Completely Stressed out and Angry

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Dirtdawg, speaking of new books, they just uncovered a deliberate conflict of interest on the part of Reading First!, a segment of the NCLB act. It was deals with particular publishers. Heavy stuff.

Before NCLB was ratified or put in place, I attended a meeting about it, from the perspective of special ed. It was made pretty clear that unless the legislation was changed, that it would lead schools to discriminate against special classes/kids because special ed kids won't be tested separately. The problem would be that kids would be tested according to age/grade, not actual grade level. That would undoubtedly bring the school's score down and they would blame the special ed students and not want them.

Kim,

Can you send me the information reagarding that conflict of interest. It would be helpful when debating NCLB with teachers and others who think it is a good law.

Frightening, but it all makes a little more sense, now.

I may be in for a rude awakening, if I move out of our present school system.

I'm new here, have a son, 16 years old, has Asperger Syn....been fighting school administrators, teachers throughout his entire school career.
He is mainlined in a regular school setting.....takes meds to keep certain aspects of his problem in check. However....what makes me angry too, is the
lack of understading on a Schools part that THEIR accomodating a child with Asperger or any other "challenge" is not an optional thing. They do not
make the rules. They must follow the rules YOU (and the ADA act) set forth. I saw mention of an IEP in a previous post. The thing about IEPs is...they too are not optional. They are guaranteed under the Americans with Disabilities Act. They set out guidelines that, even under the "No Child Left Behind" (almost fell off my chair laughing) program, MUST be followed. Any school administrator who tells you different, needs to go back to school and get educated on the matter.

www.kidsource.com/kidsource/content3/ad ... ml......is just one site that explains the issue. Go to your STATE board of education and get their info from them.

Once we have a program set up... my wife and I sit down with each one of his teachers, those that decided they didn't want to attend were given a personal invitation by the School District Superintendant (with my help of course) to attend these meetings while our expectations and needs as well as those of our son, were discussed. When teachers fail to follow the plan, instant action occurs with either a teacher change or a direcive from above for them to get with the program. IEPs are Federally Mandated, State sanctioned programs and anyone who tells you different, is looking for the easy way out.

and yet you find it is a full time job to enforce your rights.

At least your are dealing with a district that knows that you as the parent are serious and does not want to have to expend too much effort fighting you. I have seen cases where parents have gone to Federal Court, won the case, and the district had totally ignored the court order.

The district has one weapon going for it, time. Your child is in an elementary school for 5 - 6 years, middle school for 3 years, and high school for 4 - 7 years (or likely 4 if the district is playing hardball). The due process and court system operates as if time is not of the essence in cases like this (even with the short circuit of due process that the Supreme Court put in thanks to Honig v. Doe). In the meantime while you are emboiled in these fights, you childs education is going down the tubed, not to mention their mental health (which is already fragile to being with). That is why many parents simply give up trying to deal with the system and homeschool instead.

Yes...it is a full time job. That's why you have to be assertive AND creative. Today was the "annual" teacher talk where my wife and I sat down
with my sons teachers and I gave them a brief rundown on Aspergers, briefed them on the IEP and then told them in no uncertain terms, that although
they would have my son in their lives for a short period, he would have to live with the effects of their teaching for a lifetime. As such, I was willing to
leave "no stone unturned" in getting their full co-operation in fulfilling the IEP. That included sanctions to de-certify their teaching certificates, State Representative investigations, full press coverage regarding the school Special Ed program. I hate to threaten but as one teacher who did decide to "buck the system" found out....compliance is mandatory. All it took was $100 and a call from a lawyer, to attain full compliance, re-assign a teacher
to a different district ( some places it is known as "you weren't picked up for next year"). Time is NOT an issue....an injunction is pretty fast; call your District Rep with your problem, mention you will be going to all local Networks with your issues and efforts. Call the judges office back up and tell them of the non-compliance issue. As a last resort...if they won't follow..put our child in a Private School and sue the School for tuition re-imbursement since they won't follow the rules. I know it takes money to start it but it will send a message.

My count.....3 teachers who have letters in their records....1 who will never get a Principals job in this state. Sorry it happened but the child ALWAYS comes first.

