HELP!

[Guest guest]

For about a year and a half my child has beee in a private (home school)

placement. We " settled our differences " w/ the district for this period of

time. We were told we could call and schedule an ARD after May 1 of this year.

When I called to schedule an ARD, the secretary screamed at me, " What for!? " . I

explained that the ARD was needed to convene to determine how my son with autism

will continue to receive a FAPE from this point forward. she said she would get

back to me in FIVE days, the following Monday, but they did not. the

superintendent called on the following Tuesday, but would still not answer my

request regarding scheduling an ARD. He had me on speaker phone and then made

up something about someone - the curriculum director not being there, so could

he call back the next day and put me back on speaker phone.

I told him I was not comfortable with that. then he wanted to meet with us, the

parents informally. I still wanted to schedule an ARD as my son needs extended

year services. He promised that meeting informally would not prevent my so from

receiving ESY. A private meeting was scheduled. but I was not happy about it

as it is waste of time regarding decisions about continuing present placement or

developing an IEP etc... These decisions must be made by the committee.

I called my son' attorney who then inquired of the district's attorney as to why

an ARD was not scheduled. Their attorney stated that I could ask for an ARD,

but they didn't have to give us one. Then he went on to say that I was

" Overbearing and agressive. " . This is how any parent is perceived when they

advocate - it is laughable. I was polite and professional.

Then the district said it would only give us an ARD if we changed our son's

placement and enrolled him in the district -- this would mean taking him out of

an appropriate placement and putting him into a placement we believe to be

inappropriate and also enrolling him in a placement without any knowledge

regarding setting, IEP's, supports services.... It was crazy.

My son's attorney cited the case law showing enrollment is not needed to convene

an ARD, so now we finally got one scheduled. My child was tested a couple of

weeks ago and it shows that he has made substantial progress in his current

placement. We want his current placement to continue as it is appropriate and

meets his unique needs.

Testing shows this placement is producing progress. We need ideas as to how to

preserve this placement for our son. In his present placement he receives four

hours of RPM tutoring per week, two hours of therapeutic riding per month, four

hours per month of speech, PT, and OT, social skills training, and two hours a

month minimum of a home school co-op with neuro-typical children. I do the rest

of his schooling and I am a certified teacher, so we do at least two hours of

core academics per day and then some social studies, science, music, self-help,

skills of daily living - our day usually runs from 9 - 3. We go year round. I

gave him two weeks off once in the last year and a half and realized he

regresses if he gets off that much time at once, so then we just did a couple of

days here and there around holidays.

He has mad such wonderful progress in this placement. He is high functioning

and very verbal, though speech is about three years delayed. He has a

non-specified immune disorder, but since getting away from such a large group of

kids, he has finally been healthy. He is extremely sound sensitive and is

terrified of going back to the public school environment as the noise is painful

to him. In his present placement, standardized testing verifies that he gained

roughly THREE years progress in reading and math.

Theoretically speaking in general terms, if parents can show a child made no

progress in one type of placement but made progress in a private placement, then

don't they then have a good case for continuing the appropriate placement at

public expense? Any input would be appreciated.