[blindkid] Blind/Autistic child school placement/services

Rene Harrell rjharrell at gmail.com
Fri Feb 20 21:28:09 UTC 2009


Boy Melissa, do I ever feel for you, what a dilemma.  You mentioned you are
in New York--- are you close to CT, or the New Jersey borders are all?

The P.L.A.Y. project is a program that works with kids 6 and under
throughout the country to institute at-home Floortime programs, similar to
an at home ABA program. My experience is that Floortime and ABA can be mixed
*very* well. We have personally had the best success with Floortime when it
comes to social, interactive and communicative behavior, and with ABA for
very specific skills sets. The website for the P.L.A.Y. project is here
http://www.playproject.org/. Under home consulting it lists all the states
and contact information for programs in your state. There is no current
P.L.A.Y project program in the state of New York, but there are in both New
Jersey and Connecticut. If they couldn't service you across state lines, or
if they are too far away, I wonder if you could still call them and see if
they know of anyone in your area that they could connect you with. I don't
know if the programs vary financially across the country--- here in Colorado
Springs it was 6 thousand for the year, and we were able to use Family
Support funds from our Developmental Disability waiver in order to fund it.
I really can't say enough great things about that program, Clare has totally
blossomed.

As for dealing with your school district and a Floortime consultant for the
school, I would imagine that the first step would be having evaluations
showing how this is necessary (and/or ABA, if they are suggesting a
placement for him without ABA service) is necessary for him to be able to
receive a Free and Appropriate Education. Here is the list from the state of
New York for those qualified to provide Floortime consulting and/or
evaluations: http://www.icdl.com/usprograms/clinicians/NEWYORK.shtml. If I
were calling from the list, I would be making sure that the professional
evaluating them would meet the definition of "qualified evaluator" as that
is defined by your state, so that your evaluations would hold equal weight
to whatever the school district has for your son. I'd also check into your
home ABA program as well and make sure your evaluations are done by someone
who would qualify under state standards (progress reports can be done by his
consistent providers).

 What disabilities is your son receiving services for under his IEP? Is he
qualified under VI *and* autism, or are they just qualifying him under VI?
When is his triennial, or when was his last round of testing and
evaluations? What did those show in terms of his autism, and what
recommendations were made in relation to his autism? It sounds to me that if
they want to put him in a VI/MD classroom without any autism services, that
they're considering him primarily in terms of his blindness-related needs.
(I've BTDT....originally everything about Clare that was concerning was
brought back to "but she's blind" as if that was the cause of everything in
the world.). That is why I would hone in on his autism-related needs are,
using their own evaluations or outside evaluations that give you the paper
trail and documentation to prove that a denial of providing services for his
autism-related needs is a denial of FAPE.

You're saying that communication is your key focus at this point. Have you
been allowed to look at other district programs beyond the VI/MD classroom
that you don't believe would be a good fit for his communication needs? Are
there classes that aren't necessarily VI related, but developmental
disability related or autism related that you would feel would better meet
his needs and/or with just a little tweaking could be an excellent match for
him? Have they let you sit in some of these other programs and get a sense
for how they work, and what the teachers/paras for that class are like? Have
you made your own list of what you feel he needs in a program/and or what
program characteristics would be obstacles to his learning? This always
helped me remain very focused, and also gave me the best chance to provide
objective information to the school team to justify or to decline a program
based on how it related to Clare's specific FAPE needs.

A decision like you are facing: battle to get an appropriate program in your
home school or send him off for 12+ hours every day is a really wrenching
one. I know the Rebecca school is relatively new (I think it's three years
old now? Maybe 4?) but has also has a very small student:teacher/adult ratio
and (hearsay only) there have been great things said about it so far. I
don't know what kind of programs the blind school has that you feel would
best meet his needs.

 *Personally*, and this is strictly just *me*, I would focus the next
several months to see if I could not scour every inch of my local school
district to find a classroom/program that at the very least could be
modified/added to in order to meet his needs. I would figure out what I felt
would need to be done to that classroom to enable him to receive FAPE there
(i.e., needs a 1:1 paraeducator, or needs an Floortime and/or ABA
professional services for X amount of time, or needs X amount of O&M and
Vision services). I would be accruing my documentation for those justifying
the needs of those services. I would focus on his communication needs as the
make-it-or-break piece along with the staff and/teacher of the program that
you would be targeting for your son. That would be absolutely vital
component to me: discovering that gem of a teacher located somewhere in your
district. Because you can force the district's hand on money or services,
but without buy-in from the people who will actually work with him on a
day-to-day basis, you're really stuck in a bad spot. With a nonverbal child
who is unable to tell you what is going on every day, there is a lot of
additional trust that gets handed over and if their hearts aren't in it, or
they're resentful of having him, then no matter what his IEP says, I can
just about guarantee you he won't actually be getting it without a
consistent battle on your part. If you can find that classroom/program where
your son would be welcomed by the staff that runs it, then everything else
can be worked out.

So, I would focus all my energy into that search first, and making workable
so that he can be home. If it was becoming clear and apparent by the
beginning of the school year that this would not be resolved by the time
school would be starting, I would not place my child there until it was
sorted out--- I would always opt for placing my child in a spot where they
will be safe and receive an appropriate education. For us that would be home
schooling (we do home school anyway at this point) but if that were not an
option I would most likely go with a school program a couple hours away
while actively working through due process and the legal system to get the
school district to comply with providing an appropriate education in his
home school district as soon as possible. But I honestly don't think there
is a right answer to that dilemma, it really boils down to what you feel is
best for your family and your son.

Just some thinking aloud,

:-)
Rene



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