Friday Reading

Keeping up with educational issues and news isn't easy. From time to time we want to share some articles and resources we have encountered and hope you find them as informative and helpful as we have.

Section 504
An excellent discussion of Section 504 by Mary Durheim looks at what this law can do for students, how it is implemented, and what to do if you believe it has not been appropriately applied to your student. It's a particularly thorough review of a law that parents can often find confusing.

Adaptive Equipment
A recent article in the New York Times features a public school physical therapist who uses an innovative approach -- and some strong carpentry skills -- to create custom furniture and other adaptive equipment for children with physical disabilities. We love the way he thinks through what these students need to be part of classroom activities and hope his approach, which is very low cost and highly effective, can inspire parents and professionals to "think outside the box" when addressing the needs of students with disabilities.

What Do Students Need to Learn?
As students are in the midst of Common Core testing, and as a record number of parents here in New York and around the country have elected to "opt out" of these tests, it is timely to think about what students should be learning -- and why. Harvard Graduate School of Education (GSE) Professor David Perkins has addressed this question in a new book, Future Wise: Educating Our Children for a Changing World, and you can read an article summarizing his perspective in ED, the magazine of the GSE.

Resources for Children with Special Needs 
This nonprofit organization operates only in New York City, but they offer an array of resources - hotlines for questions, workshops, and special programs (most in English and Spanish) -- for students with a wide range of disabilities. Take a look at a video describing what they do and how they do it.