My husband and I are both retired public school educators...
He was a Superintendent and I was a high school librarian. This Betsy DeVos appointment is killing us...I read after the election that one third of NEA members voted for tRump, I hope they are proud of their decision. I hate republicans for the way they hate America. May all of their heads implode....fuck them all.
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I am 100% sure that the GOP wants to destroy special education. 
have been getting screwed big-time since Raygun started busting unions in earnest--and yet they keep voting in the predators.
Faux Noise and Limpballs have perfected misdirecting the anger from 'puke policies onto minorities, liberals, dems, etc.
Also, 'puke politicians have diligently worked to hide the consequences of their actions thru legislative sleight-of-hand, e.g. disguising SS cuts as age raises.
Dunno what it will take to wake up the low-information crowd.
She once told me about a pair of brothers who were hired out to work at local farms. When finals came, she was able to prevail on the employers to let one of the brothers off to come to school that day, but the other brother was forced to stay on the farm and work. After all these years, she started crying over that boy. She's been gone since 1998, I can't imagine what she would think now... 
She was born in Schuylerville and her first job in that one room schoolhouse was in Northumberland. My aunt and I looked for it once and thought we found the building. It was across the road from her grandmother's house. She cared for her ailing grandmother at the time and could see the house from the schoolhouse. If her grandmother was in trouble, she put a cloth in the window, at least that's what she told me...
She said that back then women had a choice of being a teacher or a nurse and, for her, the choice was easy. She took the teacher's exams at 17 during the 1918 flu epidemic when she was unwell. Some of her students in that school were older than she was. She remained a teacher all her life, I learned a lot from her since it wasn't just her profession, but a real calling... 
Some of these families were so poor that they hired their children out and it was just the luck of the draw where they ended up. Of course, this was well before Roosevelt, my grandmother took the teacher's exam in 1918 during the flu epidemic. She got sick, but was healthy enough to survive it. Her mother died when she was 13 so she was fortunate to live with her grandmother. And she always remembered those first students, some of whom were older than she was, and some of their stories broke her heart. She knew that an education, even back then, could make all the difference for them...
It was a much different world back then. My grandmother was born in 1900 and saw so many changes that it's mind boggling! She married in 1923 and had 4 children, a girl and 3 boys. My Dad was the oldest boy and I was so fortunate to have been especially close to her. My grandfather died young, when my Dad was only 12, but she valued education and all of her kids graduated from college.
There's so much that I still wish I could ask her. I realize that my life could be much different if it wasn't for her. She told me once that if she was born now that she'd want to become an environmentalist... 
grandmother would also. She was a very intelligent and educated woman who saw two of her three children through college in the 19-teens and 20s, but as a woman with a strong German accent in those days she couldn't have gotten an appropriate job. She needed one because she divorced her husband for reasons never divulged--unheard of in her society! So she dug up her half-plus acre and went to work growing flowers for the cut flower trade. On the bus every morning in the small hours to deliver them to the central city. This enterprise even apparently supported her through the Depression, though what on earth she did during Spokane's ferocious winters I never thought to ask. Her garden was a delight to visit when I was small and she was still at it, though. My aunt never understood why she also grew flowers she couldn't sell, and my grandmother always complained about how much space the lilac hedge around two sides took up but never removed a single plant.
Sadly, her younger descendants, who had far better opportunities, thanks in part to her, and who all hire gardening services and throw around more money in a month than she did in a lifetime, aren't nearly as impressed with her as I am (somewhat embarrassed, actually), but I hope respect will grow as they get older.
This was back in 2009 when they became the majority and hired a Friedman Foundation darling superintendent. So charters and vouchers were their focus. What they planned but were shut down by an irate parent community is they were going to take the recently vacated public library and turn it into a SPED school. We don't know if the students already in their home schools would have transferred there. If they would only take new special needs students.
After a huge protest and community outrage, they dropped it. But something tells me now with Betsy De Vos, they will again try to segregate these kids 
sent one back - told him that the DeVos $60,500 let him sell his soul (of course, I realize he doesn't really have one!) to screw over public schools. 
You are right - he is a sanctimonious A$$! 
This is terrible.. my sister is a retired teacher too and guidance councelor. I'm sure she's glad she's out but hurts for her colleagues.
but, I believe we will all feel significant pain before this drama is over.