just wondering if anyone is sending their child to a private school. I am considering this option it I can afford it after the state scholarship I will have to see how much out of pocket it will be.
I would like to know your experiences.pro's & cons.
We are considering it but only as last option because she is doing fine so far in public school. I was told they are not equipped for special needs kids ~sounds discriminating but they don't receive state funds like public school for special needs kids. Sarah doesn't get anything in public school anyway but they know her diagnoses so I feel better knowing they have a whole IEP on her...on the other hand..the private school have less kids in classroom and I like the idea she would get more personal attn..I know 2 moms with girls-aspergers..one is actually in Montissori(?) and the other is in Prince of Peace (both places allowed the childs diagnoses but don't provide special services for them;like speech or OT/PT..) Both parents-girls needed less kids around them and tried the public school route but it was way too overwhelming for them. Sarah tolerates public school but instead of screaming or stimming she just gets real quiet..the teacher states she still listens and does her work fine and we have had no problems yet..she has 24 kids in class with specials everyday ALL day. She likes it.. I worry it is too many kids, too loud..not enough attn...afraid she will be ignored and fall through the cracks. I am watching her closely and seeing if she still does well and cont. to enjoy going to school. Her teacher is nice but overworked underpaid and can only give Sarah so much of her time. I am up there a lot:) I think were our kids will be the happiest is best since they have so many years to go to school you want them to be as easy as we can make it for them.
Blessings,
Shelley
WE are moving to MN and are putting our 3 1/2 year old in a private school. They offere a 1:1 ratio sand I am happy with the program. I am just tried of fighting witht he public schools. They only have to provide a bare bones education and my son needs so much more.
I live in Minnesota, so far the schools have been great. What private school offers 1:1 ratio? Is it the Twin Cities area?
Grace
There are some states that are "dual enrollment." That means that eventhough a parent privately places the child on their own dime, the local school district is STILL required to provide special education services in that setting (the service are provided for free, but the private school has to be willing to accept those services). Most states are not dual enrollment, though. That means that the IEP only is put in place if the parents agree to put the child in the public school or in a private school the school district pays for. Once parents opt out of the public school, they have to pay for special education services, too.I so tired of fighting the school system as well. I am highly debating going that route. One around here charges about 00/month for about 16hrs of school per week. I am willing to sacrifice to help my son. If I were sure the job would be done, it would be an easier decision for me. It caters to just autistic kids. ABA centered, but it seems child gets only one hr of individual ABA instruction daily. It seems to be the only ABA program here with an opening. The other one seems not to have an opening. The thought of fighting every IEP meeting scares me.
Concernedpa.
My son is in his 4th year at a private school 9+ hours a week (we have a math program at home and there is good carry-over between home and school). He goes on every field trip and is invited in for a lot of activities which they don't charge extra for. He has his support person who goes to school with him or I go with him sometimes too. There are 4 boys and 3 girls in his class and his teacher is very much invested in helping him be successful. It hasn't been wonderful every year (this has been the best year so far!) but it has been far better than the year he spent in public school. It has been a struggle to pay for this but we apply for every scholarship we can and I do things around the school to help such as help in class, wash floors once a week etc..... We go one year at a time and it seems most of the time everything falls into place.
Merry
Don't have time to go into alot of detail as I'm heading out the door.....but my daughter goes to a private preschool and I take her to the public school twice a week for therapy, and we have an IEP. No problems getting the IEP and therapy even though I refuse to enroll her in the private school. My daughter has done wonderful in the private school, although I have had to pay for an aide to attend with her due to some behavior issues. The aide has almost been completely pulled out though. Good luck with whatever you decide!!!!!My Ali is going to go to private school in September. I will let you know how that goes. The school is small, willing to work with her with an IEP (we are going through the public school system for the eval. and the private school participates then implements the IEP), has a great program, and I think the environment is better for Ali than the public school she would have to go through. Again, I will let you know. My son goes to a parocial school. (I don't know if you are counting this as private) He always has. The classes typically are smaller. There are about 16 kids in his class. This is the largest class he has ever been in so far. The behaviors are usually in check. (He is in the 7th grade.) Therapy services are limited. My son did not qualify for any 'services.' The evaluation was done by our public school system. I badly wanted OT for his handwriting!!! Luckily, the school is great with Keith. He has an IP that says he can use a computer for the majority of his work. He also gets a small break durring the day (10 minutes to unwind), and the last hour of the day he goes to the resource room to study and do home work. Currently after school he is in wrestling. So far he is doing ok with it. I think it gives him something to look foreward to since he enjoys being in the group so much!We also have an IEP, and recieve ST thru the school dist. I have declined OT thru the SD, b/c I like his placement and ins. pays. Each time we meet for his IEP, the school does make an "offer" of what they would provide if he returned, but it doesn't come close to what we have going on right now. We are in CA.
We are lucky, his grandparents are helping pay for some of school. I feel this year has been an outstanding one for him.
My son attends a private special ed school whose overall focus is therapeutic. There are other HFA and Asperger's children there, OHI and some ED children as well. The school system placed him there and pays for it. He has OT there for sensory issues, weekly counseling sessions and in-class speech work. He will undergo a speech eval to see if ST is also needed. The counselors there are great, and overall I am satisfied. But the homework he has been bringing home is too easy. He is a first grader who was doing second grade work before he started there is January, and the homework now looks like K or even what he had in pre-K. I've addressed this with his teacher, and her answer was to send home more homework. That's a no-no for him, so I wrote a note indicating that he had a lot of trouble completing the amount of work sent home. So now, we're back to easy work. The teacher is also difficult to get ahold of to talk to. I have been talking to the counselor about it, and she agrees that the academics need to be addressed. We'll have an IEP in a couple of weeks, so I am already compiling a list of questions and issues. Oh, and they prefer restraining children who are "unsafe," and holding my son makes him really lash out, so we'll be discussing some other options as well.
