Tag:

education savings accounts

This education savings account provides personalized learning for students with unique abilities

Lisa Buie July 2, 2020

Lisa Buie

Katie Swingle, mother of a child with autism, spoke before the Florida Senate Education Appropriations Committee in March 2015, imploring lawmakers to expand education choice options for children with special needs.

Mason Noya, 7, has learned to write his name. Cole Rous, 16, has learned to ride a bike. And Gregory Swingle, 12, has learned the socials skills he needed to develop friendships.

All three are children with autism, yet each has different abilities and needs. All three have benefited from a scholarship created by the Florida Legislature in 2014 to help families of children with certain special needs personalize their child’s education by directing money toward a combination of programs and approved providers.

The Gardiner Scholarship, named to honor former Senate President Andy Gardner, who led the legislative charge to create the program in 2014, has been life changing for parents like Nancy Noya. Her son Mason, who has seizures and developmental delays, has received the scholarship since he was 3. The money has allowed Mason to attend Our Lady of Charity Private School in Hialeah, but it also has provided Mason with an iPad, pencils, and other school supplies.

Mason struggled to communicate before he started school, Noya said. Now, in addition to being able to write his name, he’s begun talking to more people.

Mason’s behavioral, speech and occupational therapies are covered by the family’s health insurance, but she recognizes that not every family is so fortunate.

“Sometimes parents don’t have the money for therapy or they don’t have the insurance that will help them pay for those therapies,” Noya said, adding that she’s grateful Mason’s Gardiner Scholarship would pay for those therapies if the need were to arise.

Seeing the need to provide Gardiner Scholarships to more students, the Florida Legislature in 2019 appropriated an additional $23 million for the program, pushing funding to $147.9 million and making it possible for more than 13,000 students to receive the scholarship this past school year. This year, lawmakers added another $42 million in the state budget to serve more students who were eligible but unable to access the program because of the lack of available funds.

Before learning about the Gardiner Scholarship, Eileen Rous struggled to find a good fit for her son Cole. When she decided to homeschool Cole from their Sarasota home, the scholarship made it possible for her to buy curriculum, a subscription to an online learning program called ABC Mouse and a dry erase board, which Cole, now 16, uses “non-stop.”

She also was able to purchase sensory swings, a jumping board, and a weighted blanket to calm his anxiety. But one of her best purchases was a recumbent tricycle that Cole uses to ride around the block.

Many of the items were available through MyScholarShop, an online store that allows one-stop shopping and features pre-approved items sold by vetted vendors who partner with the program.

“I really like the flexibility,” said Rous, whose 14-year-old daughter Emily also is a Gardiner Scholarship student.

The Gardiner Scholarship has been a lifeline for Katie Swingle’s son Gregory. In addition to allowing him to attend a private school that best fits his needs, St. Joseph Catholic School in Winter Haven, it has enabled him to learn how to relate to others.

The education savings account covers his group social therapy sessions, which have taught him about the give and take of conversation and relationships through social events such as pizza potlucks.

“This group has been of huge benefit to Gregory,” Swingle said. “Not only does he consider his group his friends; more importantly, they consider him their friend. His social impairments really are starting to improve, and he is recognizing them for himself instead of parents or teachers having to point them out.”

The Gardiner Scholarship’s flexibility makes it possible for Gregory, 12, to receive the therapies that will help him function more independently in society as he becomes an adult.

“Not every child on the autism spectrum needs this type of therapy,” Swingle said. “He did. Instead of just a tuition voucher for a school, the money is being better utilized on a particular psychological service my son needs to be successful and fulfilled in his life.”

For all these families, she said, the flexibility allows for better outcomes, meaning everyone wins.

July 2, 2020 0 comment

Blog Guest Commentary and Opinion Coronavirus / COVID-19 Customization Education and Public Policy Education Savings Accounts Featured Jonathan Butcher School Choice Special Needs Education Virtual Education

COVID-19 has accentuated value of education savings accounts

Jonathan Butcher May 12, 2020

Jonathan Butcher

Children who make use of education savings accounts, like JoEllen Talley of Mississippi, are one step ahead of many families who are struggling to find resources for their children with special needs.

