Man, if everybody could see us on video, Jacob, we were harmonized in perfect tune with each
other.
Yeah, you know, Jacob, me, Dr. Tim Slecker, and yes, it's busted pencils fully-letted education
talk, educated educators talking education, call our line, 608, 557, 8577. That way you
can leave a message for Johnny, you can also text that line and leave a message for Johnny.
Where Jacob, I'm going to put this out there for the home room today. Actually, I am soliciting
feedback today in this episode of the home room, because I going to my work today, I was
listening to a little bit of a talk show, talk, talk radio, I guess, neither left nor
right, but more newsy type of talk radio. And I heard something actually quite alarming
to the fact that you ever know, like, you knew you knew something, but you didn't know
the extent of the depth or the kind of overwhelmingness of going, oh my God, I knew that, but
I didn't know that.
And sometimes you know something as a basic factual statement, but you don't have, you
don't let the gravity of the, the immensity of the situation really sink into you until
you have that moment where things start to click.
Yeah, it's like holy crap. And that's what happened to me today, listening to a little
bit. And Jacob, we, you know, this is one thing I really want if you're a listener, well,
then you're listening. So that would be you right now. So if you are, if you happen
to be one of those people who are listening right now, listener, we really do, we want
to hear from you on the topics that I'm about to bring up because Jacob, we know that
the, you know, the education department, the department of education, federal, whether
it was Doge or the current administration, but and also the new secretary of education,
what was the number one goal that was going to happen to the Department of Education, Jacob?
I believe the number one goal was to have it not exist anymore, but I also more things
like we need more conservative ideas in teaching.
Yeah, it was like this kind of what do you want to say? Oh, yeah, which one is it? Are
they shutting it down or are they just repositioning it to, you know, promote only a certain
ideology? Yeah. But actually the decommissioning while it would take an act of Congress and
to actually totally do away with it. But what has happened, Jacob, through, you know, Doge,
the cuts, the decimation of the people who actually worked there and nonpartisan people
whose job was simply that they worked for the Department of Education. Some of those
offices have been cut down to the point of about 5% of the original workforce is what's
still there today. I didn't know that number. Yes. You know, but what came across though
was it wasn't just that number, but they were talking about the fact that we have a special
education law in this country that every child in American public schools must be assessed
if there's a sense that there could be a special education concerned. And then if special
education services are pointed out that would be beneficial to every child in an American public
school, that then we must provide individualized instruction, instruction, which meant an individual
education plan. So every child in our country gets an individual education plan that would address
their own special education need. And this isn't something you go, boy, wouldn't that be nice
if we required that. Jacob, we do require that. It's law. This is the federal law. You have to have
these individualized education plans for our special needs students in schools. Now Tim, I assume
that this is leading up to you telling me that that is happening and everything's going great.
So we have roughly at least according to the news I was listening to this morning about 7 million
children in this country that are receiving some form of special education. Support services,
whether it's the assessment, to check for special education needs, or whether it's the actual
services that are then provided for the special needs. So Jacob, all of that requires resources,
resources, money. So money has to be distributed. But you know how, excuse me there Jacob,
you know how money gets distributed, don't you? In this administration, I've heard in a brown paper bag.
Well, but I would say possibly through congressional appropriations and then the executive
having to spend that money. And guess what? The money is there, maybe not now during the
shutdown, but the money is there. It's already been appropriated. You need people who work in the
office to actually distribute and send it and figure out where it's going and how it's to be allocated
and how much goes to this school and how much goes to this district and how much more assessment
needs to be quantified and qualified. So think about that 7 million kids. And that law, and
has typically been then administered through the Department of Education. And the office of special
education is now currently working with about 95% fewer of the staff that work there right now.
95% reduction in staff. We're dealing with here on busted pencils, a 33% reduction in our staff. And
I thought this was hard. So just imagine having 95% of that staff gone. Tim, I feel like the
Trump administration's approach to this education department situation has been kind of like somebody.
And I don't know how Trump would know about this sort of real estate in propriety. But it feels like
somebody who wants to kick a renter out. And because they're not allowed to do to regulations and
the rules and you have to give people notice, they're like, okay, well, I'll just make it as bad as
possible to live there. Right. So he can't get rid of the Department of Education. So instead,
they're like, well, we'll get rid of all the staff. So there's simply no one there to sign off on
these things. I mean, it's a crazy convoluted scheme. We're not breaking any laws. Jacob, the law
is the special education federal law is still in place. We haven't rescinded the law. We haven't
broken the law. We just the people who used to make the law actually have teeth and work.
