Worked my butt off in the PTA and my son is in a "weaker" classroom

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I am one of the few MC parents in a title 1 school. Worked my butt off on the PTA board for 2 years, plus classroom volunteering, plus working directly with principal to organize events for the school.
Part of the deal as I saw it was that my son was in a stronger teacher's class last year, plus a stronger and better peer group in his class. He almost always got into free enrichment activities where there was a lottery, which I also saw as part of the deal (never was stated by anyone openly but I was even asked for a preference for a summer program).
Last year, I was asked about the preferences for my son's classroom placement, which I stated (3 of them: teacher, best friend, avoiding one other child). Well I saw the class lists today and I got ZERO of my requests fulfilled. I am fine with either teacher, I am more or less ok that his good friend is not with him, but there is a boy I specifically told the school my son had some run ins with and who is just plain disruptive and physically aggressive, and he is in my son's class. Also, I can see that his class is just weaker than the other one. Two kids who were held back a grade, one borderline special needs slow learner, and only one strong student besides him.
I am just so disappointed. I tried to stay loyal to the neighborhood school, tried to make it better, but now I am just tempted to transfer the kid to a more decent school a bit further away. I am drastically scaling down my PTA involvement this year for sure, and looking into other school options.

You really can't count on PTA involvement as a way of getting favors from the school. Sometimes it works out but often it doesn't. You're really better off focusing your time and energy on supplementing your child yourself.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:So you "volunteered" because you thought it would curry you favors with the principal with class placement? If you'd just stuck to sharing about how frustrated you were that your communicated request for separating your child from another wasn't met, I would have offered some helpful advice. But you had to throw in the part about expecting some preferential treatment because you volunteered.

You're an idiot, OP. You fail to see how your kid will be fine, even with some kids who learn differently. Even worse, though, is that you're an entitled idiot. Please stay in MD.

-Principal of a Title 1 school in Fairfax

The overwhelming number of parents who spend a lot of time volunteering, do so hoping for preferential treatment. Let's not kid ourselves.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
Schools usually honor requests to avoid another child, so you can ask why this request was not honored.

However for all the rest, shame on you, OP!

What you expected was highly unethical and immoral.

I have been on the PTA Board for years, and would not tolerate it if my child received favors as a result. That is NOT why I volunteer.
I want to help all the students, not my children in particular.

And as the parent of a child with special needs, I find your remark about the slow learner particularly offensive. At our MCPS school, children with special needs do not slow down the rest of the class - they have aides in the classroom, who help others as well as the child in question, so it's actually a bonus for everyone.

You are a disgusting human being.

As a teacher, I can assure you that the special needs kids DO slow down the pace for everyone else, or at a minimum unevenly divert teacher attention away from the other students. And I have never seen a school where the SN kids who are placed in mainstream classes have an aid sitting with them all day.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
Schools usually honor requests to avoid another child, so you can ask why this request was not honored.

However for all the rest, shame on you, OP!

What you expected was highly unethical and immoral.

I have been on the PTA Board for years, and would not tolerate it if my child received favors as a result. That is NOT why I volunteer.
I want to help all the students, not my children in particular.

And as the parent of a child with special needs, I find your remark about the slow learner particularly offensive. At our MCPS school, children with special needs do not slow down the rest of the class - they have aides in the classroom, who help others as well as the child in question, so it's actually a bonus for everyone.

You are a disgusting human being.

+1 I was a room parent last year in my oldest child's class. Her teacher was awful and I hated her, in large part because she sought to ignore the accommodations my child needs and made things harder than they needed to be. But I didn't volunteer to curry favor with the teacher - I did it because my child asked me to do it and to make the few class parties allowed at her school fun for the whole class.

Volunteers shouldn't be able to "buy" influence. And kids with special needs have every right to be in the "good" classrooms too.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
Schools usually honor requests to avoid another child, so you can ask why this request was not honored.

However for all the rest, shame on you, OP!

What you expected was highly unethical and immoral.

I have been on the PTA Board for years, and would not tolerate it if my child received favors as a result. That is NOT why I volunteer.
I want to help all the students, not my children in particular.

And as the parent of a child with special needs, I find your remark about the slow learner particularly offensive. At our MCPS school, children with special needs do not slow down the rest of the class - they have aides in the classroom, who help others as well as the child in question, so it's actually a bonus for everyone.

