RtI despite its frequent inservicing and discussions appears to be an elusive topic for many schools. Parents need to understand RtI if they are to effectively advocate for a meaningful process to take place for their child. The following guidance is a useful guidance document from NCLD.
Romney’s Stance on Special Education
The presidential election is more than one year away but is never too early to learn about the candidate's positions on matters related to education and special education. As it appears likely that Mitt Romney is the likely Republican candidate his positions bear particular scrutiny. In a recent newspaper interview with a traditionally Republican New Hampshire paper (e-edition), Romney made the following statements:
"In a Romney administration, he said, the federal responsibility for public education from kindergarten through Grade 12 would be limited to providing data to the states.
“The federal government being a funder of state and local education is not in my opinion a necessary responsibility,” he said.
Special education “is a choice we can make, but it doesn't necessarily strike me as a responsibility of the federal government. It could be a responsibility of state governments.”
He said, however, that the federal government traditionally “picks up some portion of funding for special education, and I'm not proposing eliminating that or shifting that to the states. But it's not constitutionally required that the federal government deals with special education or other education programs.”
While these statements are not clear at all, and he seems to be taking the position that little will change in terms of the role of the federal government relative to the states on special education, he leaves open the significant possibility/probability of wholesale changes with each state having responsibility for special education. On issues related to funding, even in this one interview, he waffles from no federal funding for education to possibly continuing "some portion" of funding for special education. No funding to states for special education, if that is where he ultimately came out on the issue, would be nothing less than catastrophic! Bottom line for me is that any one who cares about special education could not possibly feel confident or rest easy, if Mitt Romney were to make it to the White House. Let's also remember that the next reauthorization of IDEA will likely come up during the next presidential term.
Idaho School Focusing on Effective Suicide Prevention
Suicide is a serious and widespread issue for many students and in turn schools. Unfortunately the magnitude of this issue is sometimes only realized after a death occurs or even more than one. Administrators and principals in the Coeur d’Alene School District recently held a management retreat to address the issue of suicide prevention. The special session was the result of four tragic suicides committed students within the district in the past 15 months. One of the saddest things about this brief blurb in the local paper was the comment posted to the newspaper’s online website, which said, “Why are we coddling these people and using taxpayer money to do it? School is only to teach the 3 R’s, nothing more. And only through the 6th grade, then these parasites are on their own!” [Can only hope this person is not a parent or at least has no children under his roof!]
The callousness of the writer, who is clearly fortunate to not have had loved ones struggle with suicide or mental illness, is stunning. According to the National Center for Health Statistics, suicide is the third leading cause of death among teens and young adults from 15 to 24 years in the United States. The National Health Association estimates that up to 2.5% of children and 8.3% of teens in the United States suffer from depression. At any given time, the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychology estimates that about 5% of children are suffering from depression.
And what about our children with special needs? The data is limited, but Steve Forness, professor of psychiatry and bio-behavioral sciences at the University of California, estimates that 30 to 40% of students in ED classes and 10 to 20% of students in LD classes suffer from depression. Experts believe there is no mystery as to why students with special needs are more prone to depression. These children may be predisposed to depression due to biological factors related to their disorders. In addition these kids may suffer from the stigma of having a disorder, and their disabilities may make them stand out to their peers. As a result, children with special needs are two to three times more likely to be victims of bullying than their non-disabled peers. A study in a British journal stated that 60% of students with special needs reported being bullied compared to 25% of their non-disabled peers. The unfortunate reality even faced with empirical and reliable subjective data from parents and other sources, many schools continue to deny that there is an issue with bullying especially towards students with special needs. If only denying a problem could make it true, but it cannot.
Children with special needs are not alone with higher rates of depression. Many experts believe that gifted students are also prone to depression. These are the students who tend to be perfectionists and who are overly harsh in their self-criticism. According to James Webb, the founder and co-director of Supporting the Emotional Needs of the Gifted, a “B” on a report card can be shattering to a gifted student. Furthermore, Webb argues that these students can suffer from “existential depressions,” where they confront basic issues of existence, death, freedom, isolation, and meaninglessness—all issues that are difficult and painful for any 16- to 18-year-old to confront. The even larger problem here is that given the good and even exceptional grades that gifted students receive, schools refuse to even consider these students for a case study, even in the face of a clear and imminent risk to the student’s emotional well being in school.
Fortunately, organizations like the National Association of School Psychologists (NASP), as well as the Coeur d’Alene School District, are attempting to be proactive in an effort to help depressed students and head off potential suicides. NASP, which states that suicides may be preventable, offers detailed information and suggestions on risk factors, warning signs, what to do, and the role of the school in suicide prevention. Many, many, many other groups are also recognizing this sobering issue and confronting it. Parents must be aware that our children are at risk for depression. We must not be afraid to seek help in the form of an IEP or out of school mental health services, when we suspect our children are in trouble emotionally, even when that student is getting average or above average grades.
