Wednesday, September 5, 2012

Yet Another F

We had Little Man's Triennial Review yesterday.   I took an advocate and my husband with me and since Little Man's occupational therapist, physical therapist, and the principal did not show we were only out numberd 5 to 3 instead of the usual 8 to 1 match up. 

They spent the first 15 minutes or so detailing how marvelously well Little Man has done in the first week and a half of school.  I replied with all of the hours of private academic and speech therapy we had provided him over the summer to support his ability to do well this year.  His general ed teacher did let slip that this miraculous performance of his has been during their "settling in" period and they have not begun any academic work yet.  Oh how I wish I had brought the voice recorder.  I am sure that comment will be left out of the written notes.  They also mentioned how much more mature he seems this year – not crying all the time.  Really?  I thought you told me last year he was doing fine during the day – no crying or upset like I reported at home?  Yeah that recorder is going to be a staple at all meetings from now on.

They informed us Little Man had aged out of the "developmentally delayed" category and had to be reclassified if he were to continue to receive services.  I countered with the fact that developmentally delayed covers children until they are seven and Little Man has just turned six yesterday.  At which point they had to admit that he "could" remain classed as is, but threatened dire circumstances if his reviews were not able to be completed on time next year.  I allowed that - if - they wanted to do the testing now and recategorize now - so long as that did not eliminate him from any services we would be willing but we needed to see what testing would be done and what results came back before we would allow recategorization.

So they told me they would be doing an IQ test.  That's it.  Well, being the anal over prepared person I am I just happened to have a two page handout based on Teresa Kellerman's work showing which evaluations are best suited to uncovering the particular domains effected for a child with FASD to give them.  I recommended they consider something like that because if they did not I'd be asking for an independent evaluation .  (Which is my right and which they have to pay for and which I will get done regardless.)

They then handed me the signature page for the notes from the meeting and for the consent to test.  That’s it – just the signature page.  As if!  I insisted on reading the entire document first.  And that the fact that they had declined to attend the training we offered to pay for be added to the notes.  Oh my, the hullaballoo that caused!!  “What training – they had not heard of any training. Who knew about this – why wasn’t I told, blah, blah, blah. “  That’s when I lost it. 

So the principle didn’t even offer it to the teachers involved?  Or they were throwing him under the bus because he wasn’t there and I insisted on documentation?  You know what I don’t even care what the real answer is.  I was just pissed beyond belief.   Which made me cry.  Which made me even more mad to be crying in front of them.

And I get to do this again next week.  Because we have to do his IEP review.  Although why we are doing that before we determine if he is “still eligible for services”  is something they could not explain.

1 comment:

  1. so basically they want to reclassify him so he doesn't get services anymore? sounds peachy....

    ReplyDelete