Do States Need Schools for the Deaf?

Miss-Delectable

Miss-Delectable

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The Price Tag for Schools for the Deaf - Room for Debate - NYTimes.com

Leaving aside the heated political and cultural arguments surrounding the deaf community, the cost of maintaining separate schools for deaf children is exorbitantly expensive, especially considering the poor academic outcomes for deaf children.

California is a case in point. California has two schools for the deaf, in Fremont and Riverside, costing $35 million per school (not including capital costs). Combined, they educate close to 800 students a year. This puts the per-pupil cost at more than $87,000 a year — at the expense of other students statewide, including the more than 12,000 deaf or hard-of-hearing students who do not attend the California schools for the deaf.

Unfortunately, even with all of these concentrated resources, the academic outcomes for deaf students enrolled at these separate schools are dismal. According to the California Department of Education 2010 STAR testing results, 0 percent of third-graders were proficient in English language arts at the Riverside school, and 72 percent were far below basic proficiency. By 11th grade, 90 percent of the students at the Riverside school are far below basic proficiency in English language arts. Over all, the state of California has bleak results for deaf children, with only 8 percent statewide scoring proficient in English language arts.

A much more sustainable financial model, especially given huge state budget shortfalls, would be to have the special needs funding follow the child to the instructional model of his or her parents’ choice. For example, in Florida, the McKay scholarships provide private school funding to assist 21,000 students with special needs. The most expensive scholarship for the highest-need student is around $20,000, which is far less than the average cost to maintain separate schools in other states.

On the nation’s report card, the National Assessment for Education Progress, Florida has seen a large improvement in fourth-grade reading scores for students with disabilities — moving from 24 percent at basic proficiency or above in 1998 to 45 percent in 2009.

These special needs scholarship programs are growing around the country, and they have the added benefit of bypassing the polarizing political debate between how best to educate deaf students in separate or mainstream environments by making state financing neutral and letting parents decide the best instructional approach for their deaf child.
 
Miss-Delectable said:
The Price Tag for Schools for the Deaf - Room for Debate - NYTimes.com

Leaving aside the heated political and cultural arguments surrounding the deaf community, the cost of maintaining separate schools for deaf children is exorbitantly expensive, especially considering the poor academic outcomes for deaf children.

California is a case in point. California has two schools for the deaf, in Fremont and Riverside, costing $35 million per school (not including capital costs). Combined, they educate close to 800 students a year. This puts the per-pupil cost at more than $87,000 a year — at the expense of other students statewide, including the more than 12,000 deaf or hard-of-hearing students who do not attend the California schools for the deaf.

Unfortunately, even with all of these concentrated resources, the academic outcomes for deaf students enrolled at these separate schools are dismal. According to the California Department of Education 2010 STAR testing results, 0 percent of third-graders were proficient in English language arts at the Riverside school, and 72 percent were far below basic proficiency. By 11th grade, 90 percent of the students at the Riverside school are far below basic proficiency in English language arts. Over all, the state of California has bleak results for deaf children, with only 8 percent statewide scoring proficient in English language arts.

A much more sustainable financial model, especially given huge state budget shortfalls, would be to have the special needs funding follow the child to the instructional model of his or her parents’ choice. For example, in Florida, the McKay scholarships provide private school funding to assist 21,000 students with special needs. The most expensive scholarship for the highest-need student is around $20,000, which is far less than the average cost to maintain separate schools in other states.

On the nation’s report card, the National Assessment for Education Progress, Florida has seen a large improvement in fourth-grade reading scores for students with disabilities — moving from 24 percent at basic proficiency or above in 1998 to 45 percent in 2009.

These special needs scholarship programs are growing around the country, and they have the added benefit of bypassing the polarizing political debate between how best to educate deaf students in separate or mainstream environments by making state financing neutral and letting parents decide the best instructional approach for their deaf child.
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All about money.:roll:
 
Wirelessly posted (sent from a smartphone. )

Star scores are not reliable indicators. Why don't they test them with something more efficent for deaf students. During my senior year prior to graduation from high school, my reading level was 10 and writing level was 8 or 9. Altho my math level stinks as always. I was a student at Calif school for the deaf in Fremont.
 
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According to my SAT-HI, I could read at 12 grade level while I was in the 11th grade and when I was a senior, I could read at college level. I remmeber one of my friends refused to believe it. She said it was impossible to for deaf to be that good at reading.

I've met deaf in rl and on this forum who can write better than me so it's possible!
 
deafskeptic said:
According to my SAT-HI, I could read at 12 grade level while I was in the 11th grade and when I was a senior, I could read at college level. I remmeber one of my friends refused to believe it. She said it was impossible to for deaf to be that good at reading.

I've met deaf in rl and on this forum who can write better than me so it's possible!
Click to expand...

This was during my MSSD days.
 
sequoias said:
Wirelessly posted (sent from a smartphone. )

Star scores are not reliable indicators. Why don't they test them with something more efficent for deaf students. During my senior year prior to graduation from high school, my reading level was 10 and writing level was 8 or 9. Altho my math level stinks as always. I was a student at Calif school for the deaf in Fremont.
Click to expand...

math was never my forte either.
 