Virtual Schooling Needs to Be Adapted for Students with Special Needs
Many of the same obstacles that exist in traditional bricks and mortar classrooms, are carried over to the virtual or e-learning environment. Given tight budgets and other constraints, virtual learning will have greater appeal to school districts, but it is not a easy fit for many students with special needs. Critical technological, accessibility and curricular issues need to be worked out. While I am a big proponent of technology, I have not yet found the virtual learning world to be a good fit for my son and many of the students I represent. The following blog post is review of some of the current research and issues that pertain to virtual learning.
College Admissions for a Student with Special Needs: Waiting to Exhale—for Four Years by Marilyn Green-Rebnord
Anyone who has helped a teenager through the college selection process knows what an extraordinary stressful time it can be. The competition among the students (and their parents!) is breathtaking. My husband and I found it extremely difficult with our oldest son, who is a strong, “traditional” student. But to navigate the college selection process with a special needs student is a whole different ball game with an entirely different bucket list of worries and “to-do’s.”
I know that we are blessed that we were even able to consider college for our now 18-year-old son, because only about a third of students with disabilities attend college according to the US Department of Education in 2003 . Whereas public high schools are required by law to provide individualized educations for students with special needs, colleges are required to make only “reasonable accommodations” for qualified students. What this means varies wildly from school to school, and there is a lack of terminology to describe support programs offered by colleges. According to the Wall Street Journal, at a minimum, schools will offer “basic programs,” which offer only the accommodations required by law; eg, un-timed testing or note-taking help. “Coordinated services” provide at least one trained staffer and additional supports such as study skills classes, tutors, and other services. “Structured” or “proactive” programs charge additional fees, often involve contracts, and trained staffers who work with the students.
In general, we found the various glossy brochures mailed out by schools fairly useless—all the students were happy, the sun always shone, etc, etc, etc. What we did rely on, however, was the disability information published on college web sites. We found that schools that had pretty skimpy information about disability support on the web site offered fairly skimpy services when we met with their disability offices in person. And we met with each and every disability office at schools our son was considering. In doing so, we were able to scratch off the list fairly quickly (though painfully) some small private schools in which our son was interested. One office felt that they could have a staff person meet with our son every other week (wholly inadequate for a student with significant organizational deficits); at another school the disability coordinator appeared to be unfamiliar with our son’s diagnosis and unaware of what it meant for him.
Like every other parent/student, we purchased the different college guides that describe the various advantages and disadvantages of different schools—which schools students rated the most highly, which had the most accessible faculty, which had the best food, which had the worst dorms, best parties, you get it. But we also purchased the K & W Guide to College for Students with Learning Disabilities, which rated different disability programs at different schools. Given the distance and our son’s needs, we were utterly unwilling to consider a school on the East coast that our son was interested in and is now ultimately attending until we saw that it had a particularly high rating from the K & W College Guide.
I’m sure you’ve heard tales of those mythical students who are disciplined and can get through the application process relatively on their own. I will tell you that our older son was just such a student. But our youngest . . . oh well . . . Actually, the hardest part of the application process was deciding whether or not our son should disclose his disability. (Students are not required to do so; colleges are of course not allowed to discriminate against students who do identify their special needs.) Although our high school transition coordinator recommends always disclosing, we were on a fence. But during one particularly interminable college recruiting program (again, our students are always happy, the sun is always shining, etc), I reacted to the admission rep’s statements about respecting and seeking diversity. I figured we would call them on it. I suggested, and my husband and son agreed, to disclose the disability. If a school were going to be bothered by the disability, it wasn’t a school our son should be attending anyway. Consequently, my son wrote about his diagnosis in his Common Application essay, and I’m happy to report that the schools didn’t blink.
Last week my husband and I drove to the East coast to drop our son off at school. My older son’s university had offered a program to the parents during freshman orientation on “Letting Go.” Parents were told that they needed to trust that they have raised their children well, that they are prepared for college, and that they will thrive. The days of “helicopter parenting” must end. (I told my husband that I would walk out of any similar session if offered at our younger son’s school–fortunately, it wasn’t.) My final act of loving “helicoptering” (if that can be a noun) was to unpack and organize my son’s dorm room. This week a co-worker, who had also just dropped off her freshman son, laughed about moms who organized their freshman’s shirts by color. Guilty as charged. And yes, my husband set up the wireless for the laptop.