As of today, school buildings likely will be closed for the rest of the academic year in all states except Montana and Wyoming. Ready or not, if you are a parent or guardian, you may be spending the next few weeks rotating from your household and work assignments to your child’s virtual school assignments.

Some parents of traditional school students are reporting frustration. An April 21 headline from the Associated Press read, “’I Just Can’t Do This.’ Harried Parents Forgo Home School.” The featured parents expressed great concern that “their kids are falling behind.”

The day before the AP story, an article in The Atlantic encouraged schools to do more to help parents by giving students more space between assignments and urged parents to “take charge of their kids’ schooling.”

The scenario can be a frightening prospect for parents of children with special needs.

At the outset of the pandemic, the U.S. Department of Education issued two “fact sheets” so that schools could attempt to move instruction online without fear of violating traditional equity requirements for these children. The fact sheets urged parents and educators to switch from “business as usual” to being “creative” to reconfigure learning during the pandemic.

The small cadre of parents and children using education savings accounts in Arizona, Florida, Mississippi, North Carolina and Tennessee are one step ahead here. Because these families can use their accounts to pay for learning services and materials in and outside of their child’s school, they have been able to adjust their student’s instruction according to his or her needs.

An education savings account ensures that Anna Ragusa of North Carolina can continue to receive needed therapies during social distancing.

“We’ve been busy,” says Cara Ragusa, whose daughter, Anna, was diagnosed with Down syndrome. “I’ve got two kids who have a full day’s worth of work every day.”

The family was one of the first in North Carolina to use an education savings account when the option became available two years ago.

“Because of the account, Anna’s been able to continue to get her therapies online through Zoom and different platforms for 30 minutes at a time,” Ragusa said.

Alisson Talley, whose 12-year old daughter, JoEllen, uses an account in Mississippi, said the essence of an education savings account is to pull in the right resources “to keep children learning the way they learn best.”

“This pandemic has accentuated what an education savings account is, that one-on-one attention,” Talley said.

She explained that JoEllen, who lives with Down syndrome, has been forced by the pandemic to learn skills many children take for granted, such as proper e-mail etiquette. JoEllen has video conferences with her teachers in the morning, and they try to “simulate as much as they can from the regular classroom,” Talley said.

Meanwhile, Anna has meetings each week with a speech therapist and an occupational therapist.

“They share their screens and try to do interactive projects together,” Ragusa said.

Like everyone, the girls have had to adjust over the last two months.

“Anna thrives on repetitive routine for academic success, so that’s been a big setback while distance learning,” Ragusa said. “But having her teachers and therapists work with her regularly helps.”

Nearly two months into school closures, things are beginning to feel “a little bit normal,” she said, explaining that Anna sometimes has four calls or video chats each day involving work with her classroom teacher and different specialists.

Talley said the online coursework has been effective for JoEllen. But she worries that Mississippi lawmakers will try to cut online expenses from the list of available learning options next year, which would be “devastating.”

“It’s been refreshing to know that what we are asking for [to continue to purchase online services] works now,” she said. “It’s become a reality because it had to.”

What may not work for a child in one state will be a success for another with a similar diagnosis somewhere else. The same can be said for mainstream children, too.

This is why education savings accounts are so valuable to students from all walks of life, with or without special needs, inside or outside of a pandemic.

May 12, 2020 0 comment

Analysis Blog Guest Customization Education and Public Policy Education Choice Education Equity Education Savings Accounts Featured Jonathan Butcher School Choice

Victory for Utah students and families

Jonathan Butcher April 27, 2020

Jonathan Butcher

Benjamin Franklin Academy in Salt Lake City is an assistance program to homeschooled children with special needs.

Around the country, talk of closures and quarantine is giving way to plans for re-opening. Despite moving in fits and starts, Utah officials found something unique for families and students to look forward to even if schools are closed for the rest of the year.

