Enter to win the Medical Motherhood Games!

Plus: How a young girl saved disability funding in Arizona; a look at how federal cuts might affect special education; and a disabled student may win her Supreme Court case after all

It is time once again for the Medical Motherhood Games! This is our second annual contest celebrating those little victories in our lives.

What are you going to submit? The Midnight Pharmacy Dash? The Health Insurance Decathlon? We had many creative entries in last year’s games! You can also read that edition for more inspiration:

If you are ready to submit, just fill out this brief form:

👉 Medical Motherhood Games 2025 Entry Form

All entries will be displayed in the Mother’s Day edition of Medical Motherhood!

We have a handful of prizes donated so far!

• A 6-lesson therapy series from Moveabilities in Portland, Oregon

• A copy of Zaji Cox’s memoir about growing up biracial and autistic called Plums for Months from the lovely Forest Avenue Press

• An annual paid subscription to Medical Motherhood

(If you are interested in donating a prize to contest winners, please reach out!)

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Medical Motherhood’s news round up

Snippets of news and opinion from outlets around the world. Click the links for the full story.

• From AZ Central (Opinion): “It took a seventh-grader to break Arizona's fight over disabled funding”

[…]Without telling me, [my 12-year-old daughter] Grace emailed our District 13 representative, [Republican] Julie Willoughby, asking for a meeting.

[…]I sat back, watching my daughter hold her own in a room that rarely makes space for voices like hers. I saw something begin to build — a bridge, tentative but real.

Then it was my turn. I could’ve softened, made a friend. But, by the grace of God, I chose honesty — with empathy. I spoke about what life is like raising a medically complex child. I shared facts, countered misinformation and asked where we might meet in the middle.

[…]A few weeks later, we attended a roundtable with Gov. Katie Hobbs and several Democratic legislators. I brought both kids, and that night, Grace […] spoke of her dreams for unity, and she reminded them, “There is no champion and no enemy in this story. We all need each other.”

[…]After the meeting, Rep. Nancy Gutierrez, the assistant minority leader, pulled Grace aside.

“I hear you,” she said. “And I promise, I’ll try to cross the aisle.”

[…]Then came the blow: [House Appropriations] Chairman [David] Livingston introduced a bill that demanded legislative control of the Medicaid amendments and began dismantling the Parents as Paid Caregivers Program — a lifeline in the caregiver shortage.

[…]Days later, I heard from Willoughby and Gutierrez separately. I turned to Grace and whispered, “They finally met.” She shouted, “THE WOMEN WILL GET THIS DONE!”

And they did.

A bipartisan amendment passed that valued families and proved that collaboration is still possible. […]

• From USA Today: “Supreme Court appears likely to side with MN student in disability discrimination case”

[…] Lisa Blatt, who represented the school district, pushed the court to apply a tougher standard for all cases rather than lowering the bar for cases like Ava [Tharpe]’s.

That generated pushback not just from the Tharpe’s attorney, but also from the justices who had not thought, when they agreed to take the case, that the school was making that consequential an argument.

“It strikes me as a pretty big deal,” Justice Amy Coney Barrett said of the standard the school district is asking for, which she said would be a “sea change” for disability discrimination cases.

Justice Sonia Sotomayor questioned whether the school district had violated the court’s procedural rules.

“It would’ve been nice to have known that we were biting off that big a chunk,” she said.

Roman Martinez, an attorney for the Tharpes, told the justices disability rights groups […] would have "rung a five-alarm fire" if they had thought that's what the school district was asking for.

[…]"There is no sound basis for applying different intent requirements," Nicole Reaves, a Justice Department attorney, told the court.

Reaves said the school district is asking for a "breathtakingly broad rule" that no discrimination claims can be brought without an intent to discriminate.

[…] Chief Justice John Roberts said the court wasn't asked to decide what the uniform standard should be, just whether there should be a different standard for discrimination claims arising out of the IDEA.

A decision in A.J.T. v. Osseo Area Schools is expected by summer.

• From Chalkbeat via NJ.com: “N.J. special education students at risk amid proposed federal cuts”

Approximately 7.5 million students with disabilities across the country rely on special education services.

[…]School districts, such as Newark, that rely on federal Title I funding that supports schools in low-income areas, and special education aid, will be hit hardest by funding cuts, Hayer said. But she says parents need to have a seat at the table so districts can understand where the needs lie.

“I think that is the critical part that we’re not having, not involving [parents] in those conversations and then making decisions without the input of family. So finding ways to engage families, I think, is very, very important,” Hayer said.

[…]Earlier this month, 23 Democratic senators, including New Jersey Sen. Andy Kim, sent a letter to Education Secretary Linda McMahon demanding answers to a series of questions about students with disabilities, including whether the IDEA would be implemented and overseen as required by federal law and how layoffs at the department will affect kids and schools. The letter to McMahon also stressed that the Education Department is “the best positioned” to do the job of enforcing special education law.

“Transferring these authorities to the Department of Health and Human Services will not only overburden an agency already confronting massive workforce cuts orchestrated by this administration, but it will also stretch HHS beyond its expertise as medical, rather than educational, professionals,” the letter to McMahon read.

The letter also highlighted a backlog of 12,000 investigations at the federal Office for Civil Rights, with about half of those cases involving students with disabilities. The Trump administration reduced staffing across 12 regional divisions of the Office for Civil Rights last month.

[…]Despite the changing federal landscape, the advocates emphasized that federal and state special education laws have not changed, and parents should continue to “advocate and push schools” to get special education services.

“We have to keep in mind that nothing has changed specifically within the law,” Hayer said, “but we do know that as dollars and resources get pulled, services will change.”

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