Navigating Support Systems for Special Needs Children
A Conversation About Resources in Tennessee with Will Edwards
SEASON 1 | EPISODE 10
As the parent of a special needs child, Will Edwards knows first hand how complex it can be to receive support in the school system - and in life - and he’s on a mission to change that.
Will sat down with our host Liz Durham to offer insight into care in Tennessee. He shares his experience advocating for his child with autism at many levels, from working with guidance counselors in the public school system, to reps on the school board.
In the world of disability support, it often comes down to money. Will walks us through the process, and helps us understand whether it’s possible to close the gap in the education budget for special needs. Plus, Will offers advice for parents and families facing similar hurdles.
This is an important episode full of resources. If you know someone who could benefit from tuning in, please share. Special thanks to Will for helping support our Tennessee families who need it most.
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Will Edwards 0:02
So there's a case manager that's assigned generally that case manager is the special ed teacher at the school where the child is enrolled, that really serves to coordinate what's going to happen with the academic setting, not outside healthcare settings within the healthcare setting, you're really on your own. So it's a difficult system to navigate.
Liz 0:30
Okay, everybody, thank you for joining us for another episode of being different today. I am really excited to have wil Edwards with me actually interviewed him before and screwed up the audio royally. So he has been gracious enough to give me a second chance to talk to him. And I'm really thankful because he is a wealth of information. And I didn't know anything about these topics until I talked to him the first time. So hopefully you can learn something from it. Well, thanks for being here today.
Will Edwards 0:58
Absolutely. Glad to be back with you. Lis Yeah, thank
Liz 1:00
you. Can you tell us just a little bit about your background and what you do now, specifically on the special needs front in Tennessee?
Will Edwards 1:09
Sure. So let me just start with I have a special needs child, I've got a 10 year old with autism who's pretty severely impacted. He's nonverbal communicates with a device. So he has an iPad with a program in it. That really is his words, we actually call it his talker. So we tell him to, you know, when he needs to speak to us to speak with his talker. So this is the special needs arena is really a passion of mine, primarily driven by that at the state level that we've been involved on really two fronts. The first was the legislature created a council I guess about 2017, called the Tennessee Council on autism spectrum disorder. And what the legislature directed that council to do under the law was to essentially look at the lifespan of individuals with autism. So autistic individuals, and how we are providing services to them in the state of Tennessee, and more importantly, where are the gaps, so identify those gaps and report back to the legislature on those issues. And then number two is a serve on the Tennessee council for developmental and intellectual disabilities. And that council is a little bit unique as it comes to state agencies because it's quasi state and quasi federal. So it's created under federal law, but it serves as a state agency. And that council really serves as the quarterback, if you will, for various agencies that that serves individuals with disabilities across the state. So we look to coordinate how services are provided. And again, looking at gaps for for those individuals as well.
Liz 2:45
Did you get involved with that when you were under Governor Haslam, or is that later?
Will Edwards 2:50
That's correct. So the autism council was created by legislation during the Haslam administration's Governor Haslam appointed me I was thankful to Governor Lee for reappointing me to that. And then governor Lee also appointed me to the Council on Developmental Disabilities.