On Friday, state lawmakers approved a proposal to provide flexible learning scholarships to children with special needs. The Utah account-style scholarships combine the features of what are commonly known as tax-credit scholarships (like Florida’s scholarships for children from low-income families) and education savings accounts, as found in Arizona, Florida, Mississippi, North Carolina, and Tennessee.

Individuals and corporations will receive a dollar-for-dollar tax credit for donations to scholarship account-granting organizations. The scholarship organizations will use the contributions to award accounts to students. Parents can use a scholarship account to find educational therapists that meet a child’s unique needs, buy textbooks, and pay tuition at a private school or for online classes, to name a few possible uses.

Utah’s new scholarship offers families and students multiple private learning options, similar to education savings accounts. By funding the accounts through charitable contributions, Utah officials connected the scholarships with the private choices of businesses and other donors.

In 2016, Jason Bedrick, now policy director at EdChoice, Clint Bolick, former Goldwater Institute vice president and current Arizona Supreme Court Justice, and I described how such an arrangement could work in our research for the Cato Institute. We wrote, “Tax credits simply leave money in the hands of taxpayers who are free to choose which scholarship organizations to support with their own money,” and by adding the savings account component to the scholarships, Utah families can challenge their students or otherwise design a learning experience for a student.

Utah’s scholarship accounts followed a winding path to approval. Gov. Gary Herbert vetoed the proposal near the end of the legislative session, suggesting the scholarships would require new taxpayer spending. State analysts, however, had already reported that every child that leaves a public school to use a scholarship would save the state $1,871. While estimates were not available for existing homeschool or private school students, children with special needs often require expensive interventions no matter their school or learning routine.

With a global financial crisis settling in, lawmakers everywhere should be looking for effective, cost-saving ideas. The scholarships will be worth different amounts based on a family’s income, similar to K-12 private school scholarships available in Indiana. Utah children from families with income levels at or below 185 percent of the federal poverty line will receive scholarships worth approximately $9,000 per year, according to Utah Policy, while students from wealthier families will receive scholarships worth between $5,000 and $7,000, depending on a family’s income.

States around the country need innovation such as this. Before the pandemic, families of children with special needs were already aware of the kinds of products and assistance their children need to be successful and, if possible, learn to be independent. But during the recent shutdowns, meeting the needs of children diagnosed on the autism spectrum or living with Down syndrome presented a challenge to parents and educators. Families using accounts in North Carolina and Arizona have reported that they can continue many services for their children because the accounts are so versatile. Families of these children celebrate when their students make progress and are justifiably fearful those improvements will be lost when normal routines are interrupted.

Utah’s scholarships will be active in January 2021, which gives officials time to sort out some of the features clearly available to children using education savings accounts, such as the ability to save money from one year to the next to prepare for future expenses. Utah policymakers should look to the states with accounts to find answers to common questions about how students can access more than one product or service.

Good ideas like this have a way of breaking through, despite a governor’s veto pen. And this one arrived just in time for Utah families who are ready for life after the pandemic.

April 27, 2020 0 comment

Blog Guest Commentary and Opinion Education and Public Policy Education Choice Education Savings Accounts Education Spending Featured Jonathan Butcher School Choice

Ongoing debate over district fraud in Tennessee shines positive light on education savings accounts

Jonathan Butcher February 26, 2020

Jonathan Butcher

Between 2015 and early 2016, the U.S. Attorney’s office determined that a national insurance fraud scheme involving prescription drugs included Blue Cross/Blue Shield of Tennessee, the insurance administrator for the Hamilton County Department of Education.

Who knew a prescription cream could be so expensive?

Last fall, officials suspended three Tennessee public school employees while investigators reviewed the individuals’ involvement in an insurance fraud scheme that cost the school district some $800,000. The issue dates to around 2015, when two doctors began writing prescriptions for pain-relieving creams to be bought in bulk. Some of the claims were filled through the Hamilton County School district’s insurance plan.

