Sos: Staffings on Steroids: A Guide to Your Rights in the World of Public School and Special Education

By P.L. Frederick L.A. M.S.W.

Whether it be your first or your fourth staffing for your child to receive services with the special education area agency in your school, it can be a dreaded event. You, the parent, are introduced to anywhere from five to seven "specialists," handed a lengthy typed form that is set aside as your "rights," and the meeting begins. You are not given the time to read your rights as presented, nor are they explained to your understanding. They are set aside for you to "review at your leisure," meaning once you have left the building. It is not the intent to intimidate, frighten, and silence you. It is just the nature of the beast.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Jun 14, 2016
• ISBN: 9781514490389

P.L. Frederick L.A. M.S.W.

I am a parent first. I dealt with the Iowa Special Education Program for several years during the 1980s and 1990s. With the help of so many—Children’s First advocates, our senators, Iowa Protection and Advocacy, the LAP division of the American Bar Association, other families and friends, and of course, my family and my church—I filed suit to stop the practice of locking the children in closets while they were attending elementary school. This was usually followed by the child being hospitalized in psychiatric facilities and often removed from their home for several weeks at a time afterward. Many families exhausted their medical insurance during this process. The Rocky Mountain Regional Resource Center was hired to set time-out guidelines. The director of the Western Area Agency Special Education Department sent the policy statewide, and President Clinton signed it into legislation in 1996. In 1998, I graduated from Kilian Community College in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, with a paralegal degree, followed by a bachelor of science and a master’s in public programs/sociology from Arizona State University in Tempe, Arizona. I worked as a behavioral/crisis specialist for several years.

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Copyright © 2016 by P.L. Frederick L.A., M.S.W.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

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Rev. date: 05/04/2016

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Contents

Introduction

Preface

Be Your Own Best Advocate

Understanding Stages of Child Development

The Many Faces of Intelligence

Observational Learning

Identifying a Learning Disability

The Staffing

The Individual Education Plan (I.E.P.)

Knowledge is Power

Bibliography

Introduction

My God is within me and He knows what I need. I breathed as I turned off the ignition to my car. I wiped the tear slipping down my cheek, pulled my purse onto my shoulder and headed into my 9-year-old son’s school for a staffing.

The last one was a nightmare. There were six or seven school employees and me. The principal, my son’s teacher, a psychiatrist, a social worker, the Director of Special Ed, and the Assistant Director. They insisted my son could not return to school. It was their collective opinion he should be hospitalized in a psychiatric facility and of course, medicated. His crime was kicking down the door on the time-out room. They had presented me with a bill for $35.

Since I refused, a teacher was coming to our home to oversee his schoolwork. He was the fifth grade teacher whose classroom was across the hall from his combination 3rd/4th grade