website, which is hosting information materials that are being presented to the Texas commission on special education funding. So, 14:22:17 again, it's interesting that this venue meant to focus on improving financial support of public schools and serving students with disabilities did take a detour to address and look at vouchers specifically. 14:22:37 >> Chase: This is chase. Jolene, you might be able to answer this. It might actually help others. In other states, kind of like what you're talking about, they brought in people to speak on the issue, what have you all seen in other states when it comes to how they usually present this as a package and they start off usually with the disability 14:22:52 community with the actual goal of opening it up to any and everyone who wants to go to private school? Is that a playbook thing that's being seen in other states? 14:23:21 >> Jolene: I think you bring up a great question, and I think I saw Dennis put something in there about parental rights and empowerment choice. This is always framed as choice. Right? And yes, you're right. The attempts to start a voucher program often starts with, you know, very specific populations as we've seen in Texas. It's been students 14:23:55 with disabilities. That's usually how it's kind of the seed is sown and then it expands. This idea of choice, I think that word often feels very empowering, but there are already existing mechanisms under federal law for students with disabilities that, I think, a lot of families may not be aware of. There are so many, as Steven 14:24:24 mentioned before. We have a history in Texas of failing students with disabilities, and a lot of females felt burned maybe multiple times by public schools. That may appeal to them. As a parent, that's kind of, you know, in conversations with other families and with legislatures, it's kind of the feeling I get is we know that we can 14:24:38 go after this population because they've been burned, and this may seem empowering to them. Steven, I don't know if you want to add anything else. 14:25:11 >> Steven: No. Just to go back to the session that was conducted by the Texas commission on special education funding, of course to me, my observation is that they sort of cherry pick situations that do kind of make those -- these initiatives look favorable and certainly I think if you look at some of the publications that were shared at that 14:25:48 meeting and contrast that to other available research and literature, it's clear that not all students with disabilities will benefit from such an issue. But it's incumbent upon advocates to be ready, to have that material available because the proponents are very, very well versed, and the selling points, the talking points. Those who are going 14:26:07 to be presented at these debates need to be fully informed and aware of other information and those experiences so that it can all be exposed. 14:26:41 >> Jolene: I do also just want to add, we're in this unprecedented time in Texas public education where, you know, we have -- we're having a hard time recruiting educators. We have vacancies. In terms of special education, we've already kind of had these teacher and educator shortages. COVID and Uvalde and these things have created a perfect 14:27:11 storm, if you will, where teachers are just -- they're leaving the profession. So to say, hey, we want to take a little bit more money out of public education and allow parents to use it for religious education or private education, that they may already be getting, is, you know -- I think there are going to be a lot of educators -- I think 14:27:40 there already have been who are so strongly opposed and who that voice will be amplified during this legislative session. Thank you, Jennifer. Jennifer said the Charles Butt foundation released a survey of teachers that discusses the issues as far as recruiting, training, retention, the loss of the workforce over recent years. Yes. As some 14:27:57 of you may be aware -- I think we discussed this in a previous questionings -- the governor's task force to look at teacher vacancies was, you know, created to look specifically at this huge problem. 14:28:35 We've known, you know, for quite some time and through media outlets and other independent sources, you know, doing studies that this is an increasing problem. There is opportunity in the coming weeks to provide comments specific to the workforce, specific to these concerns that we have around public education right now. We can share that afterwards, 14:28:55 that opportunity. Before we go into breakout rooms, Steven, did you have anything else you wanted to add? I think Laura may have asked you, if you don't mind sharing the link to the meeting listings and recordings that you had mentioned just whenever you get a chance. 14:29:03 >> Steven: Yes. So let me try to put those references into the chat as a follow-up to my earlier comment. 