JSD24

Given she has 2 years to figure out how to get herself organized, she might benefit from specially designed instruction via an IEP in addition to accommodations. Being seated away from distractions in the classroom might help - in other words, away from her BF. Having the teacher give her reminders to stay on task can also help. They can work with her during study hall to stay on task & get her work done. Colleges can offer the same sorts of accommodations. An IEP or 504 will help during school hours but it seems she has needs at home. A therapist can help her with things outside of school - like if she's focusing on her phone rather than doing homework. IMO, this is where the distractions will be in college. She'll be going to parties and meeting new people but her dirty clothes pile will be out of control & she'll be behind in getting reading done for classes. Psychologists/therapists can help with this. She can be taught strategies so she can be better organized - both with her things & her time.

A good teacher will trial an accommodation and then ask for it to be added to a 504. With no required 504 team members, it should be pretty quick to get a meeting. You might need to gently remind the school that you want to schedule so you can move forward with your child getting the help they need.

There was one prescription med for ADHD that was taken off the market. It was high in Omega 3. You can get Omega 3 over the counter & it might help. Caffeine can also help but it wears off quickly. I'm not as sure about anxiety. B12 can help or B complex. Do check with your doctor or pharmacist about this as I am not licensed to prescribe. I'm suggesting you speak to someone with a license about these OTC remedies. They should be able to suggest the right dosage.

Sometimes what a school says is 'policy' is not what the district has written as policy. That said, I'd ask to see a copy of their policy. If district policy say no 3rd parties can come & observe, I feel this is a violation. How can you get an IEE (at school or parent expense) if no one can go into the school & observe? This becomes an issue for the Disability Rights group and/or the dept of ed in your state as it violates the rights in IDEA. I'd ask them about policy in your letter since schools don't write laws. IMO, there are laws that say a 3rd party can observe but I'm not a lawyer which is what I suggest reaching out to disability rights - they have lawyers.

It's possible that the added support of RTI is helping your child enough where a higher level of instructional support (an IEP) isn't needed. The thing is that RTI doesn't require progress monitoring so how do you know how much it's helping? I'd see if you can get them to progress monitor so you can see if your child is closing the gap with this level of support. 504s provide accommodations. I'm taking a dyslexia class and the instructor (Sally Shaywitz who is a dyslexia expert) says that extra time on tests is something every dyslexic student needs. Based on this, I'd see about getting a 504 so your child has extra time. If they can't read at a level where they have access to math, science & other textbooks, audiobooks is another accommodation to request. They might also need things read to them or a scribe (or AAC) if spelling gets in the way of their success in school. With accommodations on a 504, they will also be able to get the same accommodations on PSSA & Keystone exams. (With the reading parts of these, you can't get the test read to them because this is a test of reading comprehension but the math & science parts as well as instructions can be read.)

IMO, a verbal assessment when it comes to lists of things would make a great accommodation. The ability to use talk to text AAC would be another way to show mastery of information w/o testing her spelling ability which tends to be poor with this disability. Measurable IEP goals could measure accuracy, fluency and comprehension. You might need to advocate for different, measurable goals so you can figure out what sort of progress is going on.

I pulled some info on Ohio and most of ESY is about regression/recoupment. (https://www.ocecd.org/Downloads/ESY Disability Rights Ohio 20132.pdf) To determine if regression/recoupment is a factor, the student needs a track record but returning to school for 1st grade can help you establish this record. You look at the goals. Let's say there is a behavior goal that X will be able to wait one minute for the teacher to finish with another student before they start acting frustrated. Let's say in June, your nephew could wait 40 seconds and now they can only wait for 10. You now need to look at recoupment. When does this 10 go back to 40? If this goes back next week, he's recouped in a week & this doesn't meet ESY criteria. If it's November & he's not back to 40, I'd say he needs ESY. You need to do this for every goal in the IEP. You also need to the progress monitoring reports to have measured data. "Making progress toward goal" as the level of progress and you can't tell about regression/recoupment. The goals on the website tend to be measurable so I'll post a link. https://adayinourshoes.com/iep-goal-bank/ When it comes to emerging skills, if he was starting to say 3 words in April and this grew to 6 in May, that's an emerging skill. It would also need to be an IEP goal for the school to look at to say he needs ESY for an emerging skill. (IMO every non-verbal student needs communication goals of some sort: AAC, PECS, ASL or S2C if you're OK with something that's not evidenced based.) If there are issues with measuring goals, now is a good time to advocate for the school to provide data that's empirical and not subjective. Unfortunately, that will only help with ESY next summer. Keep in mind that data on regression/recoupment can be taken whenever there is a break at school so get them to take data with fall, winter & spring breaks.

