[r00fus]

Removing special needs kids from your population is the quickest way to increase test scores and reduce budget. As a parent of a child with special needs, I've studied the financials of schools in my district to find out how special needs services are supported.

1) The federal government has never lived up to its promise of matching 40% of the special needs funding (in my state they cover a mere 8%).

2) Usually the shortfall ends up at the district level. Some districts get more funding from an increased special needs population while others don't (community funding model).

3) Often the district moves programs around so special needs child cohorts (and in some cases teachers) can remain intact while not focusing the lowered scores in one school.

4) Charter schools throw a wrench into this as they typically don't support special needs kids, but still get district funding. This causes other schools in the district to look "worse" because their test scores aren't as balanced as before.

[dragonwriter]

> Charter schools throw a wrench into this as they typically don't support special needs kids, but still get district funding. This causes other schools in the district to look "worse" because their test scores aren't as balanced as before.

This is probably state-dependent, in California charters have the same obligations (with two different organizational ways of addressing them, either as if they were their own district or as part of the local district) as other public schools with regard to special education.

[HDThoreaun]

The charters in my district absolutely support special needs children. I even know a couple special needs teachers at the big charter network. I can't say how their program compares to the public school system's but there it's not empty so I figure it can't be that bad.