Those people just don't work here anymore. We're not getting rid of the guidelines to say,
you know, proper workplace behavior. We just fired everybody in HR.
You know, we still got the regulations. They're just we fired all the enforcers.
Well, that just made me think then, how is that actually playing out right now?
You know, so that's coming into for this home room this this morning when people are listening
to this or if you're not listening to it early Monday morning, whenever you're listening to this,
how is this actually being felt out in the world? You listener have a special needs child,
a special needs relative. You're a teacher working with special needs children.
I don't think, you know, because those statistics I heard this morning, what I didn't hear was
and here's the reality on the ground in classroom 23 in Jacob chairman of the board elementary
school, third grade teachers. I didn't hear that. And that's what I think we actually need to hear
is what's happening because of the quote, doge cuts and the reduction of the federal work force
when the services that that workforce typically provided are not there. And so that's what I was
thinking. I'm like, we need to hear from you out there because this is what's not being told,
statistics are being told, but we don't know the stories of the child who didn't get what
federal law requires they get. And remember this too, Jacob, what they're required to get to
was just a baseline kind of foundational stuff. It's not even, well, let's say, you know, I'd say
a lot of people will go, it's barely adequate. Yeah, well, you know, go ahead. Absolutely. Yeah,
my brother Alex is an adult with special needs. So we've gone through the education system,
getting various services and going through it. And I think everybody who has a special needs
person in their life going through the education system has a kind of a checkered record with
how satisfied they are with things. But I know one thing, Tim, is you're never going to find
somebody who said that the problem with the services they had is that it was just too much money
was given to it, too much of a service. You know, these services that people get, whether they're
perfect or not, these are important. I mean, these are really important services. And Tim,
you and Johnny have talked about during the pandemic, the learning loss that people suffered
in some of these situations and to what degree it is. But a little bit of missing learning can really
add up over time. Imagine for special needs kids out there right now who could be getting
their plans created who are missing out on these things. This is time they don't get back.
Exactly. And it's the early interventions, especially for special needs people.
The early interventions are huge in determining the trajectory of what can happen for them.
The early identification to Jake, I mean, that, you know, and so the those early identification
assessments that are expensive. And that's where the federal government people like, what's
a federal department of education do anyway? They provide the funding that absolutely is necessary
to provide those services, whether it's early identification, whether it's creating the resources
that allow a team to build an individualized education plan, whether that individualized
education plan requires certain specific types of resources. That's what the federal department
of education makes sure happens. And no, we're not saying perfectly, but make sure something happens
in a way that we're taking care of our truly our most vulnerable out there. And so, you know,
I'm just thinking for this home room, what can we do on busted pencils? Well, what we can do, Jacob,
we could tell the stories of the families, of the teachers, of the schools that are being
impacted by the reduction of the unnecessary workforce. So that people can actually start to hear the
truly, you know, the stories about behind statistics that statistics never can tell.
You know, so what I'm putting out there today, Jacob, is truly a call for any listener.
Or if you're a listener who knows somebody that can contribute to us, just seriously reach out
608-557-8577. You can leave a voicemail for us. You can send us a text message. You can go to
the civic media website where it says contact, contact civic media, the entire civic media, you know,
machine. Let them know that you have a story that you want to share with busted pencils,
that you would like to be a guest to come and talk about the realities of what's happening
with this reduction of workforce in the Department of Education with special needs and special
education. That's what I thought we could do this morning, Jacob. Tim, I think that's a fantastic idea.
I'm looking forward to hearing from our listeners on this topic. I think it's a really important one.
And I think, like you said, having an individual story can do a lot more to getting people to
understand a situation than citing the statistics can. You can look at, you know, 95% reduction
in force. That's a number. But when you hear about somebody who's claimed, did not get in,
somebody who didn't get their assessment, that's a lot different. I think you're absolutely right.
People need to hear these things. So there it is. One more time if you're listening though. Okay,
right away, the number is 6085578577. Call, leave a message, text directly. We want to hear your
stories. We want to hear from you too. If you're willing to come on and share those stories,
that's what, you know, back to what busted pencils has always been about Jacob.
But now it's time for your moment of Zen.
Education becomes most rich and alive when it confronts the reality of moral conflict in the world.
Thank you all for listening to busted pencils and don't forget you can catch us every Monday
for home room, Wednesdays for class and session, Fridays for producers, choice, and of course,
dear listener, you can find us every single Saturday at 3 p.m. Central for one hour of your favorite
blue collar scholars, Tim and Johnny, and me, producer Jacob, and keep Buston pencils.