School District Evaluations

February 1, 2010

Hi Everyone,

I am looking for some of you to tell me about your experiences going through a

kindergarten school district evaluation. My daughter has a number of special

needs, one of her needs is speech related. She also has delays in OT/PT and a

very short attention span. I recently had her evaluated for kindergarten in our

home district (sdale, AZ). They brought my daughter and me into a room and

there were about 10 adults scattered throughout the room and a small table at

the back of the room. Each of the adults was from a specialty area like speech,

PT, OT, Special Ed, etc... They approached my daughter randomly and asked her

" abby, can you say mom " , " Abby, can you catch this ball " , " Abby, come here and

stack these blocks " . Needless to say there was absolutely no stucture and Abby

just " shut down " . She shook her head no to whatever they asked her to do and

then started to cry. It was like she was being ambushed. I had expected a bit

more organization and structure to the testing. They then told me they feel the

appropriate place for Abby is in a self-contained classroom.

I was so angry and stressed out I had no words for them, just told them I would

think about this. I want to know what other school districts have done for

evaluations and how yours were structured. I feel like my daughter did not get

a fair chance to prove her abilities and that they put her into a stressful and

overstimulating environment on purpose.

Please let me know your thoughts, especially those of you who have been through

this before. I am strongly considering hiring an attorney.

Thanks you!!!

(mom to Abby 4.5 and Zachary 22 months)

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