Liz 3:07
Gotcha. How does it work in the state of Tennessee, specifically in the public school system? I know you and I were talking before and you kind of explained that people don't really understand that our total health care for a lot of these special needs individuals is run through the school system. Can you expand on that a little
Will Edwards 3:26
bit? Absolutely. That comes as a surprise to a lot of people. And this was really highlighted during COVID as an issue for families of special needs students. So like it or not, the US government has directed that our educational system really serve as a health care system for the students. So from age three, to age 21, our public schools are directed to provide certain services for individuals with disabilities, that could range from speech therapy, to occupational therapy, to physical therapy, to behavioral type therapy, all that occurs within the academic setting. So that comes as a surprise. A lot of people also don't realize that it extends beyond your traditional K 12. Education. So I mentioned a moment ago, it starts at age three. And then likewise, from age 18 to 21, you can actually extend your child's ability to stay in the public school system and continue to receive services and a lot of folks with or families that are impacted with a child with special needs will take advantage of that opportunity to extend their child's high school career until age 21. There are various services that may not be sitting in a classroom, but there are various services that are attached to the public school system such as vocational opportunities that families take advantage of in that 18 to 21 gap. So it really is a unique position because most people think of education and academics, while as parents of special needs children will tell you it goes much beyond that in our public school system. During COVID, that the highlight that I mentioned a moment ago was during the shutdown those a lot of those students were not receiving those services, not just in Knox County, but across the country. So if we look back to March 2020, through, really, I guess, September, August, September 2020, when a lot of the school systems were shut down, those services were not provided. The other unique thing is, a lot of students with special needs also attend summer school. Knox County, we have that availability as well. So that was a difficult and challenging time for a lot of those children in 2020, who aren't able to receive outside services that did not receive them during that closure period. I hope that if we're ever in a situation like that, again, as a country, we'll remember what happened to those kids during that six month period, and provide a means for them to continue to receive services.
Liz 5:54
So once they turn 21. Is there still federal money for these kids who still need continued therapy and stuff like that, or what happens after that?
Will Edwards 6:06
Yeah, we can talk all day about what the what the approach is, after age 21. A lot of this is state driven by activities that at the state level that we say these are important to us. So there's a number of state agencies that provide services, whether that's 10 care, or the Department of Intellectual disabilities, or vocational rehab, which we call Voc Rehab. So there's a there's a host of coordinators, if you will, that provide services to individuals with with disability, and then on the local level, you'll have your service providers. For example, in Knox County, we have what's called Sir toma and Sar. Tama does a great job of providing services to individuals with disabilities, but they provide residential housing for individuals with disabilities here in Knox County. So it's really a state effort. There's not a lot of effort, not saying we don't do a good job at the city and county level, but most of those services are generated at the state level. And it's gonna look different for from family to family with those services look like a lot of folks in our our disability community do rely on Tim care, pretty heavily, though, both for vocational issues which also fall under 10 care, but also obviously, health insurance and health care.
Liz 7:25
So when you have a child with special needs, do you have like a guidance counselor or someone to guide you through all this? Or are you just trying to figure it out as you go? How to know what to do?
Will Edwards 7:36
Great question. So it's really amazed that you have to learn to navigate. So there is a case manager that's assigned generally that case manager is the special ed teacher at the school where the the child is enrolled, that really serves to coordinate what's going to happen within the academic setting, not outside within the healthcare settings within the healthcare setting, you're really on your own. So it's a difficult system to navigate. What will private insurance cover? Or if you have a child, that's um, TennCare? What will they cover? Will they cover this therapy that your child may need or not? And parents really spend a lot of time trying to navigate that system. But within the education setting, it's generally going to be the case manager or the special education teacher.
Liz 8:21
Do you have any advice for families who are coming up against this hurdle? Like is are there things that you've learned along the way on how to navigate that? Or do people help you and mentor you through the process
Will Edwards 8:33
or question? So a lot of times, it's where are the resources? Where do I find help? How can I locate them, and Tennessee has launched what's called the disability Pathfinder through Vanderbilt. And disability Pathfinder is really designed to be a one stop location for service providers. So the family needs a therapist in this area for this purpose, they can get a disability Pathfinder and hopefully, find a provider. That service is offered on the web, but they also take phone calls, because a lot of our rural Tennessee and still don't have access to the web. So they'll they'll take phone calls as well. And a lot of effort and energy has been put into ensuring that we've got service providers across the state. So that's kind of the number one place I would I would point to for resources. The second the Autism Society beast in the city has done something similar. They have what's called the ASD hub, and they have local service providers listed there as well. Unfortunately, just because there's a service provider in your area doesn't mean they have the capacity to serve. We've got a very critical shortage of providers across the state, particularly in our rural areas. So this the state has particularly through the Vanderbilt Kennedy Center started initiatives related to telehealth in order to provide rural providers with resources in their areas. as well. So we hope that that continues to grow. That's one good thing that came out of COVID, we hope that those services will continue to grow as well so that we can provide services more efficiently in those rural areas.