My husband and I are now home. Our son is out East without us, and it’s up to him now to make things work. He has survived his first earthquake and his first hurricane (two events it had never occurred to me to worry about—who knew?). He’s excited and nervous about his new adventure. We are scared, hopeful, and proud. And missing him, too.
Parents of children with special needs either love or hate Emily Perl Kingsley’s poem, “Welcome to Holland” (http://www.our-kids.org/archives/Holland.html). Like everything else involved in raising a child with a disability, parents can find themselves in Holland, even while searching for a college. As for my husband and me, we’re planning to go to Italy this spring—for real, this time.
Marilyn Green-Rebnord
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122160388151245179.html
http://www.amazon.com/Colleges-Students-Disabilities-Attention-Princeton/dp/0375762205
http://www.our-kids.org/archives/Holland.html
Waiting to Exhale—for Four Years
Anyone who has helped a teenager through the college selection process knows what an extraordinary stressful time it can be. The competition among the students (and their parents!) is breathtaking. My husband and I found it extremely difficult with our oldest son, who is a strong, “traditional” student. But to navigate the college selection process with a special needs student is a whole different ball game with an entirely different bucket list of worries and “to-do’s.”
I know that we are blessed that we were even able to consider college for our now 18-year-old son, because only about a third of students with disabilities attend college according to the US Department of Education in 2003. Whereas public high schools are required by law to provide individualized educations for students with special needs, colleges are required to make only “reasonable accommodations” for qualified students. What this means varies wildly from school to school, and there is a lack of terminology to describe support programs offered by colleges. According to the Wall Street Journal, at a minimum, schools will offer “basic programs,” which offer only the accommodations required by law; eg, un-timed testing or note-taking help. “Coordinated services” provide at least one trained staffer and offer additional services such as study skills classes, tutors, and other services. “Structured” or “proactive” programs charge additional fees, often involve contracts, and trained staffers work with the students.
In general, we found the various glossy brochures mailed out by schools fairly useless—all the students were happy, the sun always shone, etc, etc, etc. What we did rely on, however, was the disability information published on college web sites. We found that schools that had pretty skimpy information about disability support on the web site offered fairly skimpy services when we met with their disability offices in person. And we met with each and every disability office at schools our son was considering. In doing so, we were able to scratch off the list fairly quickly (though painfully) some small private schools in which our son was interested. One office felt that they could have a staff person meet with our son every other week (wholly inadequate for a student with significant organizational deficits); at another school the disability coordinator appeared to be unfamiliar with our son’s diagnosis and unaware of what it meant for him.
Like every other parent/student, we purchased the different college guides that describe the various advantages and disadvantages of different schools—which schools students rated the most highly, which had the most accessible faculty, which had the best food, which had the worst dorms, best parties, you get it. But we also purchased the K & W Guide to College for Students with Learning Disabilities, which rated different disability programs at different schools. Given the distance and our son’s needs, we were utterly unwilling to consider a school on the East coast that our son was interested in and is now ultimately attending until we saw that it had a particularly high rating from the K & W College Guide.
I’m sure you’ve heard tales of those mythical students who are disciplined and can get through the application process relatively on their own. I will tell you that our older son was just such a student. But our youngest . . . oh well . . . Actually, the hardest part of the application process was deciding whether or not our son should disclose his disability. (Students are not required to do so; colleges are of course not allowed to discriminate against students who do identify their special needs.) Although our high school transition coordinator recommends always disclosing, we were on a fence. But during one particularly interminable college recruiting program (again, our students are always happy, the sun is always shining, etc), I reacted to the admission rep’s statements about respecting and seeking diversity. I figured we would call them on it. I suggested, and my husband and son agreed, to disclose the disability. If a school were going to be bothered by the disability, it wasn’t a school our son should be attending anyway. Consequently, my son wrote about his diagnosis in his Common Application essay.
Last week my husband and I drove to the East coast to drop our son off at school. My older son’s university had offered a program to the parents during freshman orientation on “Letting Go.” Parents were told that they needed to trust that they have raised their children well, that they are prepared for college, and that they will thrive. The days of “helicopter parenting” must end. (I told my husband that I would walk out of any similar session if offered at our younger son’s school–fortunately, it wasn’t.) My final act of loving “helicoptering” (if that can be a noun) was to unpack and organize my son’s dorm room. This week a co-worker, who had also just dropped off her freshman son, laughed about moms who organized their freshman’s shirts by color. Guilty as charged. And yes, my husband set up the wireless for the laptop.
