Small classes and special ed support?

[Anonymous]

I have a kindergartner with autism. He's bright and verbal but he has autism-related behavior challenges like lack of flexibility, difficulty transitioning, poor social skills, etc. His neuropsychologist recommended that he go to a school with small classes and a high teacher/student ratio, gen ed setting with pullout and pushin special ed support. Do schools like this actually exist?

So far I've found
-Private schools with resource support, but big classes
-Private schools with small classes, but no real resource support
-Public schools with robust special ed, but big classes unless you're in the self-contained classrooms
-Dedicated special needs schools which are unaffordable, don't offer financial aid, and aren't gen ed settings

Am I missing something? I live in Hyattsville.

[Anonymous]

you most likely need to send him to public with an IEP. mainstream privates will not accept this profile, and SN privates are not affordable for most.

One reason I’m not a huge fan of neuropsychology reports is that they often make impossible recommendations like this that do not provide any useful guidance to parents. Or sometimes provide recommendations that end up being counterproductive and not suited to your particular child.

[Anonymous]

Yeah it's on the table for sure. So is homeschooling the academics and getting private therapy, actually. I'm going to have him assessed for an IEP and see what they would do with him.

Our public school has 25-27 kids in first grade with a part time aide and from my experience trying to get them to evaluate my older child they are comfortable tolerating a level of disruptive behavior that I think my child could learn to not do. They also have low academic achievement, largely due to a high percentage of ELL and poverty rather than teaching skill to my understanding. I don't think it's a "bad school" in terms of safety or anything like that, and I actually think it's good when schools are comfortable with a wide range of children, but my particular child can be irritable and non compliant and is very resistant to things that are hard, and my concern is that in a school with so many different needs he would just slip through the cracks because it's just so much easier to let him do easy stuff where he isn't really learning anything but at least he isn't screaming.

I hear you on the impossibility of the recommendations. I actually think it's probably a good recommendation for him, but yeah, it's not very practically helpful if it doesn't exist. 😆

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I have a kindergartner with autism. He's bright and verbal but he has autism-related behavior challenges like lack of flexibility, difficulty transitioning, poor social skills, etc. His neuropsychologist recommended that he go to a school with small classes and a high teacher/student ratio, gen ed setting with pullout and pushin special ed support. Do schools like this actually exist?

So far I've found
-Private schools with resource support, but big classes
-Private schools with small classes, but no real resource support
-Public schools with robust special ed, but big classes unless you're in the self-contained classrooms
-Dedicated special needs schools which are unaffordable, don't offer financial aid, and aren't gen ed settings

Am I missing something? I live in Hyattsville.

I would try asking this question in the special needs forum.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I have a kindergartner with autism. He's bright and verbal but he has autism-related behavior challenges like lack of flexibility, difficulty transitioning, poor social skills, etc. His neuropsychologist recommended that he go to a school with small classes and a high teacher/student ratio, gen ed setting with pullout and pushin special ed support. Do schools like this actually exist?

So far I've found
-Private schools with resource support, but big classes
-Private schools with small classes, but no real resource support
-Public schools with robust special ed, but big classes unless you're in the self-contained classrooms
-Dedicated special needs schools which are unaffordable, don't offer financial aid, and aren't gen ed settings

Am I missing something? I live in Hyattsville.

The "soft" special ed schools like Maddux. My now-19 year old autistic child tried almost all those settings and that's what worked best.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have a kindergartner with autism. He's bright and verbal but he has autism-related behavior challenges like lack of flexibility, difficulty transitioning, poor social skills, etc. His neuropsychologist recommended that he go to a school with small classes and a high teacher/student ratio, gen ed setting with pullout and pushin special ed support. Do schools like this actually exist?

So far I've found
-Private schools with resource support, but big classes
-Private schools with small classes, but no real resource support
-Public schools with robust special ed, but big classes unless you're in the self-contained classrooms
-Dedicated special needs schools which are unaffordable, don't offer financial aid, and aren't gen ed settings

Am I missing something? I live in Hyattsville.

The "soft" special ed schools like Maddux. My now-19 year old autistic child tried almost all those settings and that's what worked best.