I was referencing my own experience... being forced to socialize when I did not want to, nor could I. It not only didn't help me, it was painful and dehumanizing for me. Forcing a child who does not want to be social to be in a social situation can backfire and make things worse, even if it temporarily seems "to be working."

It got to the point where, yes, I could somewhat "fake it" and act like I had been "taught" but I found it to be soul-killing and frightening. I continued to feel isolated and lost inside while attempting to look normal on the outside (not that I ever succeeded completely, though I did manage to find ways to appear "less weird").

It is hard, it is time-consuming, but you only get ONE shot at getting your kid through this well.

I lost a good job a few years ago because I hit my 5th absence (the magic number) all due to school issues, and couldn't get fmla because the ped at the time felt I'd "abuse" it. Ugh.

I was lucky to find a better job (and a better ped), and be able to take the time I need for my child. While I've felt guilty missing work for a stomach virus or sinus infection I've had, I've never felt guilty for a minute spent at school making my son's life better.

What's most frustrating to me is I know the principal knows the rules as well as I do, but he makes me show/prove them. I feel lucky that we always get the accomodations my son needs, but I wish it would happen more smoothly.

A lot of similar stories.
Update, we have just now started the grievance procedure. Last week went well, and yesterday they blew it big time. They don't care and they will hurt my son. So, today he was throwing up all over and was totally stressed. So, we kept him home and we'll keep him home another day or two.
They dropped the ball (concerning a transition that they know about) and didn't address something they should have. Then had the nerve to list all the things he did "wrong".
We'll know what direction the district is going to take this in, hopefully by Friday.

good luck

Thanks, the preliminary investigation came up with, "yes, they admit they are untrained but claim that the aide is a 1-1 aide for your son only, they have a new schedule/binder that is used with your son, and the principal wasn't talking about your son but other students"

The new binder magically appeared when my son returned to school on Friday (I kept him home for 2 days, he was totally stressed and I was afraid to send him). I had already furnished a dry erase board that the aide could use for the daily schedule (I had asked about 4 times for schedules for him). Visual aides and all, the aide said that she constructed it.

When my son is in school, the aide is mostly with him. But if she feels she can't handle him, she'll place him in the special ed room with the teacher and leave. He also has shorter days because of his lack of interest/skills to stay in one place. So, when/if we go to full days, will she be there the whole time? Before she wasn't, she'd have to go and perform other duties and he'd have problems.
The principal is lying, she directly told us she has a zero tolerance policy on "assaults" and that she includes name-calling "pest, dumb, stupid" as assaults. She also kept bringing up how she knew he knew what he was saying and doing.
So, now we are going to wait and see what the Behavioral Assessment Team says about Pop; his fitness for being there and the staff's fitness for doing what they do.

Part of me would love this staff to be trained in teaching autistics, most of me thinks it's a waste of time-I want to bring him home. But we'll see what is said, now that the ball is rolling.

the principal sounds like an idiot ! that's the same attitude we got with our son from many of his teachers in his old school~he can control it, he's just a bad kid who needs to be disciplined. can't stand uneducated staff !

This has nothing to do with the ongoing battle but I just got a phone call from the secretary asking why my son wasn't in school today? He's 6 years old, I dropped him off myself at 9:am and she's asking me 2 hours later why he isn't there, he's been marked absent.
She put me on hold and then came back on giggling that the teacher marked the wrong name. Oh ho, isn't that cute?! AAAAARRRRGGH! For like a minute, I'm having the worst images in my head. I'm feeling sick to my stomach.

Isn't weird how people think that tittering like a 3 year old will solve all their mistakes and problems?

One option that I didn't see mentioned is to push the district to bring in an Autism consultant to evaluate the situation and make recommendations given the staff members have no experience in this area. Our district actually suggested this (at their expense) in my son's case when he was struggling greatly with the transition into first grade.

That's what is going on right now, it's called a Behavioral Assessment, Behavioral Intervention. It's a team of what I thought would be 3 people, and now I'm hearing it's one psychologist.
We're not sure how helpful it's going to be, we'll know more by the end of the week.