The school needs to follow the IEP/PBSP. If they are following it and something like this happens, the PBSP might need to be tweaked. If they are not following the IEP/PBSP then they are out of compliance with the IEP. The school can't just 'try their best'. They have to follow the IEP. I remember my sp ed director saying there were no excuses for an IEP not being followed. I agree with this 100%.

I would follow up and ask them how they can accommodate his disability when notes aren't available. It's not like he can turn off the disability to accommodate the availability of notes. Will they allow a recording device? (IMO, the school should record the class and then play it for software that does closed captioning so there is a written version of what was said. It can then be printed out or your child could be given a soft copy.)

Have you asked them directly? You can close your letter with: Please copy and paste the above into the parent concerns section of the IEP. Not sure if they are concerned about plagiarism with using a parent's exact words...

The school is missing something. I'm aware of a student who needed a unique accommodation: Reminders to use the bathroom every 2 hours during the school day. This was needed for medical reasons throughout their attendance in K-12. IMO, the school bought the wrong IEP software package because it doesn't comply with IDEA & state regs on IEPs. Your district, from my perspective, is asking you to contact your state's Ed Law Center or Disability Rights group and develop a class action lawsuit against the software company and any of their clients. This company is selling a defective product. The product needs to be recalled. I hope you wrote an email after the meeting to clarify that the software cannot accommodate customized accommodations. I'd want this in writing so the attorneys at the Ed Law Center or Disability Rights group have proof of what's happening in your district. There might also need to be a different process to pick IEP software. My district had an open house where sp ed families got to check out the options before they settled on an IEP software package to go with. I'm not sure how well they listened to the families' feedback but at least they had a seat at the table.

Not reasonable IMO. Schools have an IEP team. The team serves the student. Communication, in theory at least, can start with any team member. Services should be performed by whomever has the expertise to deliver the service. You might be great with teaching dyslexic students and so-so with teaching social skills. Makes sense that you do small group reading instruction for students who are part of your caseload as well as students assigned to other case managers and another teacher who has expertise in social skills teach groups who need that no matter who is the case manager. There are other sp ed services where teacher credentials aren't enough - like doing a sp ed evaluation. The rule is that these are personnel issues and the school gets to decide which employees do which tasks. I feel you'll get in trouble with complying with this family's wishes. Also, what happens if you get sick & take time off? The IEP still needs to be followed. I'd want the family to waive FAPE in the event you are not available to provide services (there's a new wave of COVID circulating). You don't want to expose the school to a lawsuit if you aren't available to provide services to this student. In my district, the sp ed supervisor would speak to the school's solicitor to see if this can be done.

At school, the school staff are in loco parentis. This means that the student's parent-parent shouldn't be needed in school because other adults can fill the role. So to answer your question: yes, they can deny him the ability to call you. The thing is when your child is neurodiverse, they might not deal well with a substitute, in loco parentis. Since this seems to be the case with your child, I'd request a no-meet IEP revision where his need for you to be called in situations like this are accommodated as part of his IEP (or 504). Non-compliance with the IEP isn't allowed. I'd go up the chain of command on that (you can also file a state complaint: https://www.education.pa.gov/K-12/Special Education/Complaints/Pages/default.aspx). What I've found is, in the name of FERPA, everyone isn't going to have access to the IEP and the PBSP in it. The thing is that everyone (school officials & recess teachers included) needs to follow the IEP. Being that omniscence isn't a job requirement for working at a school, I'm not sure how this happens. It might be a good question for the school: Do the school official & recess teacher know what's in my child's PBSP? It seems like the protocol to prevent my child from getting escalated to the point he needed to be interrogated by the dean wasn't followed. What needs to happen so the PBSP can be followed 100% of the time he's at school? I hope your son recovers from this incident where he develop other behaviors so this sort of thing doesn't happen again.

