8News has uncovered Virginia school districts spending a substantial amount of time and taxpayer money fighting special needs parents in court.  

8News has been digging into a rise in special education disputes around the state and found the costs in Central Virginia have mushroomed over the last few years. Some attribute it to more parents aware of their rights and fighting for them. There’s also been an increase in the number of students with disabilities, particularly students with autism.  

Whatever the cause, the disputes can drag out and be costly.

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 Four Hillsborough schools that are grappling with teacher vacancies will get an assist in January from the administrative ranks in downtown Tampa.

Onetime teachers who rose to some of the highest levels of the school system have volunteered for classroom duty at James and Kimbell Elementary, Woodson and Sulphur Springs K-8 schools.

The 14 who signed up so far include assistant superintendent Tricia McManus, who will report to work at James in East Tampa, and chief academic officer Deborah Cook, who will teach at Kimbell in North Tampa.

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The Seattle school district joined dozens of school districts around the country in the fall of 2016 by delaying the start of school. Under the new rules, instead of beginning at 7:50 a.m., they began at 8:45 a.m.

This gave researchers at the University of Washington an opportunity to determine just how much teens need sleep. In a new study, they used activity monitors to study a group of high school sophomores before and after the changes were implemented and found that with later start times, students were not only getting an extra half-hour of sleep, their grades had improved by nearly 5 percentage points too.

Sleep is important for everyone, but even more so for teens, who are constantly losing sleep because of their busy schedules. Here’s why they need it even more:

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It’s been more than a decade since West Virginia’s school aid funding formula has been updated, and members of the state Board of Education are hoping to convince lawmakers to update it.

After months of discussion, board members voted to approve a six-pronged proposal they say will make the formula work for county school systems that continue to lose students and face greater challenges in educating children.

���We determined six very pointed areas that need funding,��� board President Dave Perry said Friday. ���We also determined in this process that we have a very equitable school aid formula, but it is dramatically underfunded.���

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Leah Stewart, a 12th-grader at Greece Olympia High School, is part of an uncomfortable sort of club at school. She calls it “the five smart black girls.” Earning admission was an exhausting ordeal, and yet she doesn’t enjoy being a member very much at all.

It began in eighth grade, when Stewart first had to push back against a counselor who wouldn’t enroll her in an advanced course. She’s had the same experience more recently in the high school, even with a track record of academic success.

“I tried to take AP physics, and my counselor pretty much laughed at me,” Stewart said. “He was pretty much just like, ‘Oh you have a lot on your plate.’ He wouldn’t sign off on it for like a really long time.”

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It’s a grim holiday gift, one born from school-security concerns that transcend schoolyard fights, bullying and truancy.

One by one Thursday, with nervous smiles, school officials accepted their 10-pound ballistic shields, hoping they would never have to use them.

The ���ultra-high molecular weight��� polyethylene (plastic) panels are believed to be the first ballistic shields to be deployed in central Ohio schools, intended to provide teachers and staff members with an added protection should they face an armed assailant.

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New York City’s plan to expand enrollment of black and Hispanic students in the city’s elite public high schools is facing a legal challenge from Asian American parents, as a bitter racial dispute moves to the courts.

Asian American civil rights groups and parents sued city officials Thursday, alleging that New York’s plan amounts to unconstitutional discrimination against Asian students, who occupy more than half of all seats at eight schools that rely on testing for admissions.

The new plan, promoted by Mayor Bill de Blasio, was supposed to take effect for the 2019-2020 school year. The suit asks the court to put it on hold while the case is considered.

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