I am glad my son is in this school as opposed to public school. I have seen some improvement, but I'm also seeing some regression. I've heard this is normal. He may one day return to public school (he frequently expresses a desire to do so), but that's going to take a while. And the most important thing is for him to be happy and comfortable.
I don't mean to go on about myself, but I hope someone can take something from my experiences. Good luck to you. If your child can be taught in a regular private school setting, that is a good thing. IMHO, it's about behavior -- the more challenging behavior your child has, and the more disruptive he is, less chance he or she will be successful in a private school environment that is REALLY into good behavior.
does anyone know of any schools that just accomodate high functioning/pdd/spd children in the united states. ive heard there are some in other countries. in maryland they are more geared to severe cases, which is why i can never get him in programs. all i hear is that if hes around severely autistic children he'll pick up there tendencies (which sounds so discriminatory not to mention are there any tendencies my son doesnt already have? :)) but i know a normal public school even with spec. ed is not going to further him and hes going to find it difficult to follow.
Tzoya, the school system pays for the private placement. We went through the process as you described above to get him there, after he was placed in a self-contained class with mostly emotionally disturbed students. That setting wasn't meeting his needs, to say the least.Mbrogue, do you live in Maryland? If so, one in particular is Ivymount in Montgomery County. While traditionally Ivymount has handled more severely autistic children, it has a new Asperger's program (and I think the school will take HFA students in this program also). I'm not sure if they handle the lower elementary grades in the Asperger's program, but I have heard good things about it. The Lourie Center school in Rockville, Maryland, handles a variety of children at average to above average intelligence, including high-functioning autistic and Asperger's. How old is your son? If you need a Maryland advocate, please let me know. I don't know if this board allows me to recommend an advocate here -- but PM me if you need someone.thanx maria. alot of therapists have said i need to move to mont. county, they were in the public school system. at present my son is just over 2 but ive got to make some decisions about next year. im pretty sure im going to wait to put him anywhere until 4 and his slts and ots agree. not much to be said for early intervention or public schools in my county. right now, until hes in school full time mont. co. or rockville is out of the question but knowing options is what i need. its about double the cost to live there and over an hour away but if i can work a 9 hour day ill probly be okay.
and i know in maryland you can get private school placement paid by the board of education. its something ill probly pursue becus my son doesnt think like others, has behavioral issues, but is capable of being average to high averagei in intelligence.
Hi. We have an 11 year son in the spectrum. We want to move to state that has a good choice of schools. Private or public. Looking North Carolina, South Carolina or Georgia. Any recommendations?Maria -- Using the term "private school" can be very confusing. That is why I asked the question. If a parent pays for a private placement, the rules are WAY different than if the public school pays. A private school that accepts public funds is not a fully private school and MUST obey certain rules. If the parents are not paying the tuition, but the school district is, then the FULL IEP has to be implemented and IS paid for by the District. The rules get far murkier in true private placement, which is when the parents pick up the tuition.Maria -- Are you paying for this private school or is this through his IEP and is paid for by the school district?
There are two sorts of private school experiences:
1. Parentally-placed private schools. This includes both parochial and non-parochial schools. The tuition is fully paid for by the parent.
2. State-approved private schools. These are school that are not owned by the state nor are they run by the state, but the state puts them on a list of schools it is possible for IEP Teams to consider when finding a placement for a child with special needs.
For schools in the first category, unless your state is "dual enrollment," (contact state ed to find out), you school district has limited obligations for your child if you place him in a private school in this category. The school must test your child for free. The school must come up with an IEP every year, including what they consider the appropriate PUBLIC placement. Once you reject the public placement, you reject implementation of the IEP at public expense. At that point, your school district can CHOOSE to give your child some or none of the recommended services. If it chooses to give your child some, then the cost of those services will be counted toward your district's obligation to give parentally-placed private school children from the District "equitable services" as a whole group. That means, the percentage of the whole population of special ed kids in your district that the whole population of parentally-placed private school special ed kids represents is the precentage of the special ed budget that your SD has to spend on parentally-placed private school kids as a group. The SD has NO indivdual IEP obligations. What's more, the private school can follow the IEP or not follow it. That is their choice, since they are private.
Schools in the second category are different. If your IEP Team agrees that the public schools do NOT have an appropriate placement for your child, they can choose to recommend a placement in a specialized school that is run privately but approved for public placement. THere is a list of these schools at your state ed website. There are MANY autism schools that fit into this category. Perhaps the very first schools like this were schools for the deaf and schools for the blind. Oftentimes, at least in the Northeast, they were run by the Catholic Church but the state still paid for kids to go there because there were no other options for deaf and blind kids that long ago. Nowadays, there are all kind of specialized private schools that are on the approved list in many states. Once an IEP Team has approved placement in this sort of private school, all rights are the SAME as if the child were in a public school and the full tuition, books, materials, therapies and transportation is paid for by the school district.
In New York, there is also the BOCES system, which is a parallel public school system comprised of specialty schools, some of which are special ed schools and some of which are vocational schools. I believe many states have similar county-run systems.
One final option is that parents can, under certain very specific circumstances, prevail at a due process hearing in getting an Impartial Hearing Officer to rule that a school district must send a particular child to a private school that is NOT on the approved list. This is very complicated and requires a Hearing as well as a very good lawyer.
The bottom line is, in MOST states, once you pull your child out of the public school system and place him in a private school for which you are paying tuition, the IEP obligations are moot.