The fraud in Hamilton County, the school district encompassing Chattanooga, has all the makings of a con: Kickbacks, third party-intermediaries in California, and crooked doctors. The movie script writes itself.

Auditors and other investigative offices regularly uncover such illicit activities in school districts around the country. With some $600 billion in federal, state, and local funds flowing to schools every year, district offices, especially, are vulnerable to a wide range of financial crimes, from embezzlement to common theft.

In the 1990s, large school systems such as Chicago and Los Angeles created offices of inspectors general to deal with the problems. Yet some of these offices say that the number of claims is more than they can investigate.

Chicago’s inspector says that the office cannot open enough cases, which “creates a substantial risk, that waste, fraud, and financial mismanagement, and employee misconduct go undetected.” The U.S. Department of Education’s Office of Inspector General (OIG) has written similar warnings in the agency’s regular reports to Congress. Chicago is home to one of the largest examples of theft in recent years, as former CPS Superintendent Barbara Byrd-Bennett was sentenced to four and a half years in prison for her role in manipulating district contracts totaling $23 million.

Periodically, districts without dedicated inspectors general consider adding such offices. For example, in 2016, the Broward County (Florida) School Board considered adding an inspector to the district. When board discussion turned to using the federal inspector general instead of creating a new office in the school district, a federal representative said he must “cherry-pick complaints to investigate because there are only five investigators to cover the entire state of Florida,” according to the Sun-Sentinel—echoing the complaints from Chicago and the federal OIG’s home office.

The boxes of pain-relieving cream in Tennessee and Chicago’s illegal contracts help to put claims of misspending among Tennessee’s education savings accounts (called “Individualized Education Plans”) in perspective. Tennessee’s accounts operate similar to Florida’s Gardiner Scholarships, and families of children with special needs can use the accounts to choose a school or customized set of learning services, including education therapy and personal tutors, for their student.

No amount of graft or misuse of resources meant for a child’s education is acceptable. But recurring claims in the media of “serious problems” with the accounts—most recently coming from the Daily Memphian, but Arizona media have made similar accusations—ignore the size and scope of fraud in school districts and lawmakers’ efforts to limit such problems in the savings accounts.

For example, the financial loss due to fraudulent prescriptions in the Chattanooga district described above is larger than all the money parents are suspected of misspending statewide in Arizona and Tennessee’s education savings accounts combined in 2018. Audits of Arizona’s accounts have found that the total amount of suspected misuse hovers around 1 percent or less of the total amount the account awards annually.

Meanwhile, Arizona policymakers have taken an innovative approach to education savings account oversight and contracted with a private firm to monitor individual transactions. As explained on redefinED last year, North Carolina officials have already outsourced management responsibilities for education savings accounts in their state. The new systems can confirm eligible savings account families and their intended purchases before processing a transaction, helping to limit intentional or unintentional misspending.

Now, Tennessee’s Department of Education is trying to do the same. Tennesseans should applaud state officials for upgrading these accounts at the first sign of trouble, as opposed to letting fraud fester for years as commonly happens in school districts. Remember, the prescription fraud in Chattanooga began in 2015. Parents and taxpayers should not have to wait five years for fraudulent use of a child’s education spending to be resolved.

February 26, 2020 0 comment

Customization Education Legislation Education Politics Education Savings Accounts Funding Gardiner Scholarship Special Education Vouchers

DeSantis touts funding boost for Gardiner Scholarship

Geoff Fox May 22, 2019

Geoff Fox

North Florida School for Special Education head of school Sally Hazelip speaks to an audience gathered at the school Wednesday to celebrate the end of the Gardiner waitlist, a priority of Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, at Hazelip’s left. Former Senate President Andy Gardiner stands behind her.

JACKSONVILLE – Returning to the school where he first pledged to eliminate a waiting list for the Gardiner Scholarship, Gov. Ron DeSantis on Wednesday celebrated a boost in state funding for the program for students with special needs.

