Special Education Today newsletter 3(37)
News and info for the week beginning 4 March 2024
Guess what! I’m sending you yet another issue of Special Education Today. It covers the first week in March of 2024. You’re getting this message because you’ve subscribed (either free or paid—but special thanks to those who have paid subs!) or someone forwarded it to you. For those who are reading a forwarded copy, please create your own entry in the email database; it’s free; just click the button at the end of this paragraph. Thanks for reading!
As an advance organizer: If you’re reading your second, third or 100th SET newsletter, you probably already know that there is a pretty consistent structure to these missives. This not is not an exception: Please read on to find that this edition of the newsletter has (a) a table of contents listing the posts from last week, (b) a couple of notes about subscribers and their activities, and (c) a sprinkle of commentary.
Table of contents
Here is the usual list of post from the previous week. There were four posts:
Special Education Today newsletter 3(36): The news and info for 26 February 2024
Weighing kids down with bologna: Weighted vests? Say what?
Parents sue LEA for transportation problems: Should kids with disabilities miss instruction and more because schools aren't providing required transportation?
Women leaders in special education—redux: Here's another list of super contributors.
If you missed any of these when they were published, that might be remedied in the future by regularly visiting the Special Education Today Web site. Although subscribers often receive mailings from me informing them about new posts on the site, that is not always the case. I post messages sometimes without announcing them in an email message.
Appreciation notes and status update
To y’all who mention SET in a Tweet on Xitter or in a post on FB: Thank you! Your actions help other parents, special educators, administrators, advocates, and others learn about SET, and I welcome those other folks to read SET. Total active subscriptions number > 660, an increase of 13 in the last 30 days according to Substack. Anyway, please keep clicking on those share buttons (and equivalents). Not each share will increase the base of addresses, but I appreciate your help.
Clay K., Adelaide D., Tina C., Joel M., Kathleen L., Ed S., and Jane B. (and maybe someone else whom I missed?) threw likes at posts on the wall…and they stuck. Thank you each and every one for amplifying the posts that you read. Much appreciated..
I didn’t catch anyone being good by commenting this past week. Oh well. I suspect some folks had an urge to do so, but resisted the urge. Don’t let yourselves fall into that trap. Just click the “comment” button and type in a few words. It’d be great if you provided something more constructive than, “C’mon, John. Grow a brain.” Maybe something like, “Hey, I think you got it wrong in the 2nd and 3rd paragraphs. Review Sarah Smith and Joe Blow, ‘Immaturity is not really all that there is to dyslexia.,’”
Speaking of interacting with SET, I’d like to thank all y’all who subscribe and read SET. If I’m reading the data correctly, in the past 28 days there have been almost 7000 visits to SET posts with each visitor looking at an average of just more than 2 pages. The number of daily visits has ranged from a low of 31 to a high of > 1400.
Commentary
I was happy to welcome visitors here at SET Central the week of 4 March. First, long-time colleague and pal, Li-Yu Hung, paid a visit; Li-Yu is the former dean for National Taiwan Normal University, former president the Taiwan Association for Learning Disabilities, and still a professor at NTNU—and those are only a few of her accomplishments. Pei Jung, Li-Yu’s former student who is now in the midst of doctoral studies at the University of Texas, Austin, was accompanying Li-Yu. The three of us were driving around the outskirts of the thriving community of Batesville, VA, when we came upon a cherry orchard. It was quite a lovely view, as I hope readers will concur.
Second, some of you may remember meeting Gertrude (Gerty) in an earlier post or two. A couple of days before Li-Yu came to visit, Gerty stopped by to wish me a happy birthday. She inspected my birdthay [sic] cupcake carefully, managing not to inhale nor extinguish the flame atop the candle on it.
Without additional ado, here are my recommendations about your behavior: Wear your seatbelts, take steps to stay healthy, and help others stay healthy. Of course, please teach your children well (meaning systematically and explicitly).
Thanks for reading!
JohnL
SET Editor guy
Charlottesville
SET should not be confused with a product with the same name that is published by the Council for Exceptional Children nor other products with similar names. SET predated other publication by decades. Despite my appreciation for CEC and the efforts by others to promote special education, this product is not designed to promote other organizations or publications.