I haven't found any of these schools that offer significant financial aid. Otherwise I would totally be looking at these. But I simply don't have $20k+ to spend on his school, even if I get to deduct it on my taxes. :/

[Anonymous]

Have you looked at Auburn? Don’t know if they have a lot of FA but if they do, it might be a good option.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have a kindergartner with autism. He's bright and verbal but he has autism-related behavior challenges like lack of flexibility, difficulty transitioning, poor social skills, etc. His neuropsychologist recommended that he go to a school with small classes and a high teacher/student ratio, gen ed setting with pullout and pushin special ed support. Do schools like this actually exist?

So far I've found
-Private schools with resource support, but big classes
-Private schools with small classes, but no real resource support
-Public schools with robust special ed, but big classes unless you're in the self-contained classrooms
-Dedicated special needs schools which are unaffordable, don't offer financial aid, and aren't gen ed settings

Am I missing something? I live in Hyattsville.

The "soft" special ed schools like Maddux. My now-19 year old autistic child tried almost all those settings and that's what worked best.

I haven't found any of these schools that offer significant financial aid. Otherwise I would totally be looking at these. But I simply don't have $20k+ to spend on his school, even if I get to deduct it on my taxes. :/

Schools like Ivymount are $80k. If $20k is out of reach, then you'll need to start in public school, with as robust an IEP as possible. "Appropriate" unfortunately doesn't mean "best."

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have a kindergartner with autism. He's bright and verbal but he has autism-related behavior challenges like lack of flexibility, difficulty transitioning, poor social skills, etc. His neuropsychologist recommended that he go to a school with small classes and a high teacher/student ratio, gen ed setting with pullout and pushin special ed support. Do schools like this actually exist?

So far I've found
-Private schools with resource support, but big classes
-Private schools with small classes, but no real resource support
-Public schools with robust special ed, but big classes unless you're in the self-contained classrooms
-Dedicated special needs schools which are unaffordable, don't offer financial aid, and aren't gen ed settings

Am I missing something? I live in Hyattsville.

The "soft" special ed schools like Maddux. My now-19 year old autistic child tried almost all those settings and that's what worked best.

I haven't found any of these schools that offer significant financial aid. Otherwise I would totally be looking at these. But I simply don't have $20k+ to spend on his school, even if I get to deduct it on my taxes. :/

Schools like Ivymount are $80k. If $20k is out of reach, then you'll need to start in public school, with as robust an IEP as possible. "Appropriate" unfortunately doesn't mean "best."

I hear this, but the problem is that I don't think the public school has an appropriate placement for him, but I think they will say that they do.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have a kindergartner with autism. He's bright and verbal but he has autism-related behavior challenges like lack of flexibility, difficulty transitioning, poor social skills, etc. His neuropsychologist recommended that he go to a school with small classes and a high teacher/student ratio, gen ed setting with pullout and pushin special ed support. Do schools like this actually exist?

So far I've found
-Private schools with resource support, but big classes
-Private schools with small classes, but no real resource support
-Public schools with robust special ed, but big classes unless you're in the self-contained classrooms
-Dedicated special needs schools which are unaffordable, don't offer financial aid, and aren't gen ed settings

Am I missing something? I live in Hyattsville.

The "soft" special ed schools like Maddux. My now-19 year old autistic child tried almost all those settings and that's what worked best.

I haven't found any of these schools that offer significant financial aid. Otherwise I would totally be looking at these. But I simply don't have $20k+ to spend on his school, even if I get to deduct it on my taxes. :/

Schools like Ivymount are $80k. If $20k is out of reach, then you'll need to start in public school, with as robust an IEP as possible. "Appropriate" unfortunately doesn't mean "best."

I hear this, but the problem is that I don't think the public school has an appropriate placement for him, but I think they will say that they do.

The only choices are public schools and private schools. Private schools cost money. For public school to agree to pay for nonpublic, your kid has to fail first.

Disability is expensive.

[Anonymous]

You other potential option is to convince the state/county (I’m not sure- ask on the special needs board) that public school can’t meet your child’s needs and get money from them toward private school. I’m not totally sure how it works and I imagine it’s not an easy process but I know it can be done.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have a kindergartner with autism. He's bright and verbal but he has autism-related behavior challenges like lack of flexibility, difficulty transitioning, poor social skills, etc. His neuropsychologist recommended that he go to a school with small classes and a high teacher/student ratio, gen ed setting with pullout and pushin special ed support. Do schools like this actually exist?

