Do you think too much therapy is excessive?

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Yes there is often too much therapy, especially since many forms of therapy exist because of custom rather than usefulness.

As for what students one is placed with I have been in nearly every possible situation there. And... well first off I don't believe in the education system as it stands. So I have trouble seeing it as ideal to keep it the same except for being put with students of one's ability level. (Because ideally learning would take place in an entirely different way.) Some of the best outcomes within such educational systems though come from situations where students are not separated by ability level at all. Rather they help each other to learn things instead of being in a more competetive or segregated context.

I have never fully trusted the impulse people have to be upset they were lumped in with (insert heavily devalued kind of person here). If you think you felt bad, imagine being part of a kind of disabled person that nearly every single other kind of disabled person does their best to distance themselves from. Imagine that for someone else to identify with you, their identification with you is considered low self-esteem. Imagine that one of the worst things to feel, is to feel like one is someone like you. Pretty crappy, right? Many disabled people's entire self-esteem comes from the phrase "at least I'm not ret*d". Imagine how that attitude feels to someone labeled "ret*d". Also remember that if you were uncomfortable with how you were treated then probably the other students you were lumped in with didn't like it either. Ideally being lumped in with any particular kind of person wouldn't be a problem because each person would be getting appropriate education for themselves anyway.

I can sympathize with the ret*d students.

You're being overly idealistic--retarded people can be jerks sometimes too. 'Cause, y'know, they're people, and people are jerks sometimes.

/oijoijninikj

Um... wow. Paying lip service because you think I believe that crap? I was saying that people deserved respect because they're human, not because I believe that "special angel" bull.

Oh and I currently test right around that "borderline ret*d" range, have spent half my life being put around people with every kind of developmental disability, and while I totally sympathize with not having your abilities recognized I just can't get into your pain about being "lumped in with" people like me or the people I spend most of my time around. It's perfectly possible to be lumped in together and yet have everyone's individual abilities recognized. (Yes, everyone's, because all those people you hated being lumped in with were undoubtedly being underestimated in some areas too. Which never seems to occur to anyone who is concentrating on how hard they have it individually because they're put in with us.)

Oh and "the ret*d cause" aka the self-advocacy movement is not about being patronizingly regarded as sweet little innocents, it's about breaking free of exactly that kind of crap.

Sorry if I ame off as patronizing. Muhammed Ali also scored in the bordeline ret*d range so nothing but respect to people who are labelled as such. I agree, ret*d people deserve the same quality education as anyone else. Positive reinforcement and creative solutions are nice but they won't get you anywhere in the real world. ret*d people deserve respect and quality education to live in the real world. They have the right to be more informed as to how their money is spent about pros and cons of treatments and effects of medication etc.