DeSantis spoke at North Florida School of Special Education, where in February he requested additional dollars in the 2019-20 state budget to provide scholarships to the more than 1,800 students on the Gardiner waiting list. Wednesday, he said that the new budget increases Gardiner funding by $23 million, to $147.9 million, which will allow the program to serve at least 2,000 more students. The scholarship served nearly 12,000 students this year.

“I campaigned to keep thousands of families off the waiting list because there just wasn’t enough money,” DeSantis told an audience of approximately 250 that included former Senate President Andy Gardiner, who led the legislative effort to establish the program in 2014 to honor his son Andrew, who has Down syndrome. “We’ve been successful. The Gardiner waiting list is no more.”

The Gardiner Scholarship, the nation’s largest education savings account program, serves students with certain special needs, such as Down syndrome, spina bifida and autism. Students on the autism spectrum make up about 63 percent of the Gardiner student population. (The program is managed by non-profits such as Step Up For Students, which hosts this blog.)

Step Up already has awarded more than 8,600 students Gardiner scholarships for next year. Scholarships average about $10,400 and can be used to pay for private school tuition, fees, textbooks, tutoring, school supplies, computers, therapies and more. Unspent money can roll over from year to year, and students may save for higher education endeavors.

Andy Gardiner told the audience at Wednesday’s event that his 15-year-old son was unable to attend because he was driving to a job interview – proof that special needs should not be an obstacle in life.

“When he was born, we made a commitment to help him and other families (with children with special needs),” Gardiner said. “Our son doesn’t have a disability. He has a unique ability. And our job is to help children find their unique abilities. To see where (the scholarship) has come and to have met the many families, we are completely humbled.”

Parent Brittney Wilson, who also spoke at the governor’s February event, thanked DeSantis Wednesday for delivering on his promise to end the current waiting list. She homeschools her three sons, two of whom are on the waiting list.

“The additional funding for the Gardiner program will open doors that previously had been closed,” she said. “I’m eager and excited to have more opportunities for my sons to learn. I’m already looking into enrichment classes they can take, such as a zoo academy that provides hands-on learning with peers their own age. … It’s like a floodgate has opened right now.”

Tamara Blankinchip said she would not be able to send her daughter Hannah to North Florida School for Special Education without the Gardiner Scholarship. Hannah has Down syndrome and autism; five years ago, she also suffered an infection that spread to her brain, compromising her immune system and forcing her out of a traditional school. Her family uses the scholarship for curriculum, speech therapy and a tutor, among other things.

“When we pulled Hannah out of school, I was so afraid she would lose everything she learned and fall way behind,” said Blankinchip, whose voice trembled as she teared up. “But she is still right on target with her age group. She reads beautifully, she writes, she spells. I tease my husband that she spells better than he does. She can count money and tell time. She is a thinker and a problem-solver. This would not have happened without the Gardiner Scholarship. …

“Thank you so much, Gov. DeSantis, for expanding this amazing scholarship for so many kids like Hannah. I am humbled to speak for countless other parents and say that we are forever grateful you have made our children so important in your work for our state.”

May 22, 2019 0 comment

Education Legislation Education Politics Education Savings Accounts

Education choice options advance in Tennessee

redefinED staff May 2, 2019

redefinED staff

Tennessee lawmakers on Wednesday approved school voucher legislation that would allow families in two counties and the state-run Achievement School District to use education savings accounts for private school tuition and other education-related expenses.

The program would give participating families debit cards worth up to $7,300 in state education money each year. For the first three years, the state would provide grants to the counties to offset the money leaving local school districts with those students.

The landmark legislation, which evolved from months of deliberation, received final approval after a 100-member committee resolved differences between the House and Senate versions of the measure. A last-minute 24-page amendment exempts home-school students from participating and mandates income verification requirements.

The program would be capped at 15,000 students.

Tennessee would join four other states that allow some sort of education savings accounts: Arizona, Florida, Mississippi and Nevada.

The voucher legislation is now headed to Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee, who expected to sign it.