My husband and I are now home. Our son is out East without us, and it’s up to him now to make things work. He has survived his first earthquake and his first hurricane (two events it had not occurred to me to worry about—who knew?). He’s excited and nervous about his new adventure. We are scared, hopeful, and proud. And missing him, too.
Parents of children with special needs either love or hate Emily Perl Kingsley’s poem, “Welcome to Holland.” Like everything else involved in raising a child with a disability, parents find themselves in Holland, even while searching for college. As for my husband and me, we’re planning to go to Italy this spring—really.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122160388151245179.html
http://www.amazon.com/Colleges-Students-Disabilities-Attention-Princeton/dp/0375762205
Waiting to Exhale—for Four Years
Anyone who has helped a teenager through the college selection process knows what an extraordinary stressful time it can be. The competition among the students (and their parents!) is breathtaking. My husband and I found it extremely difficult with our oldest son, who is a strong, “traditional” student. But to navigate the college selection process with a special needs student is a whole different ball game with an entirely different bucket list of worries and “to-do’s.”
I know that we are blessed that we were even able to consider college for our now 18-year-old son, because only about a third of students with disabilities attend college according to the US Department of Education in 2003. Whereas public high schools are required by law to provide individualized educations for students with special needs, colleges are required to make only “reasonable accommodations” for qualified students. What this means varies wildly from school to school, and there is a lack of terminology to describe support programs offered by colleges. According to the Wall Street Journal, at a minimum, schools will offer “basic programs,” which offer only the accommodations required by law; eg, un-timed testing or note-taking help. “Coordinated services” provide at least one trained staffer and offer additional services such as study skills classes, tutors, and other services. “Structured” or “proactive” programs charge additional fees, often involve contracts, and trained staffers work with the students.
In general, we found the various glossy brochures mailed out by schools fairly useless—all the students were happy, the sun always shone, etc, etc, etc. What we did rely on, however, was the disability information published on college web sites. We found that schools that had pretty skimpy information about disability support on the web site offered fairly skimpy services when we met with their disability offices in person. And we met with each and every disability office at schools our son was considering. In doing so, we were able to scratch off the list fairly quickly (though painfully) some small private schools in which our son was interested. One office felt that they could have a staff person meet with our son every other week (wholly inadequate for a student with significant organizational deficits); at another school the disability coordinator appeared to be unfamiliar with our son’s diagnosis and unaware of what it meant for him.
Like every other parent/student, we purchased the different college guides that describe the various advantages and disadvantages of different schools—which schools students rated the most highly, which had the most accessible faculty, which had the best food, which had the worst dorms, best parties, you get it. But we also purchased the K & W Guide to College for Students with Learning Disabilities, which rated different disability programs at different schools. Given the distance and our son’s needs, we were utterly unwilling to consider a school on the East coast that our son was interested in and is now ultimately attending until we saw that it had a particularly high rating from the K & W College Guide.
I’m sure you’ve heard tales of those mythical students who are disciplined and can get through the application process relatively on their own. I will tell you that our older son was just such a student. But our youngest . . . oh well . . . Actually, the hardest part of the application process was deciding whether or not our son should disclose his disability. (Students are not required to do so; colleges are of course not allowed to discriminate against students who do identify their special needs.) Although our high school transition coordinator recommends always disclosing, we were on a fence. But during one particularly interminable college recruiting program (again, our students are always happy, the sun is always shining, etc), I reacted to the admission rep’s statements about respecting and seeking diversity. I figured we would call them on it. I suggested, and my husband and son agreed, to disclose the disability. If a school were going to be bothered by the disability, it wasn’t a school our son should be attending anyway. Consequently, my son wrote about his diagnosis in his Common Application essay.
Last week my husband and I drove to the East coast to drop our son off at school. My older son’s university had offered a program to the parents during freshman orientation on “Letting Go.” Parents were told that they needed to trust that they have raised their children well, that they are prepared for college, and that they will thrive. The days of “helicopter parenting” must end. (I told my husband that I would walk out of any similar session if offered at our younger son’s school–fortunately, it wasn’t.) My final act of loving “helicoptering” (if that can be a noun) was to unpack and organize my son’s dorm room. This week a co-worker, who had also just dropped off her freshman son, laughed about moms who organized their freshman’s shirts by color. Guilty as charged. And yes, my husband set up the wireless for the laptop.
My husband and I are now home. Our son is out East without us, and it’s up to him now to make things work. He has survived his first earthquake and his first hurricane (two events it had not occurred to me to worry about—who knew?). He’s excited and nervous about his new adventure. We are scared, hopeful, and proud. And missing him, too.
