[Nfbf-l] Fw: [blindlaw] Update on Florida School for the Deaf and Blind

[rjs059 at peoplepc.com]

This disturbs me.
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Philip Breeze" <pebreeze at gmail.com>
To: "NFBnet Blind Law Mailing List" <blindlaw at nfbnet.org>
Sent: Monday, February 23, 2009 2:31 PM
Subject: [blindlaw] Update on Florida School for the Deaf and Blind


> Hello everyone, a few months back I posted an entry concerning my 6 year 
> old
> sons application to The Florida School for the Blind.  I have an update on
> the situation and find it extremely difficult to understand.  The facts 
> are
> as follows:
>
> February 2008 -- I applied for my son to attend FSDB.
> May 2008 -- I received a letter disqualifying my son from attending.
> July 2008 -- I met with the school president and staff, non of whom
> evaluated my son's records.  No person in the meeting could explain the
> reason for refusing him entry other than the evaluators must have seen
> something in his records to disqualify him.  They determined that he was
> Trainable Mentally Handicap and could not answer the question of how they
> determined this.
> October 2008 -- I filed a complaint with Florida Department of Education.
> FDOE determined that FSDB acted unethically and ordered FSDB to show proof
> of findings.  FSDB refused such saying they no longer had his records and
> that we need to reapply.  FDOE also ordered FSDB to refrain from using the
> terminology Trainable Mentally Handicap as it is no longer used in the
> professional world.
>
> Here we are in February of 2009 and FSDB has yet to admit that they used
> prejudice in evaluating my child and will not accept responsibility of 
> such
> even after being ordered by FDOE.  FSDB to this day has never seen my son 
> in
> person.  I contacted several attorney's and learned that FSDB is notorious
> for being sued and spending millions of dollars to prevent children that 
> are
> slow learners from attending.  Yes, my son is developmentally delayed.  He
> was born blind and has very low muscle tone (hypotonia).  FSDB prefers to
> allow enrollment to those visually impaired children that are most easily
> educated and to accept deaf children.  They *DO NOT WANT* young totally
> blind children.  This could possibly impact their bragging rights to
> success.
>
> I have come to the realization the FSDB, a State of Florida public school
> discriminates against young blind children.  They violate every aspect of
> IDEA and No Child Left behind.  They accept federal assistance and private
> donations.  They have a budget of $40 million dollars and only 700
> children.  They retain a high dollar attorney from Atlanta to keep 
> children
> out.  This is most blatant case of fraud, waste and abuse I have ever 
> seen.
> They excuse themselves by saying that they do not have the money nor man
> power to educate children that have multiple disabilities and those 
> children
> have other options.  My options are to stay locally and have my child
> educated by a county that has few blind children and no experience with
> teaching them or to leave the state to attend a school elsewhere.
>
> I never in my mind thought that I would have to fight to get my child
> accepted to a school for blind children.  These people work for the 
> Governor
> of Florida, the FSDB board is appointed by Governor Crist.  There in
> something severely wrong with an organization whose primary mission is to
> educate blind children and they refuse to do so.
>
> My thoughts and prayers go out to all of you that continue to suffer this
> sort of discrimination in our society.
>
> Philip Breeze
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