May 2, 2019 0 comment

Course Choice Customization Education Reporting Education Research Education Savings Accounts Gardiner Scholarship Homeschooling School Choice Teacher Empowerment

Put her in charge or it’s game over, man!

Matthew Ladner March 11, 2019

Matthew Ladner

Each of Ana Garcia’s home education students has a personalized education plan, which she’s aligned with the state of Florida’s education standards. Garcia worked in public schools for 12 years as a middle school English teacher, curriculum specialist and school-level director for accountability and instruction.

The American film classic Aliens features a group of futuristic Marines who bite off more than they can chew when a distant colony they’re exploring turns out to be a lair of deadly space monsters. Private Hudson, played by the late, great Bill Paxton, melts down in a panic. Sigourney Weaver’s Ripley reminds him that a young girl they had rescued, Newt, had survived for weeks on the space station with no weapons and no training, prompting Hudson’s memorable question: “Why don’t you put her in charge?”

Well, why not indeed? As the film continues, it becomes increasingly clear that Newt was far savvier than any of the Marines, Hudson in particular.

redefinED author Ron Matus recently reported from Miami, a K-12 education frontier, on former public schoolteacher Ana Garcia. “Miss Ana” rediscovered her calling by providing a group of special needs students with the education they need – in her home. An educator with a special needs son, she realized the system wasn’t working well for her as a teacher or as a mother.

Garcia is far from alone on either front.

She loved teaching in district schools. But over the course of a decade, her passion ebbed. Too many mandates. Too much violence. Too little help, in her view, for students with disabilities.

Her experience resounds throughout the research on public school teacher retention.

For years, teachers have cited working conditions as the primary reason for leaving the profession, outpacing compensation. Garcia didn’t lose her ability to serve children with disabilities, but she lost her willingness to operate in a broken and frustrating system. Her experience also is consistent with teacher shortage research. A universe of veteran teachers who love to teach have lost their willingness to function as a cog in a bureaucratic machine.

Garcia’s experience as the parent of a special needs child, sadly, also is not unique. Matus writes:

Frustrations began to mount for Garcia the mom, too.

In Pre-K, Kevin was happy and learning in his neighborhood school, in a class with five kids and two teachers. But for kindergarten, he was assigned to an inclusion class with 25 kids, one teacher and one “floating” teacher who toggled between multiple classrooms. Garcia said Kevin’s clothes weren’t being changed when he soiled himself. He wasn’t being fed.

Then Kevin began escaping from class and, somehow, running all the way to a parking lot before being stopped. The first time, Garcia was frightened. The second time, shocked. The third time, angry.

In 2014, after 12 years as a middle school English teacher, curriculum specialist and school-level director for accountability and instruction, Garcia called it quits.

An old expression holds that if you want something done right, you do it yourself. The Gardiner Scholarship has empowered Ana Garcia to educate not only her son, but other students as well.

Miss Ana is back, and this time, she’s the one in charge. Matus continues:

Off the grid, homeschoolers are DIYing into increasingly sophisticated co-ops and enrichment programs. Micro-schools, whether mini-chains or one-offs, are pushing the limits of what’s possible. In Florida, choice scholarships are giving a more diverse mix of parents the opportunity to go small or go home.

Garcia envisions a micro-school that can also serve home education students who want part-time services, combined with a center for Applied Behavioral Analysis. In the meantime, she’s the mutineer at the heart of her cluster, connected to a blooming constellation of other clusters.

A few months ago, I posed the question: How are Florida policymakers planning to provide the human and physical capital to deal with a large projected increase in the student population, Baby Boom teacher retirement and increased facility needs, and increased Medicaid and pension demands all at the same time. Is the plan to somehow money-whip potential public schoolteachers into actual public schoolteachers when the state lacks the money for whipping, and teacher exit surveys show other issues, some listed above, loom even larger than pay? If so, the state might need a new plan.

