During a Senate Health, Education, Labor, & Pensions Committee hearing on Wednesday, Sen. Tim Kaine (D-VA) spoke about Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-LA), who pressed Secretary of Education Linda McMahon to release Title IV funds.
00:02Thank you, Senator Tuberville, and thanks to the witnesses.
00:05Just to follow up a little bit on the IDEA issue, because this is one that troubles me, too.
00:11Separate and apart from the discussion about the scholarship program, I've always been troubled by this underfunding as a former mayor and governor.
00:19It's kind of interesting.
00:20The IDEA revolutionary law, unlike many educational laws, I've never heard somebody say we should undo the IDEA.
00:30They complain about the paperwork and they complain about the underfunding.
00:34But I think everybody realizes the notion that a child with a disability should get an individualized plan so they can be all they can be.
00:41What a great idea.
00:43It's one of the best civil rights laws we have.
00:45But the underfunding is a huge problem.
00:47So when I was mayor of Richmond, school boards in Virginia do not have their own taxing authority.
00:53So they come hat in hand to their board of supervisors or city council together with state funds and federal funds.
00:59And so we the biggest part of the city of Richmond's budget every year is the allocation that we make to our school system, about twenty five thousand students.
01:06But if the federal government was fully funding IDEA, Richmond might decide, wow, we're spending just like you, Mr.
01:13We're talking about what you have to spend that you you could spend it on teacher salaries.
01:17You could spend it on additional hiring.
01:19You could spend it on physical improvements.
01:22San Diego would spend that extra different than Richmond.
01:25That's fine.
01:26It would low localities with full federal participation could do more.
01:30And so that's why I have worked with Senator Collins over the years to try to find strategies to get us, not immediately, but to get us to what that 40 percent deal originally was.
01:42And we'd really help out a lot of schools if we did.
01:45The proposals that in the reconciliation bill with respect to tax credit for scholarships.
01:53Now, contributions to private schools are already tax deductible because they're 501 C3.
01:59So there's already a tax deduction if you make it.
02:02But this is in addition to a tax deduction.
02:05Let's do a tax credit.
02:07Is there any restriction about whether the schools that can utilize those tax credits have to follow the IDEA?
02:20Absolutely not, Senator.
02:21And the issue when we subsidize private entities is that there is, in fact, no accountability.
02:31You know, we're talking about the system of accountability and assessment.
02:35How do we know that private schools, first of all, are going to admit, you know, a fair number of students with disabilities?
02:42And just so I'm going to let everybody else respond to this, because this is an important point.
02:46How do we know that private schools are going to, in fact, employ evidence-based strategies to support students with disabilities and all students?
02:58How do we know that private schools are going to even participate in the smarter balance assessments or in the NAEP or any of that?
03:06Just to the other witnesses on this point, does the reconciliation bill require that private schools that might avail themselves of this credit follow the IDEA?
03:17Does it excuse them from following the IDEA, or is it TBD based on regulations that the Treasury Department comes up with?
03:23Well, IDEA has been around for 50 years, and throughout that whole history, private school students have benefited from equitable services funding through IDEA.
03:31This is not new for private schools.
03:33It's not new for students with disabilities to attend private schools.
03:36My daughters would be an example of that.
03:39And when we talk about school choice programs, we have hundreds of thousands of students with disabilities benefiting from state school choice programs.
03:46So these are families who have chosen to say, this whole IEP and IDEA, that regime was not working for my child.
03:54I need to go find another option.
03:56And they take advantage of those school choice options.
03:58But are the schools required to follow the IDEA?
04:02That's not in the provision for the tax credit.
04:07Not current law, and not in the provision, in the reconciliation bill.
04:11No, and like I said, for the 50-year history of IDEA, there has been a relationship between students with special needs and private schools, and that's not a requirement.
04:20Is that Ms. Gentle's point?
04:22Do you guys generally agree with that?
04:26Yeah, I think there, I have not heard anyone disagreeing with the premise or the idea or the promise of IDEA.
04:33I don't think anyone's disagreeing with that and the importance of doing that.
04:36One of the reasons we care so much.
04:38But parents cannot, you know, say, sort of challenge a school like they can in the public school setting, hey, wait a minute, you're not really doing the right thing by my kid's particular disability, right?
04:49With private schools, that's not a possibility.
04:51A plan.
04:53Private school families, they still have a plan, a private services plan.
04:58There's still a process in place.
05:00But is it enforceable in the way that it is against public schools?
05:04I think plenty of parents of students with disabilities would tell you that the IDEA process is incredibly broken.
05:09It's not enforced.
05:10And they have to hire very expensive lawyers to sue in order to get their FAPE rights, in order to get services and accommodations.
05:18This takes the lawyer out.
05:19Can I just say it's true that some aren't happy with it?
05:22It's also true that massive numbers of students, about 15% of the kids in the Virginia public school systems, are on IEPs.
05:29One of my kids was.
05:30I'm familiar.
05:30Most kids on IEPs end up working out of the IEP because the services that are provided under the IDEA through an IEP enable a student who has a special need to sort of get the, you know, extra that they need.
05:44And then they're mainstreamed with no IEP because there's been success.
05:49There are people who aren't happy with it who sue the Henrico School Board.
05:52I get that.
05:53But I think overwhelmingly for the 15% of kids in our public school systems, public school systems that are on IEPs, they are availing themselves of a whole lot more than they used to be able to before the IDEA was passed.
06:07Last thing I'll just say, and then I'm going to hand it back to you, Mr. Chair, I want to applaud the chairman who has now walked in, Senator Cassidy and some of my Republican colleagues for joining with us.
06:18When we complained at the Secretary of Education pausing these Title IV funds that were being used for literacy, you know, before school programs, after school programs, summer school programs, so kids wouldn't fall back.
06:32Twenty-three million withheld from Virginia, tens of millions from other states.
06:35When we put this on the table last week, a lot of Republicans joined in, leaned in pretty hard with Secretary McMahon while she is still pausing other funds, English language learners, which are about literacy, student mental health, which can advance literacy, at least on the 21st century community learning centers.
06:51Those dollars have been released with a bipartisan effort, and I thank Secretary McMahon for that, and I thank my colleagues for helping out.