14:29:33 >> Jolene: Thank you, Steven. Our friend Chris Macy, can you address the extension of the supplemental education services programs in any other legislation that's voucher-like? Yeah. So when we're talking about supplemental special education services or SSES, these were grants that were funded last legislative session if you 14:30:03 had been in any of those Raise Your Voice sessions where we talked about this, we were very, very cautious and rightfully so about this idea. These grants were created to provide up to $1500 per eligible student for these supplemental things which could be, you know, paying for therapy. It could be technology. It could be other academic 14:30:33 materials. So each qualifying family would get essentially an account, an online account where they could choose from vendors to purchase services or goods. The problem -- the criticism from education advocates was, this is intended to address learning loss for students with disabilities. However, there's already a requirement to provide compensatory 14:31:01 services, and there was a -- Steven our brilliant friend who led this, a COVID supplement that was supposed to be considered for each student who had an IEP, determine if compensatory services were recommended. So we already have a mechanism under federal law that failure of the district to provide a free appropriate public education or in this 14:31:30 case COVID, you know, there was -- nobody could have predicted that. There is already under federal law a provision for compensatory services for anything that was missed, reduced, paused. So the problem that, you know, we had with these grants was you guys should already be doing this instead of funding a program -- this pilot program without 14:32:01 any kind of metrics looking at the success of the program, you know, having, you know, kind of like -- just a bunch of vendors. It's like walking into the dollar store and you're not really sure like if this product and this product are, you know, what you're looking for or what they say they are. I know that may be just a really bad analogy, 14:32:28 but it's kind of like what comes to mind. So you have a bunch of vendors competing for these dollars where, you know, as advocates, we would have liked to see that money put into providing those services that are already required by federal law. By expanding this, again, and increasing the funding, it's a little bit like creeping towards 14:33:04 a voucher program especially if we see they're already increasing the amount they want to fund for this program. So it's a very, very slippery slope. Chris, I don't know if I addressed your question. Chloe said, are there specific talking points, materials around special education against vouchers that we can list? Yes. So I think as I mentioned, 14:33:34 under federal law, if any school that receives federal funding has to comply with IDEA -- private schools, they don't receive federal funding. They don't necessarily have to comply. There are very, very specific requirements under IDEA on what a student's individualized education program looks like and all the components that have to 14:34:04 be included. It's very, very specific and it has to be measurable. That IEP or individualized education plan, for each eligible student is not necessarily required or provided. Students also lose certain rights for when they're not being provided a free appropriate public education if they're attending a private school. So, for instance, if 14:34:25 Chloe goes to a private school and she was previously getting services in her neighborhood public school for special education, maybe she goes to this private school and they're like, yes, Chloe, we're going to take care of you. We'll even come up with a plan for you that's similar to an IEP in a public school. What if she's not getting 14:34:49 all that stuff she was supposed to be getting, all the things in the plan? There's no resource. There are a number of different mechanisms for filing complaints or for going to mediation, due process. There are multiple steps and things that protect students with disabilities when these things are not happening. So that's our biggest concern 14:35:13 for students with disabilities. We also have heard so much messaging about those kids, those kids. Maybe we just need all these kids to go to a special school. Obviously, not something that we would promote. But we want our kids to have opportunities, the same opportunities for inclusion in public schools in their communities like any other 14:35:40 student would. We don't want to see them pushed out. There's also kind of this vulture mentality whenever we start putting dollars -- attaching dollars to something and, again, going back to my point before in other states, they've seen subpar private schools popping up to take advantage of those available funds. Those outcomes for students 14:35:44 are not good. Following breakouts 14:51:52 >> Jolene: I know that my group, we had some really good conversations and questions, thoughts. 14:52:17 So we just want to take a moment -- you guys can either unmute or put in the chat, were there some questioned you asked that you got answered? Were there interesting things that came up or just how you feel in general about school vouchers. So this is the portion of Raise Your Voice where we kind of debrief and we get information and feedback 14:52:29 from you because this is extremely helpful for us. Dennis, you had a question or you raised your hand. 14:52:53 >> Dennis: Just a comment. We were talking in the breakout. The first thing she said, a lot of times the issue of vouchers is framed as creating more equity for disadvantaged students when, in fact, in practice, it actually increases inequity. So it's how the presentation of vouchers and kind of led yous off into our whole advantages of public 14:52:59 school. I thought that was a very interesting and insightful comment. 