There is a question that's been bothering me for a while. It's been often said here on AD that most, if not all, state schools for the deal follow the public school curriculum. This confuses me because I know that at least one of them offers "Life Skills" in high school. Where did this class come from? Is this part of the curriculum?

Exactly how does "following" the public school curriculum work? Do they simply offer it or make all students follow this curriculum?

Just trying to get a better idea of how comparing schools work. If two schools (same location) with the exact same curriculum differ greatly in academic standards, is it just because of the efficiency of teachers? Or is there more to the story?
 
deafskeptic said:
According to my SAT-HI, I could read at 12 grade level while I was in the 11th grade and when I was a senior, I could read at college level. I remmeber one of my friends refused to believe it. She said it was impossible to for deaf to be that good at reading.

I've met deaf in rl and on this forum who can write better than me so it's possible!
Click to expand...

Is the friend deaf or hearing?
 
deafskeptic said:
According to my SAT-HI, I could read at 12 grade level while I was in the 11th grade and when I was a senior, I could read at college level. I remmeber one of my friends refused to believe it. She said it was impossible to for deaf to be that good at reading.

I've met deaf in rl and on this forum who can write better than me so it's possible!
Click to expand...

Your friend must think you are something what she thought you were. :roll: of course there are lots of deaf people who write and read pretty good. Some of them can write or read very good while they went to deaf school. Some of them happen to love reading the books or parents were with them or some luck of them who naturally absorbs all of memorizing or comphrensive. for nowaday, i think deaf kids could have to get good benefits from using the internet, to the right sections for the writing and reading improvement.
 
Daredevel7 said:
There is a question that's been bothering me for a while. It's been often said here on AD that most, if not all, state schools for the deal follow the public school curriculum. This confuses me because I know that at least one of them offers "Life Skills" in high school. Where did this class come from? Is this part of the curriculum?

Exactly how does "following" the public school curriculum work? Do they simply offer it or make all students follow this curriculum?

Just trying to get a better idea of how comparing schools work. If two schools (same location) with the exact same curriculum differ greatly in academic standards, is it just because of the efficiency of teachers? Or is there more to the story?
Click to expand...

State schools follow the curriculum-- correct me if I'm wrong. The four states that I know about (Ohio, Florida, New York, Kentucky) all follow their state standards-- they are expected to teach what's on that grade level to their students, even if the students are not on grade level yet.
 
Daredevel7 said:
There is a question that's been bothering me for a while. It's been often said here on AD that most, if not all, state schools for the deal follow the public school curriculum. This confuses me because I know that at least one of them offers "Life Skills" in high school. Where did this class come from? Is this part of the curriculum?
Click to expand...

They offer Life Skills for the kids who are mentally handicapped. They also offer Life Skills in public schools too you know. As a matter of fact, I know of a case where a HOH kid (just hoh) is in a Life Skills class in public high school.
 
And the thing is...........YES we need Schools for the Deaf. We need to offer a continum of placement for kids with all sorts of disabilties. I gotta say that I think a lot of the "experts" who are asking if we need Deaf Schools are the ones who think that all dhh kids have the advantage of a suburban school with a good dhh program, or that all mainstreamed kids just need minimal accomondations. We have been mainstreaming for decades now, and it just hasn't WORKED AT ALL. The thing is...mainstream schools push the myth that they're better, so they can take advantage of parent's nativity, so the school can give minimal accomondations. That way they can legally be said to be giving a kid a FAPE, while cheating the kid out of a real education. I mean I seriously doubt that many teachers at mainstream schools are trained to teach dhh kids. Hell, most of the time if we don't respond well to minimal accomondation, we get lumped into special ed, and told we're not going to acheive. It happened to ME, and I was the type of kid who took two forign languages.
 
I really hate the government trying to save money just because State schools are expensive to maintain. Beside I think the government want deaf and hard of hearing children to go to mainstream schools which they are public schools meaning lots cheaper than going to the State School for the Deaf and/or Blind. They still think now that there is CI putting on deaf children to be able to hear and listen (meaning to pick up the words without lipreading. Ha, that is a laugh.) They expect CI children to be able to understand what is going on in the classroom without special accommodations that we need to rely on like ASL interpreters and note takers. They still would like us not use ASL. That is not fair. They are suppose to be visual children and they like to gesture with ASL, their primary sign language. I would rather have a State School for the Deaf better than the mainstream school so that we can communicate better in the classrooms and being outside for recess and also lunch time too. They can sign any time of the hours all day. That is what I like. The government should not take our rights to sign in the State School for the Deaf. Give us a break, government. :roll:
 
Beo, this debate basicly ignores the fact that MOST students at schools for the deaf aren't kids who started there from preschool/kindergarten. The gross majority of students at deaf schools were and are formally mainstreamed students.
 
deafdyke said:
Beo, this debate basicly ignores the fact that MOST students at schools for the deaf aren't kids who started there from preschool/kindergarten. The gross majority of students at deaf schools were and are formally mainstreamed students.
Click to expand...

Hi DD, I don't believe that's the case at a bi-bi school like TLC -- these kids have usually been there from preK, or transferred from other schools for the deaf when a family moves into the area. Are you referring to some of the oral schools for the deaf?
 
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