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Who forgets IEP meetings?! Obviously you have not taught in Title One schools. I have seen the gamut. Lots of parents are, "no shows", whether it is because they could not get off work, or forgot, or could not read the paperwork...who knows. And parents who just completely blow off the fact that their child is disabled. Believe me, I have seen some really strange parents. Parents of Deaf children, who don't bother to learn sign language, at all! Parents of blind children, who think that their kids don't need long canes...parents of mentally retarded kids who think that their kids are just slow learners....with bad teachers!
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I read. I read to the minutest details of the IEP so when I question on things, the autism coach or case manager is always not ready to answer nor could not give me the links to where she got those she put on the academic goals, for example. I could immediately make sure that the school officials altered the IEP without fully explaining to the parents, why it was altered or changed.
I just hope there will be more parent involvement but you know what? This autism is really a different gamut since not even the medical community has one answer to a simple question of what caused it?
You know, there is something wrong on both sides of this equation. The whole thing is just off-center. I do not believe that the teacher is just defenseless in this. Also, depending on the state, a program may or may not be available when the son is 21 years old as it depends on funding. A parent of a child with special needs has no more responsibility toward their child than a mother whose 21 year old son doesn't work and relies on public assistance or the 17 year old who is pregnant and gets welfare to take care of her and her baby. I would be delighted if ALL parents of children had to care for them and keep them off the public dime. I don't see why you expect more from the parents of special needs children than those of "normal" children who just fail to cut it when they grow up. Like I said, every story has two sides and this just screams "lop-sided"!
All well and good buy a number are not able to do so. Think of it this way, my parents were in their thirties when they had my brother and I. Meaning my father who is 65 now was 57 when I turned 21. Special needs parents spend more money over the course of their children being under 21 (college not withstanding) yet wages are set at standard and not based on how many children you have and if any special needs.
I hope by the end of this thread, I will read a good outcome.
I started this thread as a vent. And, yes I could tell you many, many success stories with children on the autism spectrum. I recently received a long distance phone call from the mother of a child that I had almost ten years ago and she explained how the solid education that her son received in EC helped him become the outstanding, regular education student that he is today.
I can update to a degree about the child that I was writing about. The one that kicked, bit, pushed and hit teachers, aides, therapists, bus drivers and the other children in his special education classroom daily for months but when he hit one regular education child (it was so soft that it did not even leave a bruise) and administration immediately jumped into action.
Well, basically all they did was remove him from any contact with regular education students (or regular ed. teachers) and did not help the special education teacher, even though he clearly was inappropriately placed in a public school.
It took over a year of this situation for the student to be placed in a special school program, in a special education school, designed for unusually violent and difficult children. By the end the student who by the end was almost as tall as the teacher plus had enormous strength. His special education classmates were terrified of him. One of his peers would start whimpering & crying if he even saw the child on the other end of the classroom. Most of his classmates would routinely hide behind the teacher or aides anytime they had to be in the same room with him.
The school went through numerous, numerous aides who would quit after working in the classroom, assisting the teacher, with him anywhere from a few days to a few weeks.
As I said, after over a year he was finally placed in a special school program. His status was to be reviewed every semester and if he showed enough improvement he would be able to return to the least restrictive environment, a special education classroom in a regular public school. Well this was several years ago and he has not be able to return yet.
A Post Script. Remember the hard working teacher, the one who had to put up with all of his abuse? The teacher, who all of the other teachers thought was an amazing and outstanding teacher? The teacher who had been named Special Education Teacher of the Year a few years earlier in the same school district?
She was fired because "she was not able to handle her students" (that is she "couldn't handle' that one child, who is still in a special program designed for unusually violent and difficult children, in a special education school).
I won't be returning to this thread. But, I wanted to update it since it was somehow resurrected.
Quote:
Originally Posted by germaine2626
Wow! I really need to vent. I am sorry but it is a very long vent, but I really need to express it.
I'm a retired special education teacher (and now I'm a substitute teacher) in an excellent school district with excellent special education services. In fact, many families would move to our school district just because of the excellent special education programs.
It has always annoyed and upset me that there is a double standardin education regarding who is hit, kicked, bit or otherwise injured by a special education student. Time after time I have observed special education teachers or aides being hurt by out of control or emotionally disturbed students and we are usually told "It comes with the territory" or "It is part of your job" or "Just make sure that the other students don't get hurt" or something similar.