14:53:22 >> Jolene: Absolutely. Just to picky back on that, our group we talked about how it -- the whole idea of vouchers is not always fully transparent to families because they think, oh, I'm going to get the full amount to pay for tuition where it may be just a fraction of what, say, the state would invest per child in public education. So that can 14:53:31 be very misleading. I agree. It's often framed in that lens of equity. 14:53:50 >> I was concerned about the parents not being really knowledgeable about what they are doing if they put their child in a private school. Maybe they experience something that was not satisfactory in the public school, and they just decided to make a switch without being knowledgeable about what may occur following that, especially with the private 14:54:02 school not being required to or being -- adhering to the federal laws in place on their student's behalf. 14:54:28 >> Jolene: Absolutely. Then our group also talked about, you know, screenings upon enrollment. Some schools will have policies like IQ thresholds or won't admit students with a disciplinary history. They are already excluded from participation whether they can afford it or not. Others? 14:54:59 >> Our group pretty much went along the similar lines. I was interested in where TEA stands. Of course, I know they're a state agency so they can't really weigh in directly. I think the one thing that was pointed out was in the availability of equipment and services and things, it's very limited that it's not as -- I wonder if parents realize 14:55:04 how limited it is. 14:55:28 >> Jolene: Yeah. Absolutely. That's an excellent point. We kind of had that conversation as well. I don't know if others did. How is it being kind of marketed to families and where is the transparency and, you know, there are just a lot of missing pieces. I agree with you, Gl enda. 14:56:01 >> The other thing we talked about, too. I feel real strongly about this. Funding education, teachers in support of the educators, not the upper echelon of the education system, but boots on the ground to have the services that they need to refer kids who have issues to get support resources and, you know, the things that they need. The 14:56:07 money needs to be there to do that kind of stuff. 14:56:38 >> Jolene: Yeah. Absolutely. We're already so stringed and sometimes seems like holding on by our fingernails. Especially now where, you know, I don't know about others who may be parents, but we're experiencing a critical shortage of educators and related staff, too, not just teachers. Speech therapists, licensed specialists in school psychology, 14:57:07 counselors, mental health providers. It just -- you know, I think one of the things we talked about in our group at least was that we want to urge legislatures to prioritize our existing problems. I think Shandra Villanueva who is brilliant in school finance, she published something that said it's like a house that's falling apart, and instead 14:57:33 of repairing it, we want to go put a pool outside or something like that, something to that effect. We need to tackle the existing projects to maintain sustainability of it. Others? Macey is dying to say something. 14:58:03 >> I have nothing good to say. I did say this to Glenda and Michael is that I'm kind of sick and tired of trying to talk about all these diversions instead of how difficult it is every day for our kids just to get the basic services they deserve and that they are rightfully supposed to get by law. Our -- not to hijack a conversation on teachers. 14:58:28 We have three kids that are high needs that have come into the class from what it was last year into my son's life skills class that are high needs and they have the exact same staff that they did last year. The class is chaos. The kids that can, you know, and could be learning, doing resource work or small group instruction, it's almost impossible 14:58:55 at this early stage because those other kids just require so much effort. The staff is, you know, just struggling. Instead of putting hundreds of millions of dollars into this program, if we just put it on teachers' aides, it would be helpful to so many districts. It's diverting our time and money. It's a shame we have to continue 14:58:58 this every session. 14:58:58 >> Jolene: Thanks, Chris. 14:59:02 >> Thank you for letting me rant. 14:59:04 >> Jolene: Any time. 14:59:04 [ Laughter ] 14:59:21 >> Jolene: Well, it looks like we're at time, and I want to make sure that, you know, for anybody who may want to stay on, you can. But I want to be respectful of your time. Dennis, I think you were going to thank our sponsors. That's correct. 14:59:42 >> Thank you all for joining us today. In two weeks, we're back and the topic will be health equity, which is not dissimilar except it's in the access to health care, which is also very important in making sure everybody gets it. So that's in two weeks, September 26th. Raise Your Voice is always free to all the participants. You can 15:00:10 always access us online and share it. We can do that because we have sponsors that pay for all the expenses associated with that, and those include am general, AstraZeneca, touch of class. We work for Healthtex text, and our highest level sponsors are United Health Care, Superior Health Plan, and Bristol Meyers squib.