Are Boulder area public schools good at handling special needs? (university, assess)

[chaite]

Hi!

We are considering moving to the Boulder area and our son has a language/auditory processing issue. It's not as serious as dyslexia, but he needs small class sizes and a tutor. We've got him in a great school currently, however I'm curious to know if the public schools in the Boulder area can work with him and meet his needs.

Thanks!

[davebarnes]

All the children in BVSD are special. Just ask their parents.

[hlsmom]

Originally Posted by chaite

Hi!

We are considering moving to the Boulder area and our son has a language/auditory processing issue. It's not as serious as dyslexia, but he needs small class sizes and a tutor. We've got him in a great school currently, however I'm curious to know if the public schools in the Boulder area can work with him and meet his needs.

Thanks!

I am interested if you found any answers to this question?

[Katarina Witt]

Originally Posted by chaite

Hi!

We are considering moving to the Boulder area and our son has a language/auditory processing issue. It's not as serious as dyslexia, but he needs small class sizes and a tutor. We've got him in a great school currently, however I'm curious to know if the public schools in the Boulder area can work with him and meet his needs.

Thanks!

From what I know of Boulder Valley Schools, yes, though it may be done differently than what you have now. The best thing to do would be to talk with someone at BVSD once you know what school he'll be going to.

[mattq331]

Hi Chaite,

Our son (who is now at University) went through his entire k-12 time within the Boulder Valley Special Needs program. He has dyslexia and, early on, hearing problems.

Our experience was that without a formal diagnosis, you won't get diddly-squat. When it became clear that my son had issues, we paid privately for a formal assessment, the result of which he was labelled as Special Needs, and a variety of support services became available to him.

We did not seek out small classes for him in particular as we did not see that as part of the solution.
In general the class teachers were marvelous, but even with the agreed Special Needs accommodations, it was a constant struggle to make sure he actually received them. Often, within weeks of the annual meeting with educators and BVSD administrators, the accommodations would fall by the wayside.

In short, it was a constant battle to keep BVSD to it's promises.
Matt

[Micktooth]

We have a daughter with special needs. She has cognitive as well as physical disabilities. We were very happy with the services she received from BVSD. There are other resources that might be of help as well. Imagine! Colorado has been very helpful for us. Imaginecolorado.org

[Crissyna]

BVSD does not screen for or identify the warning signs of any learning difference even the most common being 1in5 dyslexia. When parents identify their own children and bring in outside clinical testing the mantra is that a struggling reader needs to be at least 3 grades behind to be evaluated for an IEP and have to go through the RTI wait to fail process. Wasting valuable early intervention years, causing harm emotionally and educationally to the child. Even after qualifying for "services" after an IEP is obtained, service minutes are provided almost always in a small group reading aloud or with an inappropriate whole language program or no program at all. 504 accomadations are more willingly given as these require the efforts of the classroom teacher and do not "cost" the district money to provide. BVSD literacy dept is whole language based. Although they do have a pilot program now serving 28 students - where a likely 3,000 actually need Structured literacy.