Parents of children with special needs either love or hate Emily Perl Kingsley’s poem, “Welcome to Holland.” Like everything else involved in raising a child with a disability, parents find themselves in Holland, even while searching for college. As for my husband and me, we’re planning to go to Italy this spring—really.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122160388151245179.html
http://www.amazon.com/Colleges-Students-Disabilities-Attention-Princeton/dp/0375762205
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Waiting to Exhale—for Four Years by Marilyn Green_Rebnord
Anyone who has helped a teenager through the college selection process knows what an extraordinary stressful time it can be. The competition among the students (and their parents!) is breathtaking. My husband and I found it extremely difficult with our oldest son, who is a strong, “traditional” student. But to navigate the college selection process with a special needs student is a whole different ball game with an entirely different bucket list of worries and “to-do’s.”
I know that we are blessed that we were even able to consider college for our now 18-year-old son, because only about a third of students with disabilities attend college according to the US Department of Education in 2003 (http://www.boston.com/news/education/higher/articles/2006/03/30/determination_paves_difficult_path_to_college/). Whereas public high schools are required by law to provide individualized educations for students with special needs, colleges are required to make only “reasonable accommodations” for qualified students. What this means varies wildly from school to school, and there is a lack of terminology to describe support programs offered by colleges. According to the Wall Street Journal (http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122160388151245179.html), at a minimum, schools will offer “basic programs,” which offer only the accommodations required by law; eg, un-timed testing or note-taking help. “Coordinated services” provide at least one trained staffer and additional supports such as study skills classes, tutors, and other services. “Structured” or “proactive” programs charge additional fees, often involve contracts, and trained staffers who work with the students.
In general, we found the various glossy brochures mailed out by schools fairly useless—all the students were happy, the sun always shone, etc, etc, etc. What we did rely on, however, was the disability information published on college web sites. We found that schools that had pretty skimpy information about disability support on the web site offered fairly skimpy services when we met with their disability offices in person. And we met with each and every disability office at schools our son was considering. In doing so, we were able to scratch off the list fairly quickly (though painfully) some small private schools in which our son was interested. One office felt that they could have a staff person meet with our son every other week (wholly inadequate for a student with significant organizational deficits); at another school the disability coordinator appeared to be unfamiliar with our son’s diagnosis and unaware of what it meant for him.
Like every other parent/student, we purchased the different college guides that describe the various advantages and disadvantages of different schools—which schools students rated the most highly, which had the most accessible faculty, which had the best food, which had the worst dorms, best parties, you get it. But we also purchased the K & W Guide to College for Students with Learning Disabilities, which rated different disability programs at different schools (http://www.amazon.com/Colleges-Students-Disabilities-Attention-Princeton/dp/0375762205). Given the distance and our son’s needs, we were utterly unwilling to consider a school on the East coast that our son was interested in and is now ultimately attending until we saw that it had a particularly high rating from the K & W College Guide.
I’m sure you’ve heard tales of those mythical students who are disciplined and can get through the application process relatively on their own. I will tell you that our older son was just such a student. But our youngest . . . oh well . . . Actually, the hardest part of the application process was deciding whether or not our son should disclose his disability. (Students are not required to do so; colleges are of course not allowed to discriminate against students who do identify their special needs.) Although our high school transition coordinator recommends always disclosing, we were on a fence. But during one particularly interminable college recruiting program (again, our students are always happy, the sun is always shining, etc), I reacted to the admission rep’s statements about respecting and seeking diversity. I figured we would call them on it. I suggested, and my husband and son agreed, to disclose the disability. If a school were going to be bothered by the disability, it wasn’t a school our son should be attending anyway. Consequently, my son wrote about his diagnosis in his Common Application essay, and I’m happy to report that the schools didn’t blink.
Last week my husband and I drove to the East coast to drop our son off at school. My older son’s university had offered a program to the parents during freshman orientation on “Letting Go.” Parents were told that they needed to trust that they have raised their children well, that they are prepared for college, and that they will thrive. The days of “helicopter parenting” must end. (I told my husband that I would walk out of any similar session if offered at our younger son’s school–fortunately, it wasn’t.) My final act of loving “helicoptering” (if that can be a noun) was to unpack and organize my son’s dorm room. This week a co-worker, who had also just dropped off her freshman son, laughed about moms who organized their freshman’s shirts by color. Guilty as charged. And yes, my husband set up the wireless for the laptop.
My husband and I are now home. Our son is out East without us, and it’s up to him now to make things work. He has survived his first earthquake and his first hurricane (two events it had never occurred to me to worry about—who knew?). He’s excited and nervous about his new adventure. We are scared, hopeful, and proud. And missing him, too.
