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night. -
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when it fails to work as advertised, it's the customer that gets labeled as
defective. - Kevin
Killion
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Courage is the most important of all
the virtues, because without courage you can't practice any other
virtues consistently. You can't be consistently kind or fair or
humane or generous, not without courage, because if you don't have
it, sooner or later you will stop and say, "The threat is too much.
The difficulty is ...too high. The challenge is too great. ~ Maya
Angelou
Advocating for the rights of
children in Eanes ISD?
Be prepared to work and wait and
wait and wait ...
As Eanes TAG Board Member (Eanes
Talented and Gifted), 03-04 President of the Eanes ISD SECAC
(Special Education Citizens Advisory Committee)
and 03-04 Bridge Point Elementary Campus
Leadership Team Member, Dianna Pharr advocated
for compliance with state laws and inclusion of
parent representatives for children with special
needs on the
Eanes ISD district and campus leadership
committees. LINK
HERE.
Pharr noticed that
children with special needs such as disabilities and
intellectual giftedness were not represented on the District
Leadership Team and some Campus Leadership Teams. She
spoke out at board meetings about this issue and wrote
to the Eanes ISD administrators and
superintendent in an attempt to change the
representation and benefit children in the
district.
Over two years later,
the district changed the board
policy to include representation for children with
special needs.
From:
Dianna Pharr Sent:April 26, 2005 To: cmartin@eanes.k12.tx.us Cc: nwellman@eanes.k12.tx.us Subject: FW: From Cindy Martin, Re: SECAC
Cindy,
Glad
my input was helpful (see my email from
January 19, 2004 below). I am sure that
EISD special education families are looking
forward to learning more about your efforts to
include their children and concerns in EISD
planning committees for the 2005-2006 school
year. Please keep us posted.
Dianna
You
wrote today (snipped):
I believe that in order to promote an
inclusive environment throughout the structure
and culture of the district, parents of special
needs students should be represented on the same
decision making and advisory committees as other
parents.Your
children's interests should be considered in the
regular process of decision making and I
encourage all of you to participate on the
campus and district committees in place. I
intend to put my efforts to making this happen
and coordinating this effort as these committees
form for next year.
Carl shared with me that there are concerns that
discontinuing SECAC was on the advise of the
district attorney. He also shared that some
individuals expressed feelings that the district
(that would be me folks) discontinued SECAC to
retaliate against parents who "get out of line".
Neither of these perceptions are true.
-----Original Message-----
From: Dianna Pharr [mailto:dpharr@austin.rr.com]
Sent: Monday, January 19, 2004 7:21 PM
To: 'Cynthia Martin'
Subject: RE: CLT, DLT
Thank you.
Dianna
-----Original Message-----
From: Cynthia Martin [mailto:CMartin@eanes.k12.tx.us]
I considered sending this email to the board or
even the new superintendent. However,
experience has taught me that would be like
tossing it out of my car window somewhere in
Utah.
Board policy and the legal requirements of the
Texas Education Code regarding Campus Leadership
Teams require the participation of one special
education parent. I've heard that at least one
elementary school, Forest Trail, does not have a
special education parent on the team. I have
not confirmed this personally.
Further, I believe that there should by law be a
special education parent on the District
Leadership Team, as well. Board Policy does not
specifically call for this. In fact, unless you
are the Booster Club President-Elect, you are
not allowed to serve on the District Leadership
Team. According to BQA LOCAL policy:
<<<The committee shall include nine parents of
students currently enrolled within the District.
Each school shall have one parent representative
and that representative shall be the
president-elect of the respective school booster
club.>>>
That's seems to stack the deck against those of
us who are not the fund-raising,
best-friend-of-the-principal sort. It certainly
rules out those of us who advocate for gifted
and special education children, genuine parental
involvement, and respect for the law. I
checked the Texas Education Code and snipped the
following requirement:
<<<<<§ 11.252. District-Level Planning and
Decision-Making
(a) Each school district shall have a district
improvement plan that is
developed, evaluated, and revised annually, in
accordance with district
policy, by the superintendent with the
assistance of the district-level
committee established under Section 11.251. The
purpose of the district
improvement plan is to guide district and campus
staff in the improvement of
student performance for all student groups in
order to attain state
standards in respect to the academic excellence
indicators adopted under
Section 39.051. The district improvement plan
must include provisions for:
(1) a comprehensive needs assessment addressing
district student performance
on the academic excellence indicators, and other
appropriate measures of
performance, that are disaggregated by all
student groups served by the
district, including categories of ethnicity,
socioeconomic status, sex, and
populations served by special programs,
including students in special
education programs under Subchapter A, Chapter
29;
(2) measurable district performance objectives
for all appropriate academic
excellence indicators for all student
populations, including students in
special education programs under Subchapter A,
Chapter 29, and other
measures of student performance that may be
identified through the
comprehensive needs assessment;>>>>>
I believe that board policy should be revised to
include parents of children with special
needs and parents of gifted students as well.
Gifted children are also a "special population"
with unique special needs. As a Bridge Point
Elementary CLT member, SECAC chairperson, and Eanes TAG officer, I would
welcome the opportunity to
participate on the District Leadership Team.
