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those using private schoolsHow is that working out and did you get scholarships to fund it? Major problems with the school district, child in a way to restrictive class, am considering home schooling but would like to know how private works too.I hired an advocate and the school district did a full assessment....we just had the IEP and the advocate was great....in the end, the district agreed to pay for his non-public placement at an ABA school til the end of July and then we will ask for next year as well....my 6 yr old needs 1:1 teaching and is a flight risk....if the staff doesn't adjust every week then my son doesn't learn....An advocate costs in the beginning but in my opinion, the best way to get the schools to understand your child's needs!!!!Hi Linda, My son is in a private Catholic School by our choice. In my state, parents can choose to unilaterally place their child in a non-public school, and in a nutshell, the student must still receive services he/she is eligible for. The district does not have to provide those services at the site of the non-public school. My children's school (my NT daughter also attends) does not have any kind of special education teacher or services. It is a very small school. There is an aide in the classroom, but she is there to assist the teacher, not for 1:1 for any child. My son gets speech form teh SD and the therapist travels to his school. He leaves school early and is bused to the elementary school for 1/2 hr a day instruction with a special education teacher. Initially, teh SD was going to make him travel for all his services, and it was looking like they'd be lumped at the beginning of his school day meaning he would miss crucial social and academic time in his home classroom with his NT peers. I wrote a heartfelt letter to the CSE chairperson and made the case based on my son's unique autistic disability (as no two children with austism are alike), that what was propsoed was not in his best interest. I was able to get for my son part of his services at his home school, and the remaining services just about at the end of his school day for miminal disruption with transitions. No scholarships for us. If we needed that, we would have applied for scholarships the school had. If you're looking for the SD to pick up the cost, there has to be evidence that the SD is not providing FAPE for your child--something that can be very difficult to prove. The advantage to us being in the private school is we have a history there (our daughter), and my hubby and I are very involved. Because we're small, we are all kind of like family around there, looking out for each other and the kids. Parents of NT kids and those who have special needs or learning needs can talk with teachers anytime to work towards the solutions that are in the child's best interest. And in my son's case, the SD personalle and my son's teacher have good communication with each other: it is in his IEP that one day a week, the ST and my son's teacher have a conference. So, so far, so good for us. Good luck. WNYgirl's situation sounds similar to ours. DD is mainstreamed in a very small private school. Her therapies are all after school (OT and ST one afternoon a week) and we pay for them. Obviously, this arrangement works only with a kid whose therapy needs are not overwhelming. DD is pretty HF in many respects, and we feel the benefit of being in an intimate, incredibly nurturing environment is an acceptable tradeoff to not having the full panoply of therapies provided in the public school at no charge. We are trying to find the right balance of all the needed supports, but as little restriction as possible. If DD's therepeutic needs increase, we might need to move to a public school, which would probably also mean moving to a different school district. There is no way the SD would even consider paying DD's tuition. In general, SDs will only pay for private placement if child's needs are so broad or unique that no placement within the public schools would provide sufficient or correct services (sounds like this might be the case with ann2boys). Basically, there is no way the SD would pay for a school that provides LESS services than are available in one of the public schools. DD is where she is because it a wonderful school and DD is able to handle being in a mainstream classroom so far, not because it is provides better therapies to aspies than the public schools (it does not). My situation is a little different. My son is moderately affected by autism. Although he is improving, mainstreaming would not be beneficial to him at this time nor do I want him in the SD autism support classroom, as the teacher to child ratio is too high. We selected a school that is geared to multiple disabilites including MR, Downs, Autism, etc. The classroom my son is in has one teacher, one aid, three TSS's and 5 students. The children are seperated by developmental age. Therefore, the age can range from 5-18. Currently there are 4 boys under the age of 8 (Liam is five) and 1 girl who has Downs who recently turned 16. Since it is geared toward various disabilites, it has a sensory room that is to die for, a handicapped playground, and ST, OT and nurse's aids on site every day. My son receives one on one ST and OT 2xs per week 45 minutes per session. He also does the Edmark reading program (reading at second grade level) and Handwriting Without Tears. He just started a math program and is learning to count money. We fell in love with this place. I volunteer time there often and am welcome to observe at any time. Even if Liam never improves enough to be mainstreamed, we found a place where we feel secure in knowing he is loved and cared for when the bus drops him off. The school is a private Catholic school. We pay the tuition. I pulled him from public after one year of absolutely no improvement and some regression. My four year old will be begining there shortly, although he is higher functioning. Good luck in your endeavors. Every child deserves a school where he/she can be educated to their fullest potential.
ETA. We were required to take him to and from his ST and OT last year (until he turned 5) just as WY had experienced. Not sure whether that is state or federal law.
We send our school to a private Catholic school and pay the tuition, while also volunteering and participating in a good deal of fundraising for the school. Not many private NT schools were willing even to consider my son once I disclosed his diagnosis. I also was unhappy with our public school district's offering of a much too restrictive placement, as well as their policy of transferring students after 2nd grade to another school if they still need autistic support services. Overall, my son has done very well there socially: he has a best friend, plays soccer in after care, and has received his first birthday invitation in 2 years. We took a 3rd year in the IU which provides him with a 1:1 to help ease the transition, but next year, we will probably receive only very minimal services from the IU, maybe a half hour of speech per week in a group setting. At that point, I plan to set him up a TSS and/or a private 1:1 as needed. We will continue to provide him with additional services and social skills privately as needed. So far, we have been very impressed with the school's enforcement of its anti-bullying policy, their individual attention to our son's needs, and their acceptance of our son as he is. They have also been very accommodating of his therapists' visits, and they even informed me about a therapist that they had concerns about, whom we wound up dismissing. I have been very pleased with how the private school administration and faculty were willing to work with us as part of the team, and in fact we meet with the director, our son's teacher, and all of his therapists at the school every 5 weeks to discuss our son's progress and any issues. Some of the other parents of children with ASD that I know have much more adversarial relationships with their public school counterparts and all seem to have attorneys on speed-dial, which I don't think I could handle. Instead of constantly preparing for Due Process as some of these mothers seem to do, I decided to provide most services privately and get what my son needs when he needs it. It helps that my son had a head start academically (he has been reading since he was 3 and is currently writing stories and making up songs that he spells phonetically), and that his primary weaknesses are social skills and perseverative behavior. He is able to deal with a regular class size and the noise, and he is allowed to take sensory breaks as needed. Of course, the down-side of such a parental placement is the expense of tuition and private therapy and the hours setting up therapies and supervising, not to mention transporting our son for OT in a sensory clinic 30 min. away, social skills 40 minutes away. and probably more next year. Being very involved with the school is another big time committment, but a very worthwhile one. I think communication at every level is critical to success, and my son's 1:1 send us home a detailed report every day noting any incidents, positive behaviors, as well as charts of how many social interactions he initiated with or without prompts. The meetings every 5 weeks are equally important. I will be honest that I am not sure how long this placement will be appropriate for him as the social demands become greater, but the availability of a well-staffed learning resource center and his progress thus far gives me hope that he may be able to continue on there. Otherwise, like Playtoe, I will be faced with having to sell our home and move out of district. I wish my state were were like NY so my son could receive more services in a private placement. It would make life so much easier. Good luck. What state are you in? We're in Ohio and here we have what's called the Autism Scholarship. Basically, if needs are not met by the school district then we can use this scholarship to send them to a private school or therapies. Check and make sure you're State doesn't have anything like this. I find a lot of Ohioan have no idea it exists.Unfortunately, I do not believe such a program exists in PA. Any good catholic private schools for kids on the spectrum in NJ? |
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