My children attend a private school with no services for kids who learn differently. Many parents and board members are trying to persuade our head to hire a learning specialist. He will not hire anyone because she feels that “by middle school, it is important that the students have developed coping strategies neccessary to succeed in a demanding college preparatory curriculum.” He goes on to say that they have identified a need for many children to be helped with study and organizational skills (at the middle school level) . So, as a solution he is to offer space AFTER SCHOOL to tutors who would be hired by the familyto support the student.
Re: Need help !!!!!! more!
I have a couple of thoughts.
1. You could spend a lot of time educating someone like that,possibly years.The Rick Lavoie tapes would be a good start. I think you can order them off this website.
2. Or you could find your son another school where discriminatory views and narrow minds do not exist.
of course there is also civil rights if...
This is the section of the 504 antidiscrimination law,notice they state”recipient”
well “recipient” refers to;
(f) Recipient means any state or its political subdivision, any instrumentality of a state or its political subdivision, any public or private agency, institution, organization, or other entity, or any person to which Federal financial assistance is extended directly or through another recipient, including any successor, assignee, or transferee of a recipient, but excluding the ultimate beneficiary of the assistance
§ 104.39 Private education.
(a) A recipient that provides private elementary or secondary education may not, on the basis of handicap, exclude a qualified handicapped person if the person can, with minor adjustments, be provided an appropriate education, as defined in §104.33(b)(1), within that recipient’s program or activity.
(b) A recipient to which this section applies may not charge more for the provision of an appropriate education to handicapped persons than to nonhandicapped persons except to the extent that any additional charge is justified by a substantial increase in cost to the recipient.
(c) A recipient to which this section applies that provides special education shall do so in accordance with the provisions of §§ 104.35 and 104.36. Each recipient to which this section applies is subject to the provisions of §§ 104.34, 104.37, and 104.38.
So in other words if this Prince of a guy accepts ANY federal assistance in anyway,then,he must comply with 504.
The other sections they state applies are all other sections that would apply just as the students was a public school student.
Re: Need help !!!!!!
Unless as Socks says they get money from the Federal Gov. then they don’t have to do it. It would cost them extra money. Private schools around here that offer resource help do charge an additional fee.
One possiblilty if you decide to stay there is to group together (not too big a group) and share the cost of a tutor after school.
Helen
Re: Need help !!!!!!
They do not receive a penny from the Federal government. So, legally they don’t really have to do anything. I am not worried about the legalities. I am upset that they feel weight training and manners class are valuable to offer during the school day as enrichment courses, but study skills are only offered after school at the parents’ expense. Shouldn’t it be the reverse? Secondly, I am really concerned about the attitude that the students have to deal with their learning differences and come up with coping strategies on their own in order to become successful in life. That is like the old developmental explanation for learning differences, ” Don’t worry, they’ll grow out of it!”
Re: Need help !!!!!!
Martha,
this is kind of where I was going.
It is virtually impossible to change the mindset of administrators in public schools with this kind of attitude,and they are forced by the federal government!(well sort of) There is high probability this individual went into opening a school and refused federal assistance for the express purpose of doing it exactly the way they want to. I do not know if coping strategies is what I would call it.
Re: Need help !!!!!!
Funny, that’s an important part of the reason those kiddos need help.
You got me thinking of a “letter to the principal.”
Probably most of these folks are concrete thinkers who are pretty convinced that smarts are what you are given with, and you got ‘em or you don’t. That all this LD stuff is fru-fru for “my darling child just can’t be as stupid as he really is, so I’ll call it something else.” And by that model, yes, by middle school if the kiddo is smart he should be compensating.
Of course, the reality is that the brain’s more complicated,kids are more complicated…
In an ideal educational system, YES, our kiddos would be taught appropriately from the get go. Just about all of them would arrive at middle school basically on target with skills — oh, some will be slower with them, and a few will still rely on accommodations — and they *will* have the tools to succeed.
However, it’s NOT an ideal educational system — so many of these kids are told “oh, it’s not a big problem, it’ll go away soon.” Well, for them it WILL go away — it will be growing and getting bigger, with the kid, and will go away to middle school… where they’ll say “oh, you expect just way too much from this kid who clearly doesn’t have the potential.”
Or, they sincerely believe that well, Einstein made it, these kids are just a wonderful mystery, so they’ll (in their brilliance) manage to figure stuff out even if it doesn’t look like it. FOrget that for every Einstein there are 1000 underemployed “underachievers” who feel like failures.
Now let me ask Surfin’ Sally to see about info about adolescents…
Ooops. I didn’t mean to send that yet. Anyway, I need your help! Does anyone know of any research I can show him to discount his ideas? I find it absurb that he will offer study skills after school at the parents expense instead of during the school day. Study skills are vital to any child’s success. Secondly, he thinks that children need to learn coping strategies before middle school, yet they don’t offer to teach these to the children. In other words, they intend to let the children sink or swim. I really need everyone’s help. I know Mel Levine talks a lot about how destructive this attitude is, but I cannot remember where I read it so I can quote him. Any thoughts I can share with the board?