Florida, like every other state, can’t hire enough special education teachers for public schools, even as it spends $400 million on space for 14,500 children – which looks like about $27,500 per space by my Texas public school math. Garcia sounds like a fantastic special education teacher, and she teaches in her own home. Right about now, I’m hearing a psychic scream from a frightened person with somewhat reactionary K-12 policy preferences: “How are we going to hold her accountable?” Answer: Families will rate her online and other families with have access to the ratings. Elegant and delightfully lacking in bureaucracy.

Ana Garcia offers a solution that families need. Florida has many more potential solutions in the form of teachers who got fed up like Miss Ana. Why don’t you put her in charge by giving more families the ability to lure her back into education – this time as the leader of her own school?

March 11, 2019 0 comment

Course Choice Customization Education Reporting Education Savings Accounts Featured Gardiner Scholarship Grassroots Homeschooling School Choice Special Education Teacher Empowerment

Miss Ana and her mighty home school micro cluster

Ron Matus February 22, 2019

Ron Matus

Ana Garcia’s home education cluster includes a total of seven students, including five with autism who use the Gardiner Scholarship, an education savings account in Florida for students with special needs. Joining Garcia (at front left) on a field trip to Zoo Miami last month was, from left to right, her husband Daniel; her son Kevin, 9; her daughter Khloe, 7; Angelo, 6; and Briana, a paraprofessional.

MIAMI – “Guys! Choo-choo formation!” At Ana Garcia’s command, a loose knot of people near the turnstiles at Zoo Miami – three adults, five kids – lined up, put their hands on the back shoulders of the person in front of them, and merged into something less locomotive than caterpillar. Sixteen feet proceeded on a motley ramble. Crocodiles awaited in the Everglades section, along with plenty of carefully guided learning.

So it goes on the education frontier.

Over the next few hours, Garcia, a public-school teacher turned pioneer, subtly steered her students toward goals in their personalized education plans. Project-based learning for one. Ecology for another. Speech therapy for another. She put special focus on the three with autism, including her 9-year-old son, Kevin.

Those students, and two others not in attendance, benefit from a learning option that is revolutionary but under the radar: a state-funded education savings account. It’s ESAs that make Garcia’s home education cluster – and perhaps, someday, a never-ending array of other clusters – possible. Without them, the landscapers, Uber drivers and Dollar Tree clerks who’ve entrusted Garcia with the education of their children would be limited to schools that don’t work for their children.

Garcia knows what that’s like. She endured a nightmare school experience with Kevin before getting an ESA for students with special needs. She says it changed his life – and hers.

“Parents don’t have to fear any more that they only have one choice,” Garcia said.

Neither do teachers.

* * *

Ana Garcia has a little Mary Poppins about her, no-nonsense but upbeat, with a drive to stoke curiosity that borders on fantastic. Walt Disney is her hero. Some saw swamp; he saw magic kingdom. Garcia feels that about the landscape in education. Her great-grandmother was a teacher in Cuba. Her aunts were teachers. As a kid, her playroom was furnished with a blackboard and old textbooks, and her dolls were her class. Now when she switches into teacher mode, she decelerates her … rapid … fire … speech … until she’s sure her student is catching on.

“My favorite thing to hear,” she said, “is, ‘Wow miss, no one has ever taught me the way you have, or explained things the way you do.’ “

Garcia loved teaching in district schools. But over the course of a decade, the passion ebbed. Too many mandates. Too much violence. Too little help, in her view, for students with disabilities.

Frustrations began to mount for Garcia the mom, too.

Then Kevin began escaping from class and, somehow, running all the way to a parking lot before being stopped. The first time, Garcia was frightened. The second time, shocked. The third time, angry.

In 2014, after 12 years as a middle school English teacher, curriculum specialist and school-level director for accountability and instruction, Garcia called it quits.

* * *

But this is a story about education in Florida. So that’s not where it ends.

At the zoo, Garcia’s 11-year-old, Gabriella, took photos of black bears and gopher tortoises so she could create a brochure. Her 7-year-old, Khloe, immersed herself in geography. Kevin collected data from exhibit signs, focusing on adaptive traits like bioluminescence.