I personally have been injured severely enough to need crutches for six weeks and an arm brace for a different eight week period but was still able to work with those injuries. I was also disabled and off of work for a month due to a back injury. In each of these cases it was due to being stuck or kicked by an out of control student who needed to be on medication but wasn't or in one case the child had been on medication but the parent abrupted stopped the medication, against the advice of the doctor, without informing the school. Just to clarify, I definitely do not believe that all special education or all hyperactive or even all violent students need medication, but some students do need medications and to stay on the medications prescribed by their doctors. But my vent really isn't about medication except the the parent has told the school that "she doesn't believe in medication".
Other special education teachers, aides and therapists have been injured as well. One was kicked hard enough by an autistic student that bone in her leg was cracked, and aide received a broken bone in her arm from a student. Thankfully major injuries were/are very rare but minor injuries and bruises were/are daily events.
II have seen it happen frequently where a special education student has hurt special education staff and special education peers and nothing was done about it except to tell the special ed teacher that they were not doing a good enough job with that student. However, on the very rare occasion that a regular education teacher or student is hit, kicked, bite, struck or whatever administrators immediately get involved and discipline, suspend or transfer the student.
Continuing my vent I have a specific situation to share that made my blood boil! It is difficult to completely explain while still keeping it confidential, but I'll try. I'm even changing some details but giving you the general idea.
Last year I was a substitute special education teacher's aide for several weeks while the school district was trying to find someone to accept the position as a 1 to 1 aide with an extremely difficult to handle student with autism, mental retardation and other problems. I returned to sub aide again for several weeks when the person hired quit after a week. After the new person hired quit after a couple of weeks I was again hired as the substitute 1 to 1 aide for this student until they could find a third person to take the job. The only reason that I kept coming back was that I felt sorry for the special education teacher, other classroom aides and other special education students as they were getting hit, kicked, pushed, etc on a daily basis.
The special education teacher documented everything and followed all the procedures and didn't get any help and assistance. After a while the teacher LITERALLY BEGGED the psychologist and director of special education to observe the student as he was exceptionally complex and difficult to teach and she wanted help. Meanwhile, everyone involved with this student, special education bus drivers, aides, therapists, peers etc. were getting bruised and battered on a regular basis. This went on for almost 9 months.
Now to my main vent.
He returned to school after the summer with even more behavior problems (and his fourth 1 to 1 aide had resigned). Unfortunitely, he was now attempting to strike his special education classmates more than his usual target, the adults. Again the teacher asked for assistance in planning for this child and was basically ignored apparently because it was "only special education staff and students being hurt."
Yesterday, he hit a regular education peer while he was included in regular education music class. Within one hour the principal & director of special education had scheduled an autism specialist to come to the classroom, observe the child and assist in creating a different behavioral plan. Within three hours plans were being made to totally change his placement to 100% 1 to 1 with no contact with other students. Today, less than 24 hours after he hit a regular education peer both the psychologist and the director of special education came to his special education classroom to observe him.
Hmmm, almost nine months of hitting, kicking, slapping, throwing objects at special education staff and special education peers and nothing was done by administration but action was taken immediately when he hit a regular education peer.
Again, sorry for this very long rant but this really doesn't seem right.
Thank you for letting me vent.
Last edited by germaine2626; 09-27-2016 at 05:47 PM..
I can't help but bring something slightly off-topic to the thread, however. To those who always say how superior private schools are, private schools wouldn't work with this kid at all. One of the greatest things about public education and public school educators is that we work with ALL students.
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Not true. If we can have an IEP meeting every week, why not, to help the student with disabilities? I think, many of the posters here are from schools and they do not have children with disabilities. Sometimes, it is easy to spew words in cases we do not know so many things about than to see what is really going on.
You may not have, but parents blow off IEP meeting all the time. All the time. In some schools significantly more than 50% do. One year not a single IEP I attended had a parent present.