What services does your child need? Does any one building in your district or another one that's closer than this placement have what he needs? If the services he needs are only available 50 miles away, that's LRE. A public school does not need to create programs for your child in their district. They simply need to provide FAPE. It seems like FAPE doesn't exist since 50 minutes is too far - longer than he can be in a vehicle. I'm not sure that comp ed is the solution for this but I think that might be the only legal remedy in this situation.

An aide - where he's in the gen ed classroom w/ a helper who isn't a sp ed teacher (helper might be working w/ a few students) - might be how the new school handles coming up with a parallel to the old IEP. Resource room or self-contained classrooms would not have the level of LRE that's in the old IEP. You'll need to do your best at advocating if an inclusion classroom isn't something the new school currently does. Always good to have more than one option to suggest when meeting with the school.

I'm in a Facebook group that covers that area. I haven't heard much in the way of complaints about Pennsbury SD. I can't answer your questions but the group on Facebook is Main Line Special Needs Parents. You might want to ask them. Compensatory services might end when you move.

I would write a parent letter of concern as the school staff seems to be unfamiliar with PTSD, dysgraphia, an auditory processing disorder, and an autoimmune disorder and suspected FASD might look in the classroom. Trying harder is not possible when a student has delays due to a combination of these disabing issues. What's needed is either accommodations or special instruction so they can try starting to overcome their disabilities. You might want to send them this: https://scontent-lga3-2.xx.fbcdn.net/v/t1.6435-9/71143834_3039163332824480_4003938731475075072_n.jpg?_nc_cat=109&ccb=1-7&_nc_sid=9267fe&_nc_ohc=PfKpj8ZwlsUAX_wWUvD&_nc_ht=scontent-lga3-2.xx&oh=00_AfD72qiyDMIWTFb4tAJcD9JhV8G0Rn-gAfUs53oLA-nDbA&oe=650C4829

I would go to Lisa's website and look at her list of goals. Every child is different. My son had issues with ADHD & APD but he needed an IEP - not a 504. If you feel the 504 needs to be clarified, request a meeting & have it tweaked. https://adayinourshoes.com/iep-goal-bank/ Any IEP goal can be changed into a 504 accommodation.

I was to a conference and attended a few sessions on UDL. It's a good thing. It normalizes accommodations where students who do need them don't stand out. Makes kids less self-conscious. That said, if graphic organizers are UDL, you might still want this on an IEP. If the student goes to another school or class where this is not UDL, they will not have the accommodation they rely on. I see this as normalizing an accommodation - not diluting it. If a gen ed student is having an off day and decides to use UDL, let them. If they can do A work with UDL & B work w/o, why not use UDL? I'm taking a class that has lecture as well as subtitles. I'm finding I understand better when I read & hear. Should I limit myself to lesser understanding & not read along? (Should I play the video 2X to listen to understand better?) What would you do?

BTDT. I requested that my son be evaluated for dysgraphia a few times throughout his school career. The school OT said no - he's not dysgraphic. Fast forward to 11th grade and the issues he has aren't well explained by the evals the school has done so I requested a neuropsych evaluation. The neuropsych said he was dysgraphic & I think this is something outside of what a OT can diagnose. In a perfect world, an IEE is where you find the evaluator w/o looking at the school's list. That said, the school sometimes has some good people on their list. The neuropsych that evaluated by son was contracted by the school for when parents made a request like I did. IMO, the eval was as good as if I had picked the evaluator. It was a school eval - not an IEE - but it got the results my child needed. I would also make sure he's accommodated for this. He might need a scribe or Assistive Technology if his handwriting is delayed. He needs to have what he needs so he has access to school. If he cannot write, he needs accommodations for this.

