Frustrated in Washington

Post Reply New Topic

That's stupid. Your son gets into another school, and before he's used to it - it closes?! Man oh man, I'm very sorry that you and your son have to go through this.
The school district better get into high gear - NOW. Within the next 2-3 weeks, western WA students will be going back to school, and at least your kid would get some education. I'd love for him to be in a school where there are a WIDE variety of classes - and not just core classes + PE + keyboarding. Ones which challenge him and make him want to come back day after day in a great mood. And the teachers need to think twice and put him in choir! If he wants to sing, and enjoy being with people his age that relate to him, put him in choir!
He also needs some assistance when it comes to spring 2016. Because we all know what spring means for grades 3-8 and 11 - Common Core testing.

Do you know if the new school has a better special-ed program? Hopefully it does, because you and your son need an IEP team that cares about the students, not just takes vacations because they can spend all of their hard-earned $$$ on themselves.

I wish you and your son all the best.

Apologies for taking so long to get back to you all.

We'd been able to get my son into the Junior High here which was heralded as the Best for Special Education Services and Support - this year. He began late due to miss communication within the District.

This time through it seemed different, there was an IEP meeting prior to admittance where we had to reiterate the diagnosis of ASD since the man who did his threat assessment made a note that said he did not believe ASD correct (this being the same man that had originally diagnosed him with ADHD in 2012)

I have noticed the diagnosis' vary depending upon my son's mood, is that (for lack of a better word) normal?

He attended school for 2 hours a day, in a non-integrated partially independent study style setting. He was different. He woke up early, caught the bus, began showing interest in the route taken to and from his school, then just before the wet weather arrived he began walking home in the afternoons. He also showed more interest in personal care.

At the end of October we got another Prior Notice to attend an IEP where the District brought up sending him to a Special School in Vancouver, WA. We attended a meet and greet at that school a few days later. The school in Vancouver was touted as being the best suit for him and his difficulties. He was on the fence about attending, but agreed to give it a try. There was an incentive's program which caught his attention, where he could earn games, the right to wear his fedora and so on.

He again, went to bed early (odd) woke up early for his 45 min bus commute, began showering on a daily basis and preparing for the following day the night before - this went on for 15 days. Then the stomach/headaches started, along with anxiety induced vomiting. He started to withdrawal from everyone and invest more time in his games/room. He now flat out refuses to attend. He has begged us to let him go back to school here. He says he's afraid of getting sick so far from home, he misses his neighborhood school friends, he believes 'they' sent him away because there is something wrong with him, he's apologized repeatedly for every 'stupid' thing he's ever done wrong at the schools here.

When we talked to him candidly he said nothing is good enough for any of 'them' he gets his school work and does everything he knows how to do, then spends the rest of the day trying to work out the stuff he doesn't understand. He says, "the writing is so hard and the being in his brain searching for their answers makes him sad because they aren't in there." He isn't allowed any of the incentives because his classroom work is incomplete and every Friday when the other kids are playing games he's off to the side with a stack of incomplete work, which is over 2 weeks deep now. His anxiety over asking for help has sky rocketed, far worse than it was before. He now says he's often invaded with thoughts of killing himself just so the hurt will end and he knows he's not as good as the other kids.

So I did some digging. The school he now attends is for at risk students whom have not yet entered the Juvenile system. It's more like a Mental Hospital with classrooms, instead of a Jail but he describes it as one would a prison. He has already served a detention for having jumped from the swing at recess! Their state report card stats were suppressed due to being at less than 10% passing basic education. I know now I should have looked into this at first mention and asked some hard questions. This place is a shape up or drop out entirely end of the line retention attempt set up by the United States Government IMO.

Now we're trying to get another meeting to have him released back to our local district, so far there has been little response. It could be the Holidays wreaking havoc or more of the same stone walling. We'll see.

That's an extremely infuriating story. Not mad at you. I have no trouble believing it. I can imagine the same thing going down in WV. And ALL of it being the "professionals" fault.

I don't know anything to help you. I really don't.

