should I send my kid to another school?

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Am I the only one that sees the hippy school as harmful to the child? The incidents at the school's camp in particular alarmed me. It is a huge red flag to me when a kid says he doesn't want to live anymore, and that his physical safety was in question more than once.

I have a newly diagnosed kid, so maybe I'm not getting the importance of friendships. What I read from the posts is that the school is not teaching your child skills that will help him be successful later in life, and doesn't seem to want to work with you at all, beyond the one teacher for next year. Are you expecting the other kids, his friends, to help him when he flounders? That's a lot of pressure to put on another kid who is not trained in how to do that, nor has the emotional and mental maturity to do that. Is there a way to maintain those friendships outside of school if you move him, through playdates and such?

I agree, that is why I was talking about how to transition with minimum impact.

It is the school staff that makes a bully intolerant school, by making it very clear that people who need to harm others to feel powerful are actually weak. School staff are legally obligated to provide a safe environment. I know that does not always happen.

In the US schools get double the funding for each child with an IEP. Unfortunately, few chose to spend it on the child, and teachers get no reward, other than intrinsic personal, for going beyond the call of duty. But schools must provide what is in the IEP and parents have direct input into the IEP and can request reasonable support.

There are many reasons why Parent-Implemented Intervention is the most successful intervention for ASD and ADHD. Most often the trained safe trusted adult teaching Social Referencing Skills is a parent or family member.

It is exactly those incidents that alarm me. And after he came home from camp and had that enormous emotional breakdown, I was ready to switch. If filling in a calendar is too much trouble, if I spend the entire year trying to explain that he needs *clear* instructions, and they refuse because they believe it has to come from his internal motivation, if even the OT there described his verbal tics and stims as 'trying to get attention in a negative way', I'm pretty sure they just don't get ASD and Tourettes. Even if they do amazing things like trying to teach kids self-discipline, doing group meetings where they try to solve fights and other incidents by letting them express their feelings and try to talk it out. As great as those things are, it's just too hard for a seven year old Aspie. And I can't get over the 'we didn't use the calendar because it was too hard, we didn't really have things all planned'.

But I'm not sure they are going to 'get him' at the other school either. And it could be worse. Not even taking into account the stress of switching schools will cause. I know he had the social skills to make new friends, but there is a risk that he might withdraw because of the stress, and that other kids will make fun of his quirks.

I think that if I can make the transition easy, he'll get through it, but there's just no way to know how it will go. It seems to be the hardest decision I've ever had to make. I wish there was a mathematical equation for this.

I've changed my mind after reading the OP's second post. Hippy-dippy is one thing, but leaving a child unattended (especially a child with special needs, but really ANY child) is negligent and dangerous. I would switch schools in that case.

Sidney, you're right. You don't know how it's going to go if you make the switch. But you do know exactly what it would be to stay. It's the devil-you-know syndrome. And there's a chance that things could be actually great switching. You won't know until you do it. You seem to be quite on top of things, of what he needs with specific tools ready to hand over to the new school. It wouldn't be like you're dropping him into an unknown without supervision on your part. Is there a way to meet with folks at the new school to set a plan ahead of time? If it is a quality school, I would think they would listen to your concerns and suggestions, and just maybe have a few of their own.

Now I finally know what 'the devil you know' means, I never understood that phrase!

I asked him again yesterday, and said 'hypothetically, if you could bring your friends to the other school, then would you want to switch?'. He said yes. So that says it all. It really is my exact same thought as well.

Odetta, I'm going to try to get as much accomodation as I can, but as I said, they didn't seem to willing to spend too much time on that. I just hope we're not going to hit another brick wall.
My confidence in any school is extremely low at this point.

I'm going to try to find kids in his classroom via friends and aqcuiantances, the city isn't thát big. Make a laminated daychart and ask if they can tape it on his desk. He knows one kid in school, different class, though, but maybe they can have lunch together.

Thanks everyone, I'm still not 100% sure, but I think I need to at least try to switch, after everything that happened.

Almost make me want to start my own school.

I understand your trepidation. I really hope it works out for you.

You care, seek to learn and understand, and support. He has very important role model in you.

Thanks Lynn . Thanks everyone! This community has helped me so many times already... It's truly a gift.