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good morning, my name is Tonya Whitlock.I have 4 children currently in the
Hillsborough County School District.
I am here because I am
very very concerned with the decisions that are being made
for our students in the ESE population and and I feel i t's very important
that's at the parents who are actually within the system and have children who are dealing
in the system speak out
about the current things that are going on
I'm going to kind of start with going over some laws that
I'm very sure that most of you here know are familar with here know but because of
the recent changes to ESE
and busing children from their neighborhood schools and
the segregation children of in this school district I felt like it was pertinent to kind of
give us all a refresher of some of these laws
the first one I am going to start with is Brown versus the Board of Education
I share again that we're all familiar with it
the United States Supreme Court declared states laws establishing separate public
schools for students based on race
unconstitutional. The court's laws unanimously
The court's unanimous decision stated that separate education facilities
are inherently unequal.
again, separate educational facilities are inherently unequal.
The Rehabilitation Act of 1973 section 504 extends civil rights to individuals with disabilities
and allows accommodations so that they may fully
participate in school, employment and other settings that receive federal funding
section 504 guarantees all students the right to
free public education regardless of a disability
schools must
afford students with disabilities with equal opportunities to obtain the same result
to gain the same benefit
to reach the same level of achievement
as students without disabilities. I want to stop there for a second
this is my son Tres and he's going to be talking to you in a minute
We're not from here, we were blessed to be able to live in different states and
I'm so grateful that Tres' was allowed inclusion in the states that he lived in
through his elementary years
I can't imagine at five years old
stifling him into a classroom and saying that I'm going to
that I don't believe in your potential that I don't believe in your growth
and basically when your placing a child in an ESE placement that's what you're saying
because we all know that the standards are drastically different in an ESE setting
then they are in a typical classroom setting Tres went through
his elementary school through fifth-grade and he did amazing.
He was on the honor roll, he loved being be part to be part of his community and the kids that were in his classes.
But the amazing thing was it wasn't about just Tres. His teachers every year
would tell me, the students are amazing with Tres.
He's making an impact on them. He made an impact on them.
He made an impact on them as much as they made an impact on Tres. Tres grew up with wanting the same kind of goals.
He wanted to be on the honor roll.
He wanted to make As. He didn't see himself as a child with a disability because we
didn't allow it to happen. If we would have placed him in an ESE classroom that's exactly what we've been doing
you have a disability, we're going
to confine you and we're not going to allow you to grow. In 1975 Congress inacted the Education for all
Handicapped Children Act,
later as we all know the Education for Individuals with Disabilities Education Act
IDEA. It states that children with disabilities must be educated in the Least
Restrictive Environment
and I know that that phrase has become very subjective with many
people, but if you go on to read it states
that children with disabilities need the maximum extent
ok and to the maximum extent educated with children
right who are not disabled.
This placement must be as possible to the child's home and in the school that he or she would attend
if non-disabled. I'd really likes to stop and ask the School Board
are you really actually telling us that you are trying to educate our children
and follow these guidelines to the maximum
extent possible? I would have to question if it's even being done
at the minimum extent possible, because we're transporting them
away from their neighborhood schools .
We're placing them in classrooms where their standard of education
is the same across the board.
Was that buzz to tell me I'm almost done? 30 seconds. Okay.
So, quickly I just want to say if we were to go back to the 1960s
and we were to talk to those leaders who were vehemently
against desegregation, we would hear the conviction in their voices
of them stating why they believe their decisions and what they were doing
to those children were just. Just as I believe
that some of you and some of the board members that have spoken
believe that their decisions are just.But I fear that the Hillsborough County School Board is standing
on the wrong side of history.
Thank you.