My kids are all out of HS but I wanted to acknowledge your post. I feel that your best bet is to make your child aware of what's in the IEP as far as both special instruction (you should be pulled out once a week for A and twice a week for B) so you have info that the IEP is being followed - do the same for accommodations. I know my son was very self conscience about being different, missing class to get services. You might want to talk to them about this - my son felt it was unfair for him to get extra time for assignments. The one thing I didn't have in his IEP that I regret is that we knew he'd be missing class to get speech therapy but he also had ADHD & figuring out how to make up the work in the classes he missed for speech became a problem. I should have had someone tell him what he missed so he wasn't failing that class. If your child says they didn't get pulled once a week for A and twice a week for B, you can ask the therapist what is happening. It's possible the therapist pushed into the classroom instead so get the story from the therapist before complaining the services didn't happen. Also ask your child if there are accommodations they need that they aren't getting. If they don't have time to write down assignments, there are ways to accommodate this (photo w/ a phone/ipad or email from the teacher). With MS & lockers & changing for PE, make sure your child can do what's needed. Practice, practice, practice at home. I hope he has a great year!

I agree with Lisa. If recess dysregulates her due to the noise, etc, that's a great reason for her to do something else. Does the school have a sensory area? What about a library? Would it make sense to give her a job - like helping a teacher make copies or change out a bulletin board - where she gets a little activity. I wouldn't push her to spend the time learning. Research shows that breaks make you more productive so finding something that's fun for her might make for the best alt recess activity to put in the IEP as an accommodation.

I didn't realize that the request is to retain the child in K. There is data that retention doesn't help. Students who are retained tend to drop out where they don't graduate HS. My school has a policy on this and the decision is made over time starting around February with trying to provide additional instruction to catch up a student who is failing. It's hard for parents to overrule a schools decision to promote a student. What might make more sense would be to homeschool so there is flexibility in the schedule to do ABA if this is what's helping the most. ABA can work on some of the academic areas this child is behind in. With missing 50% of the school day as well as being academically behind, placing a child into 1st grade doesn't make sense. With missing this much school, a lack of academic progress will be blamed on lack of attendance. Depending on state laws on absences, truancy might be where the half days lead. You need to do some homework to see what the law in your state is on this. I've seen parents get in trouble with weekly therapy & a child missing an hour of school each week. (What happens a year from now? Will this child be ready for 1st grade by then?) I'm pretty sure that IDEA requires all students with an IEP to be considered for Extended School Year. My kids had IEPs and it was discussed at their IEP meetings - my daughter always qualified because she was so far behind from where she should have been. Some states require students to regress over the summer to qualify where in K, there is no track record so the school can't anticipate regression. (With a student that had an IEP in pre-K there should be info on summer regression.) If you do homeschool for this year, the current IEP will lapse and a new eval would need to be done before a new IEP could be written. My suggestion is to request an IEP eval in Feb or Mar the year you plan to have the child return to public school. This allows time for the eval & meetings so an IEP can be in place on the 1st day of school. IMO is shorthand for in my opinion. I'm curious what state you are in. There are some that are a lot harder to get sp ed services in. This sounds like one of them.

In my area, a preschooler who needs speech would have an IEP and a teacher/speech therapist would come to them at their private preschool (because we don't have public preschool where I live). There has to be a way to have an IEP in preschool - it's required under IDEA. Definitely request a special ed eval and list the areas of need: speech, OT, anxiety, sensory processing and a medical diagnosis of ADHD. (How are her social skills? With this combo, social skills will often lag.) The last page of this has a template to request an eval: https://www.elc-pa.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/getting-a-special-education-evaluation.pdf

Diagnosed with what by 2 neuropsychologists? Was speech & OT evaluated by the school as part of a preschool special ed IEP? The criteria for school speech & OT are different from medical speech & OT. I would definitely look at putting a 504 in place at school. Additionally, I would request a special education evaluation be done to see if your grandchild qualifies for special ed services. (The written request needs to come from a person with educational custody which might not be you.) School staff generally are contracted to work ~186 days per year so they are not available to meet for IEP or 504 meetings during the summer. I tend to tell parents to ask for a sp ed eval in February or March of the year they will be entering the public school system since IEP evals take 100 (or more) days given the rules on how state sp ed laws are written. I would request the sp ed eval look at speech & OT given that is the outside therapy this child current gets. Depending on what the neuropsych eval says, it might make sense to ask for other things to be evaluated. You will need to share when & what evals are done because you cannot repeat the same eval within 12 months & get valid results. It might make sense to share a copy of the neuropsych evals with the school. Some will take an outside report and use it to provide IEP services rather than the school doing an eval.