Question: Resources spent on fighting accommodations

[guess]

Hang with me for a second. I will sound weird.

1. How much do the 504 accommodations you request for eligible child typically cost? Estimates are fine especially if they are $0 but do remember to estimate on cost not just cash. Personnel, materials and the like have a value.

2. How much do you reckon the district(s) has/have spent fighting requested 504 accommodations for eligible child? Now, in comparison to how much implementing the requested 504 accommodations cost?

Guest replies are fine, sock accounts, whatev. Watching your butt is never a bad idea.

One last question, a two-parter. How many have utilized assistive technology as part of their 504 accommodation (particularly effective use implemented with fidelity)? How many of you either have, or would use service dogs as part of child's 504 plan if money were not a barrier to using a service dog?

In general.--The term `assistive technology device' means any item, piece of equipment, or product system, whether acquired commercially off the shelf, modified, or customized, that is used to increase, maintain, or improve functional capabilities of a child with a disability.

Please note the 2011 Revised ADA Requirements for Service Animals. The dog must perform tasks related to the disability. State laws may broaden the definition or requirement.

Service animals are defined as dogs that are individually trained to do work or perform tasks for people with disabilities. Examples of such work or tasks include guiding people who are blind, alerting people who are deaf, pulling a wheelchair, alerting and protecting a person who is having a seizure, reminding a person with mental illness to take prescribed medications, calming a person with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) during an anxiety attack, or performing other duties. Service animals are working animals, not pets. The work or task a dog has been trained to provide must be directly related to the person's disability. Dogs whose sole function is to provide comfort or emotional support do not qualify as service animals under the ADA.

This definition does not affect or limit the broader definition of "assistance animal" under the Fair Housing Act or the broader definition of "service animal" under the Air Carrier Access Act.

Some State and local laws also define service animal more broadly than the ADA does. Information about such laws can be obtained from the State attorney general's office.

By the way I'm not advocating service dogs for allergies in schools or discouraging them. All I want to know is what have you done or what would you do if initial cost were not a factor. I'll circle back to why this is all important to kids w/LTFA 504 plans, OCR, DOJ and Title II but if I give too much info it might create a demand artifact in responses.

[LinksEtc]

2. How much do you reckon the district(s) has/have spent fighting requested 504 accommodations for eligible child? Now, in comparison to how much implementing the requested 504 accommodations cost?

I think sometimes the "costs" to the schools of putting accommodations into 504s are also things like accountability, transparency, & liability.

For instance, if they put an accommodation into a 504 and then they fail to implement that item, they can be held accountable.  Policies don't have that level of accountability & they can be easily changed by schools.

If they formally agree to do something to keep the child safe, and then they don't and the child gets hurt, they might be liable ...... whereas, keeping agreements verbal minimizes documentation.

Plus, although the cost for 1 child for a trained adult on a bus might not be much, schools generally don't want that cost for each FA family.

Dealing with schools & manufacturers have similarities.  They say they care, and often they do, but when it comes down to it, a lot of them would like to say "we cannot ensure your safety ... "eat our products/attend our school" at your own risk ... we will only do what is required by law/regulation.  How many times I was told it was better for dd just not to eat any of the products of a company ... the company only had to label for the top 8.

[guess]

Regulation defined costs not arbitrary and capricious thought on expenditure that LEAs are not allowed to use as factors to consider whether an accommodation necessary and effective to deliver FAPE is to be implemented with fidelity.

[ajasfolks2]

Trying to come up with some of the accommodations over the years -- especially when LTFA child is young . . .

So, here are some that might incur actual $ expense:

1.  Wipes for hands -- would be higher if ALL children required to have hands wiped when enter building in morning, before and after recess, before and after snack, before and after lunch . . . wipes for desks and classroom implements . . . computer keyboards . . . what else?

2.  Soap for hands  -- kind of same as #1 -- but would be lower than #1 as only for hands and not other things. 

3.  Aide on bus -- for assessing allergic reaction and/or admin of epinephrine.

4.  Cost to train bus driver(s) to admin epinephrine.

5.  Cost to train school staff (X number of teachers & staff OR all of them, as some schools do) on Epipen and AuviQ administration.

6.  Cost to train school staff (X number of teachers & staff OR all of them, as some schools do) to recognize and appropriately respond to LTFA reaction.  I split this off from #5 as some schools won't "recognize" but will just GIVE epi in certain instances. 

7.  Cost for school nurse if school would NOT have had one without the 504 mandate for the child.  (I would think highly unusual . . . ) 

8.  Cost to bus child to/from different school should it be deemed he/she would be better served there than at school for which zoned.  (We faced this in Georgia, but opted to go private school, so don't know what it would have cost them to send special needs bus daily to transport child.)

9.  Cost for private school should the school NOT properly accommodate and then be forced to pay for private school (after lengthy litigation, most likely).

10.  Cost for school to provide the "safe treats" for the LTFA child when the school will not give up on the food-in-classroom "education style".  (Need to vomit when I read this one.)  Average number of instances per year would be highly variable -- recall that our DD's public school, 1st grade classroom (Fairfax County, Virginia FCPS) had something like 60 food-events.  We did not yet have accommodation that school foot the bill for that one . . . accommodation came later with DH's 4th grade and 5th grade experiences.

11.  Cost for aide or trained adult to accompany on field trips.

Some schools might bear these costs outside the normal course of school business and other schools would somehow be able to cover this in already budgeted for items, is my guess.

Putting monetary value to these would be a challenge . . . I'll think of more accommodations too, I'm sure.

[ajasfolks2]

12.  NO documentable $ cost to ban food for parties, rewards, treats, manipulatives.  IN fact, this would likely result in cost savings.

[ajasfolks2]

13.  Possible cost as to loss of income if school required to remove "for sale" snacks and/or vending machines.

[CMdeux]

Commodities replacement in USDA lunches-- this can add up to real $$$ in a hurry for some schools with high vegetarian populations.  (milk/peanut butter might be commodity staples there).



Okay-- as to service dog.  Hmmm.  If initial costs were not a barrier, HECK YEAH I'd use one with my DD.  In fact, I might even be keen on the idea of training it to do early alerting for reactions, and I think it could be done, quite frankly.

[Stinky10]

Cost of the meetings

that's where I see the most cost to my school - we've never had wipes, training is in place already, no aide, but getting 6 people in a room for an hour has cost in hard $ and opportunity cost in what they would have been doing otherwise

[hedgehog]

Cost of the meetings

that's where I see the most cost to my school - we've never had wipes, training is in place already, no aide, but getting 6 people in a room for an hour has cost in hard $ and opportunity cost in what they would have been doing otherwise

As a sub, I can verify that.  Often I float from one classroom to another through the day covering for teachers in such meetings. 

[Macabre]

I had determined to some extent the cost of our district providing a bus aide at one point in late elementary/early MS. We stopped the bus aide in 8th grade, but before 7th started I called our Sped Director and asked about budget things. Our school district was going through a very tough time. My DS went to a STEAM magnet MS with a great language program, and I was  worried about it being cut.  I basically told our Sped director that I would take the language program over the bus aide.  He replied that the SD will meet the needs of my child, and that was that. I remember creating a thread for this back then--the budget impact of 504 plans. At our hyperboards place.

The bus aide and the school providing wipes were probably the two most expensive costs our 504 resulted in. This year DS would really like the peanuts removed from vending. We will pursue that. But there will be other items there to replace them.