Liz 10:13
Yeah, listening to Anthony, our producer, talk about his wife being involved with the kits for those rural areas. I had no idea that at those schools, it's just like the school nurse who is doing all of this health care for these families. And I just was not aware. And so that's really like, concerning, you know, it's sad. That's right.
Will Edwards 10:34
So our schools really do are important to more than just the academic center, particularly in rural areas. They serve as a health care spot as well, our Department of Health generally will serve that role as well in our rural areas, but they're not day to day in front of parents and students. So the school nurses do a good job and, and have a really important job and helping the educators identify what needs are and providing services.
Liz 11:02
Gotcha. Well, when I first talked to you, we were talking about you running for school board. And so I had a lot of questions about that. And these kind of go hand in hand, which I didn't even realize that at the time when I was writing out questions I had for you. But could you tell us what the school board in Tennessee does, what authority and decisions do they have for curriculum etc,
Will Edwards 11:24
happy to jump in there on the local school board issues. It's a bit a bit of misnomer that we call it the local education agencies, which is in Knox County, the Notts County Board of Education because these are really state law created entities. So the state of Tennessee still has a lot of oversight and control of what happens in our local school districts. Not withstanding that we like to say that we have local control in Tennessee, that's just not the case, the legislature still has significant amount of control of what happens in our local school board. So really, our school board has three primary responsibilities. One is the budget, which is a very large number two is selecting the director of schools that we like to call the superintendent, and three is casting the general vision for the county. Going back to the budget, essentially seven out of every $10 and Notts County, with respect to taxpayer dollars are spent in our local local schools. So the school board has no taxing authority whatsoever. It's completely at the mercy of what the governor and the legislature allocate, and then what the county commission allows them to spend. So every dollar that's spent in Knox County is approved by the Knox County commission. Commission has a very large budget and Knox County, I believe that's approaching right at a billion dollars a year now. I had no idea. But a lot of that goes to education. So most of that's already spent before it comes to them. But that's one of the primary roles of the Board of Education.
Liz 13:03
Does the special needs part fall under that part of the budget that that school board is involved on
Will Edwards 13:09
a very complex question. So the special needs component is funded locally, by local dollars, by state dollars, but also by federal dollars. So the the US Department of Education will fund it will fund particular services for students with special needs, it's not 100 cents on the dollar. So the state and local impact of that is we have to fill the gap with respect to that. So for example, if a student has a one on one aid, the federal government will fund a portion of that aid, that the state and local budgets have to fill the gap on that related there to the state of Tennessee just last year passed a new education funding bill that hopefully will help to close the gap with respect to those students with special needs and funding related to needs they have. So what what the new funding model is, is basically it looks at seven or eight different categories. And depending on where the student falls, additional funding is allocated to the local district for that. One of the disadvantages of that is the local district is not required to spend that dollar. They're just allocated that dollar for that particular student. So even though the dollars allocated because of the student, that doesn't mean the dollar is going to get spent on the student. I'm hoping that that will follow later on. But that's not currently the way it's drafted.
Liz 14:39
What happens if it doesn't get spent,
Will Edwards 14:41
it just goes into the general the state dollars are allocated to the county and then the county determines how do we want to spend those dollars. It's not a directive that you must spend it in this way. It's here's $1 that you're entitled to. And it's up to you on how you're going to spend
Liz 14:59
it Interesting. Okay, so then there's the school board also responsible for like giving teachers raises and I know that we were talking about with the special needs you were saying that a lot of those people their job retention is terrible, because they're only paid like $10 An hour or something crazy like that.
Will Edwards 15:16
Right? So the school board is responsible for giving those individual wages. And I think right now they're actually looking at a salary review. For those what I'll call service providers, so those extra hands in the classrooms, the teachers, a special education aides that support the general education teachers and the special education teachers as well. So yes, they are responsible for setting those salaries and those expenditures.
Liz 15:43
Okay. Is the school board responsible at all for the curriculum? Like, is Common Core still being taught? Do they have any input in that? How does all that work?
