The Least Wonderful Time of the Year

In the first place, God made idiots. That was for practice. Then he made school boards.

- Mark Twain

This week is one that many have already experienced this year. It is a week that some parents embrace with joy, and some children embrace with dread. Same is true for some teachers.

It is the first week of school.

It's one of the worst weeks of the year for me.

Once again, I have to entrust my ASD daughter to people who may not necessarily understand how to deal with an ASD child.

Yes, they may have had a child with autism in their class before (and that's about the extent of their special needs training), but do they really understand how to handle them? Do they really understand Helena's specific needs, which of course are different from any other child?

• In Helena's first full year of school (pre-k), we had to battle to get an aide for her. We were told that we were asking for "the Cadillac of services" and that "she would just be the quiet one in the classroom." This from the Director of Special Education for the school district!!! In other words, we'll pull her out of the class for some therapy, but we're not going to help her in the classroom. They relented after we threatened legal action. She also came home with some artwork made with pretzels, after we repeated explained she was on the GFCF diet. They didn't seem to get that even though she didn't directly eat a pretzel, she did handle them, and then she puts her fingers in her mouth, and then...sigh!
  


• Things went a little better when we moved to Montana, when Helena was in the middle of Kindergarten. But then they assigned her to a first grade teacher they said would be wonderful for her. And maybe she is a wonderful teacher. But she runs her classroom with little structure. And what do ASD children need? STRUCTURE!!! Helena was miserable, and she lashed out at anything and everyone. We had to put a behavior plan into her IEP.
  


• Second grade went better - more structured classroom, better aide. And third grade went ok too, despite transitioning to a new building, with yet another new aide. But when she had an incident in the classroom, we suddenly all discovered that her bahavior plan was no longer in her IEP!! The teacher and the aide panicked - they had no idea what to do!
  

So now Helena is in fourth grade, and school starts in two days. Here is where we stand:

• We just found out today (that's right, two days before school starts) that Helena's case manager no longer works at the school. We have the name of the new case manager, and hopefully we can meet her before school begins.
  


• Helena has met her new teacher, but we have not. Again, hopefully we can do this in the next two days.
  


• But this is the worst of all:

This is the playground for grades 3 - 5 at Helena's school. Or should I say, was. Back in May, they started construction on all parts of the school. They are adding classrooms, changing traffic patterns, and building a new administration building. A newsletter sent home from the superintendent proudly talks about how work is on schedule for a better school. The contractor talks proudly about how much dirt they have moved and how many sewer lines they have laid. They see progress...

All I see is no parking, constant noise in my daughter's building from all the construction (oh yes, she is noise sensitive), and most importantly, no swings. They will let the children play in the grass field across from the building, but there is no playground equipment there.

Do you know how important swings are? Helena loves them! It is the one playground apparatus that really calms her down, and the only one she looks forward to using. Now that is gone...

The least wonderful time of the year? Definitely. And even more so this year.

Then again, we haven't signed the IEP yet.

I think I'll slip in a provision that Helena needs to swing every day...