Rural Matters

A rule proposed by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services will reduce schools’ ability to access federal help to serve low-income students who receive special education services at school. More information is below. You can read the proposed changes and comment on them at the Centers for Medicaid and Medicare Services. (Rule CMS-2287-P) Deadline is tomorrow!

Under the proposed rule, schools would not be able to receive payments for “administrative” services or for most transportation provided to students in special education whose families are eligible for Medicaid.

In addition to cutting reimbursements for transportation to and from school, to school activities, and to outside therapeutic providers, the cuts would also affect administrative services such as outreach to families, referrals, or training for staff who work with these students. In addition, districts would not be able to use these funds for expanded physical, occupational and speech therapy programs for students, services which many students would not otherwise receive.

The changes are intended to meet the President’s budget goals and would cut $3.6 billion over five years. The reduction would force districts to reduce services to low-income students and/or pay for the services from the district’s general funds, which many districts find are increasingly strapped by other demands and requirements.

It is important to note that the rule change would not affect payments for direct medical services provided in schools to children who qualify through Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA)

Apart from the proposed cuts to Medicaid reimbursements for schools, however, the President’s budget also proposes additional cuts in federal funding for schools through IDEA. IDEA is the primary federal funding mechanism for supporting students who receive special education services at school. IDEA was authorized to provide 40% of funding for students with special needs in public schools. The Act has never been funded at that level, and the proposed Medicaid cuts would put IDEA funding at only 16%.

The Medicaid cuts are being carried out through an administrative process called a rule change. The public is allowed to comment on such rule changes, but the deadline is nearly here – it is November 6. To read the proposed rule, visit www.cms.hhs.gov/eRulemaking. You can also submit your comments electronically at the site -- scroll down to CMA-2287-P for this particular rule. Comments do not have to be formally composed.

You can read more about the proposed changes at:

http://www.sacbee.com/111/story/392837.html

http://www.nctimes.com/articles/2007/10/21/news/top_stories/19_30_6110_20_07.txt

Posted by Robin Lambert at 12:51 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

The fourth report in a biennial research series from the Rural Trust is released today.

Why Rural Matters 2007: The Realities of Rural Education Growth provides essential information on the condition of rural education in each of the 50 states.

This year's report also provides perspective on state policies that help - or hinder - rural students and the schools they attend.

The report uncovered new trends and new challenges facing rural educators. Overall, enrollment in schools located in communities with fewer than 2,500 people is up by 15%. This is a reversal of a long-standing trend of in rural education.

Among rural students of color, the enrollment increases were even more dramatic, with an overall increase of 55%.

Despite these enrollment increases, Why Rural Matters 2007 also shows that many rural schools continue to face a number of challenges, including high poverty levels, low teacher salaries, uneven distribution of federal Title I funds, and low student achievement--especially in states with high challenges and weak policy supports.

Continue reading "It's Here! Why Rural Matters 2007" »

Posted by Robin Lambert at 09:57 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Sometimes it seems to me that we live in a time with a prevailing ethic of I’ve-got-mine-you-take-care-of-your-own. Maybe it’s always been this way.

I was reflecting on this several weeks ago while I listened to yet another radio report of a wounded volunteer soldier back from Iraq whose family is losing almost everything as a result of his (in this case) service in the military. Do we have any sense of what we owe each other, I wondered, any sense of how we benefit from each other?

Later that day I began making calls to people in rural Arkansas for a story for Rural Policy Matters about ACRE, Advocates for Community and Rural Education. I talked to about eight people, mostly parents and community residents, including people who do not have kids in school but who nonetheless care.

I opened with a pretty general set of questions: tell me about ACRE and why you are a part of it.

The responses were a powerful antidote to what I heard on the radio.

Continue reading "Sharing Responsibility for Our Kids and Our Communities" »

Posted by Robin Lambert at 09:08 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Commentary on School Choice in South Carolina

This article also appeared in The Times and Democrat,
in Orangeburg, South Carolina on August 30, 2007.

Resting in their heavenly repose, South Carolina's civil rights pioneers of the 1930s and 1940s must be scratching their heads. A prominent African-American state senator, also a Democrat and minister, says many of his generational peers are longing for the days of racially segregated schools. Another minister says most African-American children "fared better when we were segregated."

These leaders are understandably frustrated. Too many children are not reaping the academic gains that African-Americans hoped would follow public school desegregation. On last year's state achievement test, more than 40,000 African-American students in grades three through eight scored "Below Basic" in English/Language Arts. An average of 60 percent of all African-American students in third through eighth grade performed at the Below Basic level in science.

There is some good news. Thousands of African-American students are performing well, scoring at the highest levels, "Proficient" or "Advanced," on the state test. However, thousands more have the unrealized potential to do so.

Proposals to solve students' academic problems abound, but many are simplistic. South Carolina has long favored such approaches in public policy. Human bondage would fuel economic development. Secession would free South Carolina of the federal yoke. Racial oppression and segregation would preserve "our way of life." Low taxes would attract industry. Providing a "minimally adequate education" will secure the state's future.

Now comes school choice...

Continue reading "GUEST AUTHOR: Hayes Mizell" »

Posted by GUEST AUTHOR at 09:52 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Status of Education in Rural America, a new report from the National Center on Education Statistics (NCES) has some pretty interesting information about rural schools.

For example, rural students face more challenges related to college access and participation than students in any other locale. High-poverty rural schools spend LESS per pupil than high-poverty urban schools and less than most other rural schools.

And, "remote" rural schools -- those that are more than 35 miles from a city and more than 10 miles from a town -- have higher rates of poverty than many urban schools. In fact, African American and American Indian/Native Alaskan students who attend remote rural schools are more likely to attend a high poverty school than are their peers in cities.

Despite these challenges, remote rural schools have higher averaged freshman graduation rates than all other locales except suburbs, which they equal.

But you wouldn’t learn this information from most news reports. Those tend to focus on how rural is "in the middle," doing better on most indicators than cities and not as well as suburbs.

That's because news coverage has focused mainly on the rural "averages" highlighted in the report's own summary.

The reality, however, is that “rural” is highly variable. Rural places differ from one another more dramatically and on more dimensions than most suburbs or cities.

Some rural schools in affluent communities have plenty of resources, long histories of public support, and lots of opportunity. In short, they skew up the rural averages.

On the other hand, there are hundreds of struggling rural districts that face poverty rates as high or higher than most of the nation’s poorest urban districts (see "The 'Rural 800' Districts"), and many have long-standing histories of political and social struggle. Yet these poor rural districts have even fewer financial and municipal resources than districts in most large cities, and they get less attention.

When indicators for the best-resourced rural schools are averaged with those for the most challenged schools, the result reveals little about either school setting. And the averages divert attention from real needs. And from real possibilities in rural schools, including struggling ones.

So what does the report have to say about rural schools that is revealing and important?

Continue reading "Rural Schools—Not So Much—In the Middle" »

Posted by Robin Lambert at 02:35 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)