Charles P Fox Law Offices

Special Education Law and Guardianship

Law Offices of Charles P. Fox
355 W. Dundee, Suite 209
Buffalo Grove, IL 60089
Phone: 847-205-9897

Navigation

Special Education Law and Advocacy

Experienced Special Education Attorneys

Overcoming My Difference By Isabelle Fiona Fox

By

The following is the heartfelt wisdom and pathos from my own daughter. She is a beautiful, wonderful person who has had to face the challenges of being a sibling to a brother with special needs and the internal identity struggles of being adopted from China. We are all a work in progress, but her essay below captures in poignant terms her thoughts about her "difference."

Well, if you had to ask, a difference that I have had to overcome was my family. Being adopted kind of bothered me, and my brother has spastic cerebral palsy and epilepsy. I know being unique and different is good, but this to me was VERY unusual. I mean how many people do you know have a family of an adopted daughter from China, and a son with a disability? Just as I thought, I may be the first. As you continue to read you may find yourself asking question about your own family. Just know your family is something you should appreciate and enhance.

[Read more…]

The Harsh Reality of Incarcerated Youth

By

The use of seclusion and restraint for children with special
needs in our nation’s schools has received national attention.  These practices have been deemed as cruel and
dangerous, and various pieces of legislation have been proposed to eliminate
their use.  Yet, these practices are
being used on an ongoing basis on our nation’s incarcerated youth.  Up to 81,000 teens are incarcerated in
juvenile facilities on any given night, and an additional 10,000 teens are in
adult prisons. According to the ACLU, which released a report on
solitary confinement in October, a significant number of these facilities
isolate youth for days, weeks, months, or even years.  The use of solitary confinement, according to
the ACLU, causes “anguish, provokes serious mental and physical health
problems, and works against rehabilitation for teenagers.”

One of the most tragic outcomes for incarcerated youth is
suicide, and half of teen suicides occur while youth are placed in solitary
isolation.   A position paper published
by the National Commission on Correctional Health Care, which expresses
concern about the high rate and potential underreporting of teen suicides in
jails, states that further research is needed to delineate better the
relationship between suicide and isolation. 
Yet, according to the American Academy of Child & Adolescent
Psychiatry (5), the research is in already. 
The potential psychiatric consequences of prolonged use of solitary
confinement on these “developmentally vulnerable” adolescents are “well
recognized” and include depression, anxiety, and psychosis. 

[Read more…]

The Real Harm of Bullying

By

October was National Bullying Prevention month. Throughout our nation’s schools, students attended pep rallies, signed petitions, wore t-shirts with anti-bully messages, and participated in anti-bully marches. Anti-bullying Facebook pages, some with extraordinary amounts of helpful resources and information, were created. It was all a wonderful display of anti-bully sentiment which ensured that everyone was thinking about bullying behavior and its consequence, at least for awhile. So what happens in November? Now that anti-bullying month has ended, what is occurring today in your child’s lunchroom or on the playground? Were the October messages enough to reduce bullying? What really works to help reduce bullying?
There is a huge amount of literature on the best methods and curriculums to defeat bullying. Yet some of it is contradictory. One strategy from one anti-bullying expert is deemed misguided by another. To add clarity to this discussion, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services has defined 10 best practices for bullying prevention. Those 10 strategies are:

1. Focus on the social environment of the school

2. Assess bullying at your school

3. Garner staff and parent support for bullying prevention

4. Form a group to coordinate the school’s bullying prevention activities

5. Train your staff in bullying prevention

6. Establish and enforce school rules and policies related to bullying

7. Increase adult supervision in hot spots where bullying occurs

8. Intervene consistently and appropriately in bullying situations

9. Focus some class time on bullying prevention.

10. Continue these efforts over time.

[Read more…]

Dental Care for Children with Special Needs

By

Taking a child with special needs to the dentist can be
stressful for both the child and the parent. 
Parents know that their child
doesn’t want to see the dentist, but does the parent know if the dentist will want to see the child?  It’s important for parents to find out,
because results of surveys of dental students and practicing dentists indicate
that not every dentist feels prepared for or is comfortable with treating
children with special needs. 

Whether or not a dentist is comfortable with treating
patients with special needs appears dependent on their dental school
training.  According to a 2010 study,
most dental programs are providing only limited training on treating patients
with disabilities.  Data collected from
22 dental schools in the United States and Canada showed that only 64% of
programs offered a specific course on treating the patient with special needs,
although 91% of programs addressed the topic in the clinical education.  Additionally, only 37% of schools offered a
special clinical area for treating patients with disabilities.  Fortunately, the majority of schools
indicated their intentions to increase the clinical and extramural training of
dentists with regards to special needs patients, which is good given that both dental students and practicing dentists indicate that they
feel unprepared and that their training was inadequate to treat patients with
disabilities.

[Read more…]

Teaching Critical Skills to Become a Learner Not Just a Student

By

That standardized test scores can accurately predict whether
a student will attend college, be gainfully employed, and be successful in life
have become the bulwark of educational policy in this country.  How kids “measure up” on tests are linked not
only to teacher performance evaluations, but also to determinations of whether
or not a school is considered successful or a failure under No Child Left Behind.
But standardized tests don’t tell the whole story about a student.   In fact, some researchers now argue that
a student’s grades are better predictors of overall success in life than
standardized scores.  Those seemingly
intangible factors which keep a student in school and persevering—resilience,
self-control, and grit–may be far more important in the long run than
short-term mastery of course content.  