And, why not have meetings every week? Because most parents can not afford to miss work once a week and because every meeting takes time away from the teacher that could be used to do their job - planning and actually teaching, along with implementing the IEP. Writing and discussing an IEP is way easier than implementation of one. Teachers and other educational professionals involved in your child's education collaborate on a weekly, and sometimes daily, basis to discuss and adjust their services to meet your child's needs. Just to put a different prespective on it, about 8-10 years ago my principal was grousing that every IEP meeting we had in our school cost the district at least $725 per hour. I scoffed at him but then he showed me his spread sheet and, unfortunately, he was right. Schools can't afford weekly IEP meetings.
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I can't help but bring something slightly off-topic to the thread, however. To those who always say how superior private schools are, private schools wouldn't work with this kid at all. One of the greatest things about public education and public school educators is that we work with ALL students.
*raises hand*
I worked for years for a private school that was specifically created for children whose behavior was so violent and/or self-injurious that they could not be safely educated in their traditional public school settings. Our program emphasized behavioral intervention strategies that supported students ultimately being able to return to less restrictive settings safely. Not only WOULD our school work with students with severe behavioral needs, it was, in fact, created specifically for those students. Mainly because their needs actually WERE NOT being safely met in their home public school settings, usually due to the various individual schools' financial inability and/or unwillingness to provide the necessary supports.
Public schools do not always work with all the students. Sometimes, they will find it in their best interest to refer particularly challenging special education students to specialized settings (on the district's dime, obviously, per IDEA). I had a whole school of these students, for exactly that reason. Only one of our hundreds of students was private pay, where the parents had elected for the placement, although the home district did have the means and willingness to provide the necessary supports. All the rest were school district referrals.
Remember that there are many types of private setting, including those that are tailored exclusively for special needs.
You may not have, but parents blow off IEP meeting all the time. All the time. In some schools significantly more than 50% do. One year not a single IEP I attended had a parent present.
I, too, have had many parents not respond to prior written notice, which creates a real CYA situation on mamy levels. And our school bent over backward to accommodate parental schedules, including scheduling evening IEP meetings, early morning ones, and even a Saturday conference call one here and there, if that's all that would work. Some parents will not meet, no matter how accommodating the team is.
I worked for years for a private school that was specifically created for children whose behavior was so violent and/or self-injurious that they could not be safely educated in their traditional public school settings. Our program emphasized behavioral intervention strategies that supported students ultimately being able to return to less restrictive settings safely. Not only WOULD our school work with students with severe behavioral needs, it was, in fact, created specifically for those students. Mainly because their needs actually WERE NOT being safely met in their home public school settings, usually due to the various individual schools' financial inability and/or unwillingness to provide the necessary supports.
Public schools do not always work with all the students. Sometimes, they will find it in their best interest to refer particularly challenging special education students to specialized settings (on the district's dime, obviously, per IDEA). I had a whole school of these students, for exactly that reason. Only one of our hundreds of students was private pay, where the parents had elected for the placement, although the home district did have the means and willingness to provide the necessary supports. All the rest were school district referrals.
Remember that there are many types of private setting, including those that are tailored exclusively for special needs.
True.
But I think you know that's not what I was talking about. I'm talking about the kind of private schools that anti-public-school types like to point to and say how great their test scores are.
You may not have, but parents blow off IEP meeting all the time. All the time. In some schools significantly more than 50% do. One year not a single IEP I attended had a parent present.
And, why not have meetings every week? Because most parents can not afford to miss work once a week and because every meeting takes time away from the teacher that could be used to do their job - planning and actually teaching, along with implementing the IEP. Writing and discussing an IEP is way easier than implementation of one. Teachers and other educational professionals involved in your child's education collaborate on a weekly, and sometimes daily, basis to discuss and adjust their services to meet your child's needs. Just to put a different prespective on it, about 8-10 years ago my principal was grousing that every IEP meeting we had in our school cost the district at least $725 per hour. I scoffed at him but then he showed me his spread sheet and, unfortunately, he was right. Schools can't afford weekly IEP meetings.
What I always found interesting were the 3 groups of parents we had in regard to sped. Group 1 -- parents who desperately wanted special educational services for kids who didn't need it. Group 2 -- parents who refused special educational services for kids who did need it. Group 3 -- parents who trusted the school to generally know what was best.
Again, sorry for this very long rant but this really doesn't seem right.
Thank you for letting me vent.
Nothing to be sorry for. You're just telling the truth. There is an aversion to order, and a partiality towards chaos that must be addressed.
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