They talk like parents hold all the power, but the fact is that's not true. Unless you're wealthy enough and assertive/aggressive enough to make them believe you're going to sue and sue and sue, they can refuse to teach your kid, tie everything up in red tape, and sic Child and Family Services on you. They can completely f**k you and your kid over, and do it in politically correct language with a mealy-mouthed glad-handing smile.

Can you tell I hate them?? Yeah-- my HS principal was the same kind of f***tard.

I'd tell you to pull your kid out of their BS "school" system and homeschool, but I imagine you can't as they've already set CFS on you once.

It's a sad option, but you do have another one. Tell him that it's them as much as it is him, and to just try to do what work he can, be non-verbal, and sit really really still for another 3 years to minimize the amount of trauma he's forced to endure. Then drop out, give him some time to recover, and start teaching him yourself again.

There's no age limit on getting an education. There's no age limit on getting a GED.

There is a limit to how much trauma a person can stand before their brain f*****g cracks.

I'm really sorry these small-minded, self-serving, self-righteous f***tards are doing this to your kid. They ought to be fired.

ETA: I'm not avoiding the swear filter. It doesn't recognize the swear in f***tard, so I fixed it myself.

And my advice is sad, bad, mad advice. It's angry hillbilly advice. It's nuclear-option advice (no it isn't, that would be suing the school system). It's about as far from a good attitude and the best possible outcome as you can get.

But if nothing else works, it might be a way to avoid the worst possible outcome.

You can work with autism.

You can't work with stupid.

I can't believe they transferred your son to that horrible mess of a school. He's not supposed to be in a mental hospital with classes! I'd love if your son was able to be in a school where he would get one-on-one help on his assignments, and maybe meet some friends that will not use autism as another excuse to call him the "R" word.
You need to find a school where he can do what he wants to do to succeed. The administration at both schools seems to not care about your son, and would much rather label him a "failure."
If only EVERY school had a drama class, a choir class, and a bunch of clubs with friendly people. Why don't we have that? Schools spend 95% of their budget on SPORTS, and 5% on academics...it's sad. I know your son probably isn't interested in signing up in the junior high football or basketball squad either, and for a good reason.

Just keep trying and don't let the admin stop you! Keep fighting for your son.
Happy holidays.

Whelp I've been writing out a time-line of events regarding this whole mess and trying to figure out how one goes about filing a lawsuit, since I've never done that before! I'm not even sure where to take it.

Latest, we filed for homeschool, which ideally worked when he was younger not so much now that he's been jacked around by the system.

We had been able to get a meeting with his IEP team and the district special education office before Thanksgiving, wherein I was unable to attend. My mother and my son attended the meeting.

The principle for the Middle School he had attended prior to being shipped off to Vancouver, told my son 'schools have a long memory and they don't forget bad behavior easily.' - that was their response to his apology. He told them he knew he'd made mistakes when he was younger and angry, but he knows now that isn't how to act and he was sorry. He requested they please allow him to return to school near his home and his friends and promised he'd work a lot harder to make sure he didn't repeat the mistakes he'd made in the past. Then the District Sp. Edu guy told him there was no where within the Longview school district for a person like him and his former teacher hard lined specifics like student/teacher ratio in the Vancouver school vs Longview and finally they finished off by telling my mother and my son that if he was allowed to return to Longview he would be treated like any other student. He would be required to attend a full day, normal classes, normal homework load, no more special treatment and that he needed to return to the Vancouver school while we thought long and hard about bringing him home.

I was irate when she called me! I couldn't believe my mother hadn't sensed any passive aggressive threats in their language. Although she left the meeting heartbroken and depressed. My son refused to return to the school in Vancouver and since it's such a long burdensome commute when we'd get a call that he was absent there was no way to drive him even if he'd wanted to go.

Then came talk of truancy, so i asked my mother to respond to the district with direct quotes from the notes she'd taken at her meeting and request clarification on the language they had used, which prompted a call from the head of the Vancouver school. The man said my mother had stirred up quite the hornets nest and it seemed all of the participants involved were back peddling. They requested my mother arrange a time so they might meet again to go back over what they'd already said and until such time told her she needed to make my son attend school so they wouldn't be forced to file truancy due to his absences.