[Read more…]

Travel Training a Key Missing Piece in Transition Plans for Students with Disabilities

By

Young adults with moderate to severe disabilities who age
out of special education if at all possible must have the skills to navigate
safely through their community using public transportation for the purposes of
employment, post-secondary education or training, or recreation or
leisure.  To lack these skills means that
these young adults may effectively be trapped in their homes due to their
constant dependence upon others for transportation.  “Travel training,” as this skill is called,
can be taught, preferably well before the completion of high school.  (A different skill is taught to young adults
who are blind or visually impaired.)  However,
travel training is an often under-looked yet vitally important component of a
child’s transition plan.  The Government
Accountability Office cites limited access to reliable public transportation as
a major obstacle for individuals with disabilities and may be one of the
reasons for the high unemployment rate among young disabled adults compared to
their peers (13.5% vs. 7.3%).  

Transition plans, which are the blueprint to assist the
child in reaching his post-high school goals, are developed as part of an IEP
usually when the child turns 14 but no later than 16.  A thoughtfully written transition plan will
carefully delineate the steps needed to ensure the student can achieve those post-high
school goals.  And for appropriately
identified students, travel training can be a key related service in the
transition plan.

[Read more…]

Sleeping Difficulties Prevalent in Students with ASD

By

Many children have difficulty sleeping.  But a disproportionate number of children
with special needs have sleep problems. 
Anywhere from 49 to 89% of children with autism spectrum disorders, 25
to 50% of children with ADHD, and 34 to 86% of children with cognitive
impairments are estimated to experience sleep difficulties.  Additionally children with other syndromes,
such as Angelman or Down syndromes, are also reported to have sleep
difficulties.  But what is not known is
if the learning problems cause the sleep problems, or if the sleep problems
cause the learning problems.  Dr. Bonuck
and her associates from the Albert Einstein College of Medicine attempted
to answer this question in a prospective study just published in Pediatrics by looking for an association
between sleep difficulties in young children with a later need for special
education services.

 Prospective studies follow a specific population (or cohort)
over time, identify certain risk factors, and see how these factors affect
outcomes over time. The Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children (also
known as ‘the Children of the 90s’ study) is one such cohort that had enrolled approximately
85% of pregnant women in Avon, England in 1991-1992, allowing for a large
population-based study.  The initial
cohort in the study, which was used by Dr. Bonuck and her associates for their
research, comprised more than 13,000 infants, but children with any known condition
that might lead to a disability or was associated with a disability were excluded. 

[Read more…]

Educating Students with High Functioning ASD: Part 2- A Personal Story by Marilyn Green Rebnord

By

In doing research on finding appropriate placements for
students with either high-functioning autism or Asperger’s syndrome, I got side
tracked by a little jewel of an article that had appeared in a magazine
published by the National Education Association.  Titled “Square Pegs:  Kids with Asperger Syndrome are Hoping You’ll
Help Them Find a Place in the Classroom that Fits Just Fine,” the article
quotes Lucas, a young man with Asperger’s who had just graduated high
school.  According to Lucas, “You’ve heard
people say we don’t want to be square pegs in round holes, we want to be square
pegs in square holes.  To me that means
we don’t need to be fixed.  We’re not
broken people.  We just need to be
understood.” What Lucas is asking for—understanding–is what is essential to
ensure a successful placement for the child with high-functioning autism or
Asperger’s.

 Teachers who are willing to go the proverbial extra mile may
discover that children on the spectrum can contribute enormously to their
classrooms.  These children can shine
brightly with a teacher who appreciates who they are and shows classmates by
example how to treat the child with autism or Asperger’s with respect.   Children who are placed with rigid, top-down
disciplinarians are probably not going to do so well.  Everyone—the child, the teacher, the
principal, and the family—are going to be miserable.  And some children simply cannot have their
needs met in a mainstream classroom. 

[Read more…]

Chart of Disability Issues Makes it Easy to be an Informed Voter

By

Thanks to Disability Rights Ohio, an Ohio disability organization it is now very easy to be an informed voter on issues effecting people with disabilities. They have put together a side by side comparison chart of the candidate's position on the issues. Now it is obviously time to read it, be informed and vote for the issues that matter to us, our families and people with disabilities that we care about.

Educating Students with High Functioning ASD: Part 1

By

The number of children being diagnosed with autism is
rapidly increasing.  The incidence rate
within the past few years has gone from one child in every 500, to one child in
every 150, and now, according to the CDC, the incidence of kids on the autism
spectrum is 1 in 88.  It’s beyond the
scope of this blog to explain the reason for the escalating number of children being
diagnosed, but suffice it to say that the public schools are being called upon
more and more frequently to provide services for these children.  Sometimes schools can do a phenomenal job in
addressing these children’s needs; sometimes not.  In particular, meeting the needs of those
students with higher functioning autism or Asperger’s syndrome can be uniquely
challenging because on the surface many of these children look “fine.”  Yet, these children have challenges and need
help. 

 School staff can be blinded by the sometimes high intellect
or seemingly strong verbal skills some children with either Asperger’s syndrome
or high-functioning autism exhibit.  Yet,
these kids can be exceedingly puzzling. 
Seemingly competent students fall apart when their rigid adherence to routine
is interrupted.  Due to sensory overload,
the student in AP physics might wind up under the table during a fire drill.  Navigating gym classes, lunchrooms, and
playgrounds—confusing even for some children without special needs–can be
nightmares for children on the spectrum. 
Homework and class work are also stressors for these children.  Some teachers will fault the child on the
spectrum who fails to turn in his homework, loses it, or even more
frustratingly, simply refuses to do it. 
After all, these are bright children who should really “know better.”  Any and all of these scenarios can result in
meltdowns for these children.  In worst
case scenarios some melt downs are so very badly managed by school staff that
the child exits the school in handcuffs escorted by police.  Other children will quietly slip under the
radar and simply have their needs overlooked.     

[Read more…]