Will Edwards 15:53
So a lot of people think the answer is yes, but the school board has very limited interaction with the curriculum, because it's largely set at the state level. So if you think of education, it's really four prongs. It's the US Department of Education. It's the state of Tennessee and related, they're to the State Board of Education, the Tennessee Department of Education, and then our local school board. So all of those have some involvement in setting curriculum, the State Board of Education designs, or sets our academic standards. So you hear a lot of people talk about academic standards. So back in 2015, I believe it was the Haslam administration repealed Common Core, the legislature then describe certain criteria for curriculum and the state board can tweak that and set the overall academic standards. So there's a constant ongoing review, and I forget where we are in the cycle. We may be a math this year. But the state board of education is constantly looking at those standards. We have a representative or every congressional district in Tennessee has a representative that sits on the State Board of Education, but they're really the ones that are driving your curriculum and the standards, they don't actually select the textbooks that comes through what we call the state textbook Commission, which is largely overseen by the Tennessee Department of Education, the Tennessee Department of Education and that state textbook, correct, our commission will select textbooks based on the standards that are set by the Board of Education at the state level. And then ultimately, the State Board of Education will approve a textbook. So basically what the local board so the Knox County Board of Education will get is a menu of options from the state of here are textbook selections that you can make. And there they have to operate within the constraints of what that textbook commission is set along with the standards from the state as well. So they have very little control over curriculum and textbooks.
Liz 17:58
Okay, so that's a lot that is the State Board of Education. Are those voted on positions? Or is that are those assigned by the governor,
Will Edwards 18:08
those are largely appointed, and it's some combination, I believe, of the governor and maybe the Speaker of the House and the lieutenant governor. So those are appointed position, but very powerful, powerful. Yeah, as you can tell,
Liz 18:24
interesting, okay. I literally my kids are young. So we're not in school yet. But I didn't care about any of this until COVID. And I thought that the local school board had way more power than it actually does. And I'm like, these poor people were just getting berated. And they probably didn't have any control of these decisions that were being made. So
Will Edwards 18:42
so a lot of times, it's natural to complain to the person that's in front of you, right. So a lot of times the complaints are lodged with the local board of education related to curriculum. And that's actually okay. There's procedures and state law requires that they have policies and procedures for parents to both review textbooks, but also lodged complaints. And that's welcomed, and that's part of their their job description. However, I think it's more effective not to wait until the textbooks already in the classroom to lodge the complaint, but rather engage at the state board of education level when they're setting the standards, and then engage with the textbook textbook commission. When they're selecting the textbooks. Those are always available for review, they actually on the Tennessee Department Education website, have a link to review those and as they are putting out for bid or before they will actually award or list the the curriculum or the textbooks that can be purchased. They'll put sample materials up on their website. Interesting and that's constantly changing as as the criteria changes, and then they go out and bid for new textbooks. So really, the folks on this the local Board of Education, have no control over it, but they're the one that hear the complaints. but it may be years after the decision was made at the state board of education level, so it's almost too late to complain at that point. So looks really should get engaged with that textbook commission and, and look at what the state board is doing.
Liz 20:12
That's helpful because I was wondering if parents had any input in what the kids are being taught actual curriculum. So it's, what you're saying is, it's not as good to complain after the fact you need to be involved when they're actually making the decisions. If you want to see any change, that's, that's gonna come quickly that will impact your kids. That's
Will Edwards 20:29
right. A lot of things that we hear about in the press that come into the classroom that are hot button, political issues are often taught outside of the textbook. So it may be a materials that are brought in by the teacher or perhaps by a student or an outside lecturer, that sharing information. And that's a lot of the stuff that we'll hear in the media from day to day. Yeah, I
Liz 20:51
know, it was huge during the election or whatever. But he was talking about critical race theory and sexual, you know, transgender stuff, all that you said something the very first time I interviewed the I thought was incredibly important. And I want you to expand on it again, you said, kids need to be focusing on reading, writing and arithmetic. Can you say your stance on that? Absolutely.
