Realistic chance of private placemt in DCPS

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Thank you, pp.

What some people don't seem to grasp is that funding for private placement does not include placement at any ol'private school.

There is a list of accredited SPECIAL ED schools that are dedicated to kids with learning disabilities. The schoos on the list are the only schools that can be considered.

It's not like these kids are being funded at Sidwell Friend, Georgetown day, Maret or St. ALBANS.

Private placement means Lab school, ivy mount, Kingsbury, etc.WHICH COST EVEN MORE

Don't think that these parents are getting away with anything! Believe me, we wish our child could attend our local public school with all our neighborhood kids and have his IEP needs met, but DC has no program in place to serve his needs.

The affluent, white parents I know personally in ward 3 who hire $400 an hour attorneys to (attempt to) get their privileged, white children into Diener and Lab will tell you flat out that the Dieners and Kingsburies are preferable to Murch and Hyde and Mann. That the dedicated privates have better programs overall. What they don't say, because it isn't true, is that NO DCPS could ever meet the needs of,their ADHD of with apraxia. Not at all. Just that Diener would do a better job.

What do you say about them, these lawyers and consultants who were savvy enough to at least try to work the system to get the very best school in the region for their particular kid, on my dime? Why can't they settle for the /A/ in FAPE -- "adequate"? They'll tell you right out (because they erroneously assume the same mindset) that, say, Janney was OK and Nate was doing OK but that they hear the program at ivymount is phenomenal.

I'm sure it is probably better I resent that they want me and my neighbors to pay for it instead of them.

The A stands for Appropriate.
Not adequate.

Here's another A -- you are an ass.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I've read this thread a couple of times and would be interested in any constructive input.

We currently have an IEP for our son, but the school seems to be unable to meet those expectations and realistically, given our son's condition, it seems unlikely that they will be able to. The school administration has been great in trying to accommodate his particular needs, but he is not advancing and we are coming to the conclusion that we will need to explore private options.

He has an aide, but they come from a company that contract’s with the DCPS and will never have the appropriate educational or medical background.

Our son has an ill-defined form of catastrophic epileptic encephalopathy. Ill-defined means there's no cause that can be identified despite going to Georgetown, Children's, Johns Hopkins, and NYU for evaluations.

He has frequent seizures that are resistant to conventional therapy and there is a waxing and waning cognitive component (has had a number of neuropsychological evaluations) on top of the difficulty associated with trying to think after recovering from multiple seizures (post-ictial) before and during school.

There's a lot more, but given the educational challenges and significant health risks (we take turns sleeping with him so that we can give him rescue medication to stop seizure clusters and monitor out of concern of Sudden Unexplained Death in Epilepsy (SUDEP)), I'm looking for thoughts regarding private placement.

My questions are:
So many of the stories here and elsewhere are heartbreaking, but is the health risk and issue that is considered for getting private placement?

We know families who go to the Lab School and have great things to say about it, but are there any recommendations or thoughts on alternatives?

Has anyone had similar experience with these kinds of health issues, frequent seizures, and were you successful in receiving private placement? And if so where did you go and why?

Are there any thoughts on anything else?

I'm just coming from another heartbreaking experience at his school and Would appreciate any thoughts or suggestions.

Thank you

I'm not sure about your private placement chances, but I just wanted to say I wish you the very best of luck. Your situation is very complicated and I could see it going either way in terms of private placement. On another note, please search the DC and local counties court record databases for each aide who comes into contact with your child. The aide agencies seem to have a different level of what they think is acceptable in a background check. Anyway, I would definitely contact a lawyer who deals with a lot of due process, placement cases and get an opinion. The thing is, I don't know that the schools that deal with learning disabilities and autism and such would necessarily be able to deal with such a complex medical issue.

Anyway, just wanted to send good thoughts your way. I have cried more than my fair share of tears about school and DC. It's not easy and it's never-ending.

[Anonymous]

PP -- I think DCPS is under a lot of pressure to avoid private placements and try to accomoidate in the system. So even something as solid as yours, they may try to accomodate in the styste first.

I have heard that for kids with medical needs, they sometimes look to Kennedy Krieger. You'd have to show why that long drive is not safe for your child, even if they put an aide on the bus.

[Anonymous]

Thanks you both. I hadn't heard of Kennedy Krieger, but its helpful to know what might be suggested.

Unfortunately, one of the most reliable seizure triggers for our son is riding the the car. It's usually not a matter of if, but when, he'll have a seizure. So, a short distance is key.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Thanks you both. I hadn't heard of Kennedy Krieger, but its helpful to know what might be suggested.

Unfortunately, one of the most reliable seizure triggers for our son is riding the the car. It's usually not a matter of if, but when, he'll have a seizure. So, a short distance is key.

Did you look at St. Coletta? I wasn't sure from your posts what age or degree of cognitive challenges you're dealing with. It's a DC charter school near Stadium Armory metro.

http://www.stcoletta.org/index.php?page=school-program-2

Best of luck to you and your child

[Anonymous]

His challenges are variable. The belief is that he has an underlying autoimmune disease and the resulting encephalopathy appears to relapse and remit. He's in fifth grade now and having a lot of problems, but he was at level through most of fourth grade. He missed much of the last three months of the school year because of a dramatic uptick in seizures. He reads at or near grade level sometimes and can do fifth grade math on good days.

We're also fighting Electrical Status Epilepticus during Slow Sleep (ESES), which is a form of/component of severe epilepsy that can result in significant neuropsychological regression. Sometimes referred to as Penelope Syndrome, from the myth of Penelope, the wife of Odysseus—what is weaved during the day will be unraveled during the night.

So it is believed to impact the consolidation of memory, but they don't know why.

His last 24 hour EEG was negative for ESES, but the one before was positive.

We are also in the process of weaning him off a couple of antiepileptic medications both of which cause fatigue, dizziness, headache, drowsiness, anxiety, and abdominal pain. All antiepileptic drugs negatively impact cognition, even the ones that are purported not to.

So the short answer is we don't know from day to day, week to week, or month to month what to expect.

Thanks again for your input