Garcia knows where each student stands with their learning plans, which she has aligned with Florida education standards. She nudged each towards their targets.

At the Gator Hole, she shifted attention to Angelo, who is 6 and mostly non-verbal. She pointed to a blue crayfish. “What is that Angelo?” she said.

“A crab,” he said.

Not quite, but close enough. And another step for a boy whose gentle face belies a kid once prone to fighting and biting.

Garcia left the district, but she didn’t leave teaching. She just joined the mutiny.

Her cluster isn’t quite sustainable yet, but education savings accounts gives her hope it can be. The main one in Florida (and biggest in the country) is the Gardiner Scholarship. Created by the Florida Legislature in 2014, it now serves 11,276 students with special needs such as autism and Down syndrome, with nearly 1,900 more on a waiting list. (It’s administered by nonprofits like Step Up For Students, which hosts this blog.) Each scholarship is worth about $10,000 a year, and parents can use it for a wide variety of programs and services, including tuition, therapies, tutors, technology, curriculum – whatever a la carte combination they think best.

Angelo’s mom, Vilma Moran, considered several schools. But all wanted to place him in self-contained special education classes where she didn’t think he’d learn. When Angelo started with Miss Ana, he wasn’t talking, didn’t seem to recognize his mom and dad, and showed no emotion.

Now, Angelo loves dinosaurs and laughs at funny videos. Now he greets people by name.

“When we go somewhere, like the zoo, he’ll say, ‘Let’s go see the elephants,’ ” said Moran, who installs fences for a living. “He wasn’t like that two years ago.”

* * *

Kevin is terrified of thunder.

But as Garcia described in The 74, she used the ESA to ease his anxiety – and learn science in the process.

She worked with Kevin’s therapists and tutor to develop lesson plans around the subject of thunder and lightning. The therapists showed him pictures and videos of lightning, taught him calming techniques, and worked with him on articulating why he was scared. The tutor taught him how clouds form and what causes thunder. Knowledge reduced his fear.

“Sometimes, things need to be micro,” Garcia said. In a school district, “you can’t possibly tailor everything to every child. There needs to be a middle ground somewhere. There needs to be a hybrid.”

Or lots of hybrids.

Off the grid, homeschoolers are DIYing into increasingly sophisticated co-ops and enrichment programs. Micro-schools, whether mini-chains or one-offs, are pushing the limits of what’s possible. In Florida, choice scholarships are giving a more diverse mix of parents the opportunity to go small or go home.

Garcia envisions a micro-school that can also serve home education students who want part-time services, combined with a center for Applied Behavioral Analysis. In the meantime, she’s the mutineer at the heart of her cluster, connected to a blooming constellation of other clusters.

For example, a paraprofessional, training to becoming a registered behavioral therapist, joined Garcia and Garcia’s husband on the zoo trip. The five autistic students in Garcia’s orbit all go to the same ABA center, but each is served by different speech, occupational and physical therapists. Kevin has his own tutor, a certified teacher who executes a plan Garcia designed. But the tutor also works with other students in other settings. Once education is de-coupled from school, the potential matches of students and teachers becomes infinite.

Garcia arranged swimming lessons at the Y for some of her students, biscuit-making at Red Lobster for others. Music and martial arts classes are on tap, along with lessons in table manners at Cracker Barrel.

So it goes on the frontier.

* * *

The Miami-Dade school district has 350,456 students, counting 68,487 in charter schools. Throw in private schools, and Miami-Dade has 425,000 students. Competition between sectors may be the most intense in America. And if test scores and grad rates are any indication, students are benefitting.

But none of those schools, so good for so many, were good for Kevin and Angelo. Garcia’s micro-cluster is.

Will it last? Garcia thinks it can work financially with a few more students. But it’s complicated on the edge, and there is no trail. She said she’ll keep pressing to figure it out, and more pioneers every day will do the same.

“If it’s not me,” she said, “it’ll be somebody else.”

February 22, 2019 2 comments