Will Edwards 21:14
So that's really the focus of our local education authority, right is to ensure that our kids are receiving those fundamentals, if you will, those basic standards. And if you look at the test scores, and I realized a lot of people don't like the testing component of public schools, but if you look at our test scores, you can tell we're not being very effective at teaching those basic items. So there's a lot of noise. I think a lot of it's outside noise about what may or may not be occurring within our schools, but our we need to return our focus to ensuring that our children are reading, writing and have the ability to do math when they graduate. So
Liz 21:54
how do you think that parents can best be encouraging and involved in making that happen?
Will Edwards 22:00
Yeah, so we have a superintendent that welcomes parental involvement, that's one of his priorities is to ensure that parents are involved and engaged COVID certainly changed the landscape on parental involvement and some of the pushback that you heard in the press related to parents essentially being shut out of the classrooms. So Knox County has reopened for business, so parents should be welcomed back into our schools, and engage in volunteer capacity. So ensure that number one, you're engaging your own children and reading, but go volunteer at a school and read, volunteer to read to children and students in engaging in volunteer roles is critically important to parental engagement. But more importantly, the more engaged our parents are, the higher our test scores. Not every parent has that opportunity. Not every parent has the ability to do that. But we as a community can come together and certainly be more engaged. So I would say just the fundamental, volunteer role. There's no role that's too small. And I think that's an important opportunity to engage. The second piece is don't wait until there's a crisis to engage. Yeah, it's too late at that point. And I think that's where a lot of people fail in 2020. I'm not saying that people should not have been engaged in 2020. But it was a little light at that point. So continue, even though we're not in crisis mode, continue to be aware of what's going on, and show up to help.
Liz 23:32
I saw this stat the other day, I wish I would have found it before we came in here and did this. But it was saying that like one of the greatest factors to kids being successful in life is if their parents read to them. So I think a lot of time, it's easy to just be like, Oh, the school needs to do this, that and the other. But if the parent is not involved, too, then you know, that plays a big role. So I think that's really important. So from what you have learned through your personal experience, and when you are running for everything, what do you see that the school board can do to make things better, especially for families with kids of special needs.
Will Edwards 24:08
So what I would say to parents of students with special needs, is ensure that your child is presumed to be competent when he walks in the classroom. And what I mean by that is, the school system should and should have the base understanding that your child has the ability to perform at any level. So they should not assume immediately because there is a disability that the child can't perform. The law requires the student to be placed in the least restrictive environment. And that law is there to to presume competence of the child. So always start there, make sure that they presume and aren't assuming that the child doesn't have the ability to do something. A lot of our students with disabilities have significant ability to do things we just don't know. How to engage them and ensure that they, they have the ability from our perception to do that. So assuming competence is the number one thing, and it's easy to say, well, the child doesn't have the ability, so we're gonna throw our hands up, continue to assume competence along. Number two is, every child is different. So don't assume that your child's teacher has a certain level of expertise with your child's disability. That's not a knock on the teacher at all. A special ed teacher has a caseload that's very heavy, but your child's disability is probably unique to the child that sits to them in the special education classroom. So always be willing to provide insight into what your child's disability is, and also how that affects them academically. So presume, presume competence, competence, and be engaged, I guess, would be the two primary things.
Liz 25:57
Gotcha. And what do you think that the board members can do to make the culture better within the administration of the schools and everything.
Will Edwards 26:07
So we've got a long way to go. In that area, I think about a month ago, at the last board meeting, Superintendent, Rhys wick announced that they were going to conduct a review of matters related to our special education classrooms across the county, with the directive that they would implement certain things in the fall of 2023. So that review is supposed to come back over the summer, so that they've got time to do that. They're going to have listening tours across the county, for parents to come and discuss what's working and what's not, and, and have the ability to voice their grievances, if you will. So it's important for the board to listen to what the parents are having to say, to understand and have empathy, because these are unique and difficult challenges that these families face and three, encourage communication. A lot of the issues that arise with special needs families comes down to communication, I hear from families across the district on a daily basis. And a lot of the issues could have been resolved had we communicated rather, sometimes that's the teachers, sometimes that's the district level. And sometimes that's the parents. So it's everybody working together. But back to what I encourage families to do was to presume competence, I hope our school board will set a culture and direct our superintendent to set a culture that every student is competent, and that we have the ability to seek excellence for every child.