So far I've found
-Private schools with resource support, but big classes
-Private schools with small classes, but no real resource support
-Public schools with robust special ed, but big classes unless you're in the self-contained classrooms
-Dedicated special needs schools which are unaffordable, don't offer financial aid, and aren't gen ed settings

Am I missing something? I live in Hyattsville.

The "soft" special ed schools like Maddux. My now-19 year old autistic child tried almost all those settings and that's what worked best.

I haven't found any of these schools that offer significant financial aid. Otherwise I would totally be looking at these. But I simply don't have $20k+ to spend on his school, even if I get to deduct it on my taxes. :/

Schools like Ivymount are $80k. If $20k is out of reach, then you'll need to start in public school, with as robust an IEP as possible. "Appropriate" unfortunately doesn't mean "best."

I hear this, but the problem is that I don't think the public school has an appropriate placement for him, but I think they will say that they do.

The only choices are public schools and private schools. Private schools cost money. For public school to agree to pay for nonpublic, your kid has to fail first.

Disability is expensive.

No, I get that. I think I would rather homeschool him than leave him to struggle in public school for years while I file a lawsuit to make them pay for a private school. I guess I'm just wondering if there's a school somewhere (or category of schools) that I haven't heard of and should be looking into. For example I know of a Catholic school in Bethesda that has a program for kids with Down syndrome and costs about $13k before financial aid. But you can't really tell from their website that they have this support available, which made me wonder if there were any places I just didn't know to look at for autism. Not sure if that makes sense.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:You other potential option is to convince the state/county (I’m not sure- ask on the special needs board) that public school can’t meet your child’s needs and get money from them toward private school. I’m not totally sure how it works and I imagine it’s not an easy process but I know it can be done.

This is in general really hard -- only about 3% of MD students with disabilities are in non-public placements. I would be surprised if my child were that exceptionally unsuited to giant understaffed classes haha. Furthermore I have been told that the first step in getting this done as a Prince George's County resident is to move to Montgomery County. 😆 Basically I think it comes down to what a PP said above -- the public school has a much lower bar for what they consider "appropriate education" than we as parents might want for our kids.

[Anonymous]

The way a lot of private schools designated for special needs survive is that parents use the system...and they prove that the public school was unable to provide a free and appropriate public education (like, they had no speech therapist for 6 months and the child was entitled to speech) and the team agrees that the child needs to move to a private school at the expense of the school system. So, that 80K is paid by MCPS (or wherever). Parents don't pay. They pay the lawyer/advocate.

A lot of teachers with special training in disabilities can make more than general ed teachers in public school, so private schools have a hard time keeping them. A small class size is not budget friendly. If the teacher makes $60K, class has 7 kids at $10K a year, and related service providers (OT/PT/SLP) make about $100/hour, the school would be in the red all the time.

Lab is wonderful but is more for dyslexia/SLD than ASD.

Sycamore is great with a variety of learners, and they take some of hurdles out of school that are hard for kids that can have rigid tendancies. Flexible and more hands-on/project-based learning.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The way a lot of private schools designated for special needs survive is that parents use the system...and they prove that the public school was unable to provide a free and appropriate public education (like, they had no speech therapist for 6 months and the child was entitled to speech) and the team agrees that the child needs to move to a private school at the expense of the school system. So, that 80K is paid by MCPS (or wherever). Parents don't pay. They pay the lawyer/advocate.

A lot of teachers with special training in disabilities can make more than general ed teachers in public school, so private schools have a hard time keeping them. A small class size is not budget friendly. If the teacher makes $60K, class has 7 kids at $10K a year, and related service providers (OT/PT/SLP) make about $100/hour, the school would be in the red all the time.

Lab is wonderful but is more for dyslexia/SLD than ASD.

Sycamore is great with a variety of learners, and they take some of hurdles out of school that are hard for kids that can have rigid tendancies. Flexible and more hands-on/project-based learning.

If OP had a rising 5th grader, Sycamore would be perfect for "autism-related behavior challenges like lack of flexibility, difficulty transitioning, poor social skills, etc." since that is typical in their student population. It runs 5th grade through 12 and does offer some financial aid.

Not many schools fill the niche between no support and Special Ed like Sycamore does. It's great for the students who fit there.