To give us some time to figure out what to do, my mother filed a home school petition. Now my son's xbox achievements are through the roof and his interest in school has gone out the window. He does and doesn't want to go back. He is angry again. He worked very hard to apologize for his past, I know it was hard for him to find the right way to say how he felt.

We asked the pediatrician for a referral to a local children's hospital in order to have an academic/developmental assessment on him since the school hasn't done much in the way of testing to determine his needs and abilities, but his insurance has denied it stating the risk assessment completed in order for him to return to school was billed under that code and they see no reason to grant a second assessment. I'm going to contact the dr today and ask he refile the referral to the Autism Clinic instead and hope this helps us somewhere.

I no longer have the time needed to make sure his education is taken care of from home. My eldest daughter lost her ability to walk at the end of October, it's related to her genetic condition and I'm swamped having to care for her daily needs at home as well as make sure her re-evaluations for home tutoring are filed in a timely manner. Having to deal with two separate school districts is beyond frustrating.

Schools seems to suck in Washington state for kids with disabilities. I don't know if I am being bias or not. You seem to be having problems with it and so did my parents when we lived there. Is your son in the same school district I attended? Even with an IEP, my parents still had to fight for me and my school continued seeing me as a behavior problem like I was a bad seed or something.

Whoa, I don't understand how a kid can have a diagnoses and the schools still refuse to help him. Also that is a long drive for his special school he was attending, (you said you were in Longview). I have heard of these stories before and I wonder why some kids are unable to get help despite their diagnoses and I still had help despite my parents having to pull teeth with my school. Can you get a lawyer? I think the school is breaking the law. They do it because they think they can get away with it so it's up to parents to find out what their rights are and what the laws are for their kid's education. The only solution I can see next is to move but that might not be an option.

That is horrible that Longview School District would say that to your son. Obviously they don't care about helping a child with special needs. Research into the district and see how much is going to sports/extracurricular, and how much is going to special education in general. I suppose 98% of the budget goes straight into the sports programs.
Obviously I live in WA...when I was in elementary school I lived in a suburb north of Seattle. Large school district. May PM you with further details on where I went. I was in sp-ed but in a general ed class with an aide helping me out. Would sometimes be pulled out for a Sp-Ed social skills class, and had speech 1x/week and OT/PT 1x/week until about 3rd grade. Speech continued through the end of elementary school.
The district, nor the sp-ed aides, never got my parents irate. They enjoyed having me in that district. Was there until almost 8th grade, then moved.

2nd district had a sp-ed program but felt that I didn't fit in. Most of the students in the sp-ed classes had ADHD and learning disabilities - not autism. Had 2 sp-ed and 5 regular classes in middle school (7-period day for all students). The high school also had a sp-ed program, but that's where I was bullied by football players for not doing the warmups in freshmen PE as good as everyone else. They would yell F-words, s--t, and sometimes derogatory slurs to me and others.

3rd district was great. 1 sp-ed but 5 regular classes...I was starting to fade away from having sped classes. General education classes were just fine - and no one harassed me...this was 2nd half freshman year, 1st half sophomore year before yet another move.

4th (and current district) is fine as well. 1 sped class (a study hall), the other 5 are general ed. Most of the people in the study hall I believe have learning disabilities, and not so much autism. One young man I talked with (really nice by the way) told me he never had sp-ed classes in elementary school. I guess if it's a "learning disability" of any kind, you lose 1 of the elective spots for study hall...

I'm sorry to hear about your oldest daughter. Just puts another burden on your son and schooling. Is she in a wheelchair?

Lawyer would be a great option for that Longview situation. The other option is to move closer to Seattle, or try the districts in the Portland metro, but I know that's not a choice right now.
Sorry to hear about all of this. Keep fighting for not only your daughter, but your son...who I KNOW wants to be in a school where he gets accommodations, extra help, good mix of electives, and friends who can understand him.

I'm sorry you are going through all of this. I'm in Portland, OR and I could possibly help you with contacts in the Portland public school system. There is an attorney here who specializes in education cases. She is excellent; very to the point and thorough. Word here in Portland is if she comes to one of your IEP meetings, you will get everything you need!

Her name is Diane Wiscarson. Here is her website: http://wiscarsonlaw.com
If she can't practice in Washington, I'm sure she knows someone in the state who could help you.