Educational Leadership - December 2011/January 2012

Association agreed. 1

The final question was, How many hours a week should therapists work with stu dents, as opposed to provid ing consultation, conducting testing, and writing reports? It turned out that some therapists were with students 80 percent of the week and others less than 40 percent. A thought ful review of the value of this noninstructional time suggested establishing a target of 70 per cent direct service.

Applying the concept of academic return on investment, the district reduced speech and language therapy costs 35 per cent by creating small groups and thoughtful schedules. It was able to use these cost savings to hire more reading teachers, thus increasing overall student learning through an expanded reading program.

valuable, ask how much learn ing is taking place, how many students are being helped, and what the cost is per student served. (The suggestions out lined in “What Works Better?” on p. 38 can help you measure the effectiveness of individual programs or strategies.)

Managing a shrinking bud get is never easy or fun. The academic return on investment approach provides a path to prevent politics, preferences, and tradition from guiding these difficult decisions. It puts student learning and student achievement data at the center of the resource allocation discussion.

Everyone trying to balance a
school district budget, I
suspect, intuitively tries to
balance learning and cost. Few
would lobby to keep an
ineffective program or to cut a
highly effective, lowcost
program. The reason budget
debates often get heated is that different
stakeholders have their own assump
tions about the value of particular
programs. Having hard data won’t make
the process more enjoyable, but it will
help keep the discussion calm, data
driven, and childcentered—just what
we need in these tough times. EL

1Cirrin, F. M., Schooling, T., Nelson, N., Diehl, S., Flynn, P., Staskowski, M., Torrey, T., & Adamczyk, D. (2010). Evidencebased systematic review: Effects of different service delivery models on communication out comes for elementary school age children. Language, Speech, and Hearing Services in Schools, 41, 233–264.

Paraprofessionals

Too often the discussion at the IEP meeting embraces the idea that if para professional support is good, then more paraprofessional support must be better! Although it seems like common sense that an aide could only be helpful, the reality is just the opposite. The presence of an aide can reduce a student’s contact with his or her teacher and prevent friendships from forming with class mates. A student struggling in math may need an aide in that subject but may be fine on his or her own for the rest of the day. Moreover, even when providing an aide initially appears to make sense, another form of support may prove both more effective and more costeffective.

For example, a traditional response
to a student with a behavior challenge
would be to assign a paraprofessional to
help the student control any outbursts
that occur. A better solution for both the
student and the budget, however, may
be to have a skilled behavior specialist
work with the student and teacher for a
few days to develop coping and preven
tion strategies. Spending more in the
short run will result in a better out
come—and a lower cost over time.

Putting Student Achievement
at the Center

These three examples of costeffective ways to raise achievement for students with disabilities rewrite the equation that says that reductions in special edu cation spending must hurt children.

Academic return on investment can be applied to general education, district strategy, and operations as well. Although the particulars vary, the concept is the same. Instead of assum ing that all current spending is equally