Parents of children with special needs either love or hate Emily Perl Kingsley’s poem, “Welcome to Holland” (http://www.our-kids.org/archives/Holland.html). Like everything else involved in raising a child with a disability, parents can find themselves in Holland, even while searching for a college. As for my husband and me, we’re planning to go to Italy this spring—for real, this time.
Marilyn Green-Rebnord
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122160388151245179.html
http://www.amazon.com/Colleges-Students-Disabilities-Attention-Princeton/dp/0375762205
http://www.our-kids.org/archives/Holland.html
Waiting to Exhale—for Four Years
Anyone who has helped a teenager through the college selection process knows what an extraordinary stressful time it can be. The competition among the students (and their parents!) is breathtaking. My husband and I found it extremely difficult with our oldest son, who is a strong, “traditional” student. But to navigate the college selection process with a special needs student is a whole different ball game with an entirely different bucket list of worries and “to-do’s.”
I know that we are blessed that we were even able to consider college for our now 18-year-old son, because only about a third of students with disabilities attend college according to the US Department of Education in 2003. Whereas public high schools are required by law to provide individualized educations for students with special needs, colleges are required to make only “reasonable accommodations” for qualified students. What this means varies wildly from school to school, and there is a lack of terminology to describe support programs offered by colleges. According to the Wall Street Journal, at a minimum, schools will offer “basic programs,” which offer only the accommodations required by law; eg, un-timed testing or note-taking help. “Coordinated services” provide at least one trained staffer and offer additional services such as study skills classes, tutors, and other services. “Structured” or “proactive” programs charge additional fees, often involve contracts, and trained staffers work with the students.
In general, we found the various glossy brochures mailed out by schools fairly useless—all the students were happy, the sun always shone, etc, etc, etc. What we did rely on, however, was the disability information published on college web sites. We found that schools that had pretty skimpy information about disability support on the web site offered fairly skimpy services when we met with their disability offices in person. And we met with each and every disability office at schools our son was considering. In doing so, we were able to scratch off the list fairly quickly (though painfully) some small private schools in which our son was interested. One office felt that they could have a staff person meet with our son every other week (wholly inadequate for a student with significant organizational deficits); at another school the disability coordinator appeared to be unfamiliar with our son’s diagnosis and unaware of what it meant for him.
Like every other parent/student, we purchased the different college guides that describe the various advantages and disadvantages of different schools—which schools students rated the most highly, which had the most accessible faculty, which had the best food, which had the worst dorms, best parties, you get it. But we also purchased the K & W Guide to College for Students with Learning Disabilities, which rated different disability programs at different schools. Given the distance and our son’s needs, we were utterly unwilling to consider a school on the East coast that our son was interested in and is now ultimately attending until we saw that it had a particularly high rating from the K & W College Guide.
I’m sure you’ve heard tales of those mythical students who are disciplined and can get through the application process relatively on their own. I will tell you that our older son was just such a student. But our youngest . . . oh well . . . Actually, the hardest part of the application process was deciding whether or not our son should disclose his disability. (Students are not required to do so; colleges are of course not allowed to discriminate against students who do identify their special needs.) Although our high school transition coordinator recommends always disclosing, we were on a fence. But during one particularly interminable college recruiting program (again, our students are always happy, the sun is always shining, etc), I reacted to the admission rep’s statements about respecting and seeking diversity. I figured we would call them on it. I suggested, and my husband and son agreed, to disclose the disability. If a school were going to be bothered by the disability, it wasn’t a school our son should be attending anyway. Consequently, my son wrote about his diagnosis in his Common Application essay.
Last week my husband and I drove to the East coast to drop our son off at school. My older son’s university had offered a program to the parents during freshman orientation on “Letting Go.” Parents were told that they needed to trust that they have raised their children well, that they are prepared for college, and that they will thrive. The days of “helicopter parenting” must end. (I told my husband that I would walk out of any similar session if offered at our younger son’s school–fortunately, it wasn’t.) My final act of loving “helicoptering” (if that can be a noun) was to unpack and organize my son’s dorm room. This week a co-worker, who had also just dropped off her freshman son, laughed about moms who organized their freshman’s shirts by color. Guilty as charged. And yes, my husband set up the wireless for the laptop.
My husband and I are now home. Our son is out East without us, and it’s up to him now to make things work. He has survived his first earthquake and his first hurricane (two events it had not occurred to me to worry about—who knew?). He’s excited and nervous about his new adventure. We are scared, hopeful, and proud. And missing him, too.
