Comments on: Sophie’s IEP is Mildly Retarded

By: Megan

Megan — Fri, 12 Sep 2008 02:47:32 +0000

Ok, don’t want to threadjack Amy’s blog but really quick:

School districts are eligible for extra state money to hire ELL teachers, they also receive ESL money from the federal government to meet No Child Left Behind standards. Finally, many ELL students live in low income districts and attend Title 1 schools where they receive even more federal money. So the amount of money a district receives is somewhat proportional to the needs of the students — in some districts it might be double, in others it might be almost nothing.

While there is certainly room for differences of opinion when it comes to immigration, it’s important to note that not all of Oregon’s ELL kids are undocumented, and blaming ELL programs for a lack of services for other populations does all kids a disservice.

From the area code, I am guessing you are in 4J? I tried to look up the percentage of ELL students in the district, but their Web site didn’t list it — I bet you guys are one with a high percentage.

Anyway, this probably comes down to some fundamental difference of opinion, but instead of taking away from one population to fund another, Oregon needs to change its school funding structure to take care of ALL kids I love talking about this stuff, so feel free to e-mail me privately to keep talking…. I hope I didn’t sound snooty in my first comment…

By: Linda

Linda — Thu, 11 Sep 2008 23:25:28 +0000

Megan, I called the Chief Financial Officer of our school district (Susan Fahey – 541-687-3333). She said that the ESL students in our district are counted as one and a half students. For our district the legislature pays $6,000./year per English speaking student but pays $9,000./year for an ESL student. On top of the $9,000., ESL money also comes from various other sources such as local Bonds and interest revenue, which brings the total amount of money provided per ESL student to close to double of that which is provided for an English speaking student (As I stated earlier). I don’t know how Arizona works. My point is that a child who has special education needs, should have those needs met. I think we all would benefit by looking into how our tax dollar is being spent, and to figure out if that is how we want it!!!

By: Linda

Linda — Wed, 10 Sep 2008 23:26:24 +0000

I heard the statistics on the Lars Larson show. Regardless, it doesn’t take much logic to figure out that a lot of educational dollars are spent on English as a second language. Probably more than $9!

By: Megan

Megan — Wed, 10 Sep 2008 23:05:59 +0000

I’m curious where Linda “heard” this, but it’s definitely not true.

There is no extra allotment given to schools in Oregon for kids who don’t speak English — legal or otherwise. The only schools that get extra cash are Title 1 schools which are entitled to money from the federal government. (Now, there is a higher Spanish/Russian speaking population at these schools, but the federal allotment has nothing to do with language or race, and everything to do with socioeconomic status.)

(Sorry Amy, I just can’t let wrong information about the Oregon public school system float around the Internet uncorrected.)

Also, 9 dollars?!?! Shameful.

By: Linda

Linda — Wed, 10 Sep 2008 18:23:37 +0000

You should check into how much $ the schools are receiving for illegal immigrants who don’t speak English. In Oregon I hear the schools receive double the per child allotment.