Liz 27:42
This from what you've experienced and seen so far, most private schools aren't equipped to deal with these types of special needs, right?
Will Edwards 27:50
For the most part, and it's really on a case by case basis. There are certain private schools in Knox County that have specific kind of targeted populations, if you will, but for the most part, students with special needs are going to be served in a public school setting.
Liz 28:09
This is kind of a broad, vague question. But I know with autism specifically, because that's what your family is dealing with. Have you seen anywhere in the country or any specific settings that are doing it really well that you think we should try to replicate?
Will Edwards 28:25
Yeah, so it's, it's hard to say this state is doing it? Well, because it's back to the local control. So that culture is set at the local level. Even at Tennessee, we've got a couple of counties that are doing this well. One is Hamilton County. Hamilton County lost a court case at the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals several years ago. And to their credit, they said we're going to change things. So what Hamilton County was doing was, in essence busing students to special needs schools, basically, they were segregating students in the court of appeals. In a case that from a child right here in Knox County, who happened to move to Hamilton County said no, you can't segregate students like that. So Hamilton County created a task force, and basically came up with 10 or 15 things that they're going to ensure that are implemented and they've done a great job of doing that. That doesn't mean that there are still gaps. They still exist, but they've got they've been intentional about thinking. And then Williamson County and Tennessee has also done a good job of creating inclusive environments. Across the country, though what we're seeing that I think will work well long term is CO taught classroom so rather than creating segregated environments, bring those children into the same classroom with their Gen Ed peers and teach them in the same setting. University of Tennessee Chattanooga is now basing its education curriculum on CO taught classrooms. So they've shifted their mindset as well. And I hope that Tennessee will continue to move in that direction.
Liz 30:06
By co taught, do you mean a kid having an aide in the classroom or having two separate teachers in the classroom? How does that work?
Will Edwards 30:13
Generally, it's two separate teachers, you'd have special ed teacher and Gen Ed teacher in the same classroom. Obviously, that's not going to be in every classroom and yes, county, but we don't have a lot of those currently in Knox County. So
Liz 30:27
from what you've witnessed when a child is given the opportunity to be with their peers, with the right teacher or aide or whatever, do they usually rise to the occasion and do better than if they're kind of I don't know, as presumed not to be able to meet what you're saying the standards? Great question. So
Will Edwards 30:45
the the legal standard is that the child has to be making reasonable academic progress in order to be in the general education setting, reasonable progress towards his goals, or her goals. So that special ed students goals may look very different than their general education peers. However, as long as they're in that academic setting with their general education peers and making progress, they should the law says they should continue to be in that setting. So to answer your question directly do does it raise all ships together? And the answer is yes. The data shows that not only does it raise the level of the special ed students, it also raises the test scores for the general education students interesting. And the reason for that is, I think it creates empathy. Yeah. And it's more of a focus on those around you in society, rather than your individual cell. So a lot of the pushback that we hear is, Well, the students of the general education population and their parents don't want special ed children disturbing the classroom, students are resilient, they're going to react appropriately, perhaps better than adults do from time to time. But more importantly, they're going to be willing to engage with this special needs pier. So it's always heartwarming when students parents approach us and say, oh, you know, Johnny was engaging with your son in the classroom. And here's a picture that we took out on the playground or whatever the scenario might be, but I think it really kimete creates a sense of community for folks, when that happens. And beyond the educational setting, they're not going to be in segregated environments when they're adults, right. So whether they're an employer or an employee, or whether they're dealing with someone at a restaurant, or in a social setting, it's not a segregated environments, our classrooms should reflect what the environment is going to look like, in the future.