Parents of children with special needs either love or hate Emily Perl Kingsley’s poem, “Welcome to Holland.” Like everything else involved in raising a child with a disability, parents find themselves in Holland, even while searching for college. As for my husband and me, we’re planning to go to Italy this spring—really.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122160388151245179.html
http://www.amazon.com/Colleges-Students-Disabilities-Attention-Princeton/dp/0375762205
Waiting to Exhale—for Four Years
Anyone who has helped a teenager through the college selection process knows what an extraordinary stressful time it can be. The competition among the students (and their parents!) is breathtaking. My husband and I found it extremely difficult with our oldest son, who is a strong, “traditional” student. But to navigate the college selection process with a special needs student is a whole different ball game with an entirely different bucket list of worries and “to-do’s.”
I know that we are blessed that we were even able to consider college for our now 18-year-old son, because only about a third of students with disabilities attend college according to the US Department of Education in 2003. Whereas public high schools are required by law to provide individualized educations for students with special needs, colleges are required to make only “reasonable accommodations” for qualified students. What this means varies wildly from school to school, and there is a lack of terminology to describe support programs offered by colleges. According to the Wall Street Journal, at a minimum, schools will offer “basic programs,” which offer only the accommodations required by law; eg, un-timed testing or note-taking help. “Coordinated services” provide at least one trained staffer and offer additional services such as study skills classes, tutors, and other services. “Structured” or “proactive” programs charge additional fees, often involve contracts, and trained staffers work with the students.
In general, we found the various glossy brochures mailed out by schools fairly useless—all the students were happy, the sun always shone, etc, etc, etc. What we did rely on, however, was the disability information published on college web sites. We found that schools that had pretty skimpy information about disability support on the web site offered fairly skimpy services when we met with their disability offices in person. And we met with each and every disability office at schools our son was considering. In doing so, we were able to scratch off the list fairly quickly (though painfully) some small private schools in which our son was interested. One office felt that they could have a staff person meet with our son every other week (wholly inadequate for a student with significant organizational deficits); at another school the disability coordinator appeared to be unfamiliar with our son’s diagnosis and unaware of what it meant for him.
Like every other parent/student, we purchased the different college guides that describe the various advantages and disadvantages of different schools—which schools students rated the most highly, which had the most accessible faculty, which had the best food, which had the worst dorms, best parties, you get it. But we also purchased the K & W Guide to College for Students with Learning Disabilities, which rated different disability programs at different schools. Given the distance and our son’s needs, we were utterly unwilling to consider a school on the East coast that our son was interested in and is now ultimately attending until we saw that it had a particularly high rating from the K & W College Guide.
I’m sure you’ve heard tales of those mythical students who are disciplined and can get through the application process relatively on their own. I will tell you that our older son was just such a student. But our youngest . . . oh well . . . Actually, the hardest part of the application process was deciding whether or not our son should disclose his disability. (Students are not required to do so; colleges are of course not allowed to discriminate against students who do identify their special needs.) Although our high school transition coordinator recommends always disclosing, we were on a fence. But during one particularly interminable college recruiting program (again, our students are always happy, the sun is always shining, etc), I reacted to the admission rep’s statements about respecting and seeking diversity. I figured we would call them on it. I suggested, and my husband and son agreed, to disclose the disability. If a school were going to be bothered by the disability, it wasn’t a school our son should be attending anyway. Consequently, my son wrote about his diagnosis in his Common Application essay.
Last week my husband and I drove to the East coast to drop our son off at school. My older son’s university had offered a program to the parents during freshman orientation on “Letting Go.” Parents were told that they needed to trust that they have raised their children well, that they are prepared for college, and that they will thrive. The days of “helicopter parenting” must end. (I told my husband that I would walk out of any similar session if offered at our younger son’s school–fortunately, it wasn’t.) My final act of loving “helicoptering” (if that can be a noun) was to unpack and organize my son’s dorm room. This week a co-worker, who had also just dropped off her freshman son, laughed about moms who organized their freshman’s shirts by color. Guilty as charged. And yes, my husband set up the wireless for the laptop.
My husband and I are now home. Our son is out East without us, and it’s up to him now to make things work. He has survived his first earthquake and his first hurricane (two events it had not occurred to me to worry about—who knew?). He’s excited and nervous about his new adventure. We are scared, hopeful, and proud. And missing him, too.
Parents of children with special needs either love or hate Emily Perl Kingsley’s poem, “Welcome to Holland.” Like everything else involved in raising a child with a disability, parents find themselves in Holland, even while searching for college. As for my husband and me, we’re planning to go to Italy this spring—really.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122160388151245179.html
http://www.amazon.com/Colleges-Students-Disabilities-Attention-Princeton/dp/0375762205
This Year IS Next Year: Back to School Advice for Parents of Students with Special Needs
For many parents and students August means that thoughts turn to back-to-school sales on clothes and school supplies. While those items are on the minds of parents of students with special needs, they often have much weightier things on their minds; how to make this school year experience significantly better and different than last year. At the annual review IEP at the end of last school year, schools often make promises that the issues from last year or the unmet goals will be accomplished, or progress will be made, next (school) year. Well it is time to make good on those promises and representations, as this year IS next year. Those promises need to have more meaning than the average New Year’s resolution. Here are my thoughts on some things to consider, as an attorney who practices in the area of special education law, at the start of this new school year:
Court Appointed Special Advocate (“CASA”) Helping Families Navigate the Special Ed System by Marilyn Green-Rebnord
The following is a blog from Marilyn Green-Rebnord, who has been a court appointed special advocate or CASA. In this role she has provided invaluable help to families trying to navigate the special education system. She was also one of the founders and moving forces behind Special Kids, Special Families that for more than a decade provided excellent advice, support and presentations on various topics to help families. While Special Kids has now disbanded she continues to help families as a CASA and working part-time in my office.
SLANT Successfully Used to Teach Students with Downs To Read by Pam Labellarte
I have recently run into a series of IEP teams that all seem to have been making the same claim that students with intellectual challenges can not learn to read beyond the most rudimentary level. When faced with lack of progress even on IEP goals, I am told that students "like that" just do not progress. It is enough to make my head explode when faced with the bias of low expectations. Schools feel that they have a literacy loophole that negates any need to show progress on a basic area of academic developement–literacy.
Pam Labellarte, an experienced special advocate and a parent of a child with Downs Syndrome who works for me, authored the following first person account of her struggle with school to recognize that her daughter can read if taught appropriately, and her wonderful success in recent years with the SLANT method. At the end of the first person account is her tutor's Masters thesis on her work with SLANT with students with Downs and her data. It is good stuff and should help in the future when faced with the same argument that students like that can not learn to read.
Anger Management Lesson for Your Next IEP Meeting
Humor is usually an area of the blog that I leave to my wife's column High Stakes Jesting, but the following just came across my desk and it struck me as quite funny and wanted to share it. Under the heading of "Anger Management" a local school district just emailed the following lesson overview, which is excerpted below:
" Here is an example of how you might practice these steps with your child at home: You hear a shriek from the family room. You find your child near tears because Henry, the family dog, just ran through your child's board game. You say, "Remember to stop and think. Ask yourself how your body feels. I can tell that you're angry. Calm down. Remember what you said to yourself when you needed to calm down the other day? Try saying those things again. Now that you're calm, let's go through the problem-solving steps you learned to see if we can keep Henry from messing up your game the next time." … At-home activity idea: Write each of the calming-down methods on a small piece of paper. Fold each piece and place all in a container. Present your child with a pretend situation that may cause him to become angry (such as a sibling taking the last cookie). "
Most adults would find this lesson challenging and more than a little off-putting. I am thinking of using this paragraph above, however, as a script at the next IEP when my advocacy gets the special education director's nostrils flaring. "Now remember, that raising your voice at me did not help the last time we met and you got mad at me. You made really damaging admissions that we used against you at hearing and your attorney got mad at you too. When you went home that night how did that make your body feel." If this part of the script worked, I would go on to say "OK now that you are calm, you can readily see that no matter how much you scream and holler and bluster, this student is not literate at all and he/she is in high school. You see confession is not just good for the soul, your body feels better too." Next time, we will use a hypothetical like controlling your anger when "the teacher tells the truth when he/she has been expressely been told to lie." My body feels better just thinking about it.
Case Rules No Fee Shifting to Schools from Parents
Since IDEA 2004 became the law one topic that has been troubling parents is the prospect of the school district shifting fees to parents when they file due process. In an Arizona case, the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, ruled that since the parents' claim could have resulted in remedies in their favor their claim was sound and there could be no fee shifting. The parents lost the due process but were not held responsible for their school district's fees in excess of $140,000 (that number alone is truly astounding for a due process case even with an appeal).
In R.P. ex.rel. C.P. v. Prescott Unified School District, 56 IDELR, (9th Cir. 2011) ruled that the parents' failure to obtain relief and win their case did not mean that the case was baseless or frivolous. This case is consistent with a decision out of Missouri where the court similarly turned down the district's efforts to shift fees to parents for losing a due process. Under the current law, parents should bring cases that are well founded in the law and facts without fear of being tagged for the school district's fees in the event that they do not win the case. Winning or losing the case is not the standard for school's to shift fees claims to parents. It is highly advisable to consult an experienced attorney in the area of special education law to make sure that any due process claim is in fact well-founded in IDEIA and that the facts are sound to go forward with a due process filing.
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