Liz 32:47
I am, I don't have a special needs child. So this is me, purely speaking, speculative, speculatively. But I think that it is so important for kids to be around people that are different from them. And that doesn't mean just race or, you know, sexuality, wherever I think also, the special needs is such an important component, and because of the empathy that you're talking about, but also for the special needs kids, like, if you treat them like they're so different, that can't help but like hurt them, you know, so I feel like you know, include them, and they probably will do way better. And then also, once they age out of the system at 21, or whatever, they'll probably perform better in the real world, I would imagine.
Will Edwards 33:29
So our goal as appearance of a special needs child, is to ensure that he has some level of independence as an adult. And you say, Well, that sounds like a very selfish goal. But from a societal standpoint, that's important as well, because the more independence that our child has, as an adult, the less I'm using air quotes here burden that he's going to be on a system that we've created in Tennessee called TennCare. So I think it's important for us, I say this frequently to legislatures. But let's think about spending $1 today to save $100 Later, yeah. And that just happens to occur in the educational setting. But it's important for us to have a mindset of what let's take care of the issue. Now let's let's intervene, let's provide the services today to provide that level of independence that hopefully we can reduce the amount of services that are necessary later. Otherwise, if we don't, it's going to be in a very expensive proposition down the road. As taxpayers that's hard for us to hear. And particularly for politicians who are running election to election, our house members run every two years. They have to be very concerned about what the dollar looks like. So that requires us or that causes us not requires us that causes a lot of folks to look only at the current situation rather than the long term. But we really need to be looking long term with respect to this population. We can already see on TennCare currently what those dollars look like in the increased cost. And that's only going to continue to grow if we don't support these children a very early age.
Liz 35:11
And I mean, nobody wants to feel like they're a burden, you know. So if you can do things make an investment in them while they're young to where they can actually do more and not feel like that that's got to be so much better for their mental state as well. And I think that so often I like focus on I don't want to pay more taxes, I work hard, like, you know, but you also have to have this human being element to it of what if I was the person in that position? What if I was the one with the special needs, I would want somebody to invest in me so
Will Edwards 35:40
and even from a current tax situation, being a taxpayer, and what's the bottom line look like today? Back to the educational environment. There's been some press on this recently in the news Sentinel related to dollar amounts of lawsuits settlements, related to students with special needs. And that number continues to grow year over year. So we're spending a lot of money on lawsuits related to the students where we could be spending that dollar in the classroom, rather than on legal issues, and, and court settlements. So I hope that can be our long term perspective as well.
Liz 36:16
It seems like it would be helpful to that whole population, if you were investing the money in the classroom instead of on settlements as well,
Will Edwards 36:22
absolutely. Well, well,
Liz 36:24
is there anything that you can think of that would be advice or something you've learned through going through your personal experience that you have for families that are dealing with this,
Will Edwards 36:34
don't give up, it's a tiring path. It's difficult. There's a new challenge every day, my wife and I say, you know, once we overcome one obstacle, there's another wedding around the corner. So persevere, it requires a whole community around you to do that. So I would encourage you to engage some of those resources that I mentioned earlier through ASD hub or disability Pathfinder. You're doing great work. And no, from day to day, the challenges feel overwhelming, but make sure to reach out to those supports. It's important for our community to see your family succeed. And I know it's important for your child to have success and excellence as well.
Liz 37:17
Well, thank you so much for doing this. I know that it is a growing need everywhere, not just in Tennessee. And I really appreciate what you're doing in our community. I know you said that through Mr. Jacobs. You're still heavily involved in it right now. And it's kind of your life passion. So I know it's making a difference in a lot of people's lives. And I thank you for taking the time to do this with us. Well, seriously.
Will Edwards 37:39
Well, it's an honor to serve and it's important work. So Becca, my wife, Becky, and I are glad to do.
Liz 37:47
Well. Thank you for coming, everybody. Thank you for joining us for another episode of being different. If you have any questions. I'm going to put up some of the resources that we'll mention today and the podcast, and also put them on my website at Liz durham.com. Hope you join us next time. Being different with Liz Durham is a palm tree pod CO production it's produced and edited by Anthony Palmer. Thanks to Emily miles for digital support. The content for this episode is created by me Liz Durham.