You are a disgusting human being.

+1 I was a room parent last year in my oldest child's class. Her teacher was awful and I hated her, in large part because she sought to ignore the accommodations my child needs and made things harder than they needed to be. But I didn't volunteer to curry favor with the teacher - I did it because my child asked me to do it and to make the few class parties allowed at her school fun for the whole class.

Volunteers shouldn't be able to "buy" influence. And kids with special needs have every right to be in the "good" classrooms too.

In our school if you have an IEP, all kids are placed in one classroom regardless of SN or academics. So, if you have a kid strong in academics who needs minor supports they are placed in the SN classroom with a slower curriculum. My child has been stuck there for two years and teachers refuse to give her higher level work. The other issue is she gets very upset by other kids behaviors and is very distracted each time a child is pulled out or having a meltdown. Since for a few kids the meltdowns are frequent, it interferes with my child's learning and I get calls complaining she is distracted. The other issue for us is one child for the majority of the year was grabbing her (I think it was to hug or be affectionate) or touching her in other ways which made her scared to go to school. I complained frequently to get the kids separated given it was physical and they refused to do anything about it saying the child had SN and not his fault. It may not be his fault (which I agree with) but its a huge issue when my child has to be forced to go to school and comes home crying after being harassed all day. And, because her needs were so mild in comparison, she never got the support she needed because they had to focus on the kids whose parents insist they be mainstreamed when clearly those kids should be in a more supportive environment.

[Anonymous]

eh, I volunteered in the classroom to help free up the teacher to teach which benefited my own child and every other child in the class.

Ex: I helped out with Language Arts projects, going table to table, while the teacher took the kids aside individually to do reading assessments. I stuffed take home folders so that the teacher didn't have to spend class time doing it. I helped out in the computer lab by looking over assignments before they were printed (to make sure they were completed).

I helped in other capacities, too, fund raising, class parties, etc. I also donated supplies to the classroom.

I did a lot when you add it all up but I was not a heavy duty volunteer by any stretch of the imagination.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So you "volunteered" because you thought it would curry you favors with the principal with class placement? If you'd just stuck to sharing about how frustrated you were that your communicated request for separating your child from another wasn't met, I would have offered some helpful advice. But you had to throw in the part about expecting some preferential treatment because you volunteered.

You're an idiot, OP. You fail to see how your kid will be fine, even with some kids who learn differently. Even worse, though, is that you're an entitled idiot. Please stay in MD.

-Principal of a Title 1 school in Fairfax

"Educators" like you are why we pay $40k/yr for our children.

On behalf of all public school principals and teachers, I say "Thank you PP."

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I remember feeling like the teachers and principal favored kids whose parents volunteered a lot around the school. Mine did not volunteer much which was not my fault and I remember feeling like it was unfair that those kids seemed to get special treatment

OP: in fairness, I never felt any special treatment for my son, nor did I expect it. I wanted to have a fairly strong peer group for him, which I got last year. But apparently not this year.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am one of the few MC parents in a title 1 school. Worked my butt off on the PTA board for 2 years, plus classroom volunteering, plus working directly with principal to organize events for the school.
Part of the deal as I saw it was that my son was in a stronger teacher's class last year, plus a stronger and better peer group in his class. He almost always got into free enrichment activities where there was a lottery, which I also saw as part of the deal (never was stated by anyone openly but I was even asked for a preference for a summer program).
Last year, I was asked about the preferences for my son's classroom placement, which I stated (3 of them: teacher, best friend, avoiding one other child). Well I saw the class lists today and I got ZERO of my requests fulfilled. I am fine with either teacher, I am more or less ok that his good friend is not with him, but there is a boy I specifically told the school my son had some run ins with and who is just plain disruptive and physically aggressive, and he is in my son's class. Also, I can see that his class is just weaker than the other one. Two kids who were held back a grade, one borderline special needs slow learner, and only one strong student besides him.
I am just so disappointed. I tried to stay loyal to the neighborhood school, tried to make it better, but now I am just tempted to transfer the kid to a more decent school a bit further away. I am drastically scaling down my PTA involvement this year for sure, and looking into other school options.

You really can't count on PTA involvement as a way of getting favors from the school. Sometimes it works out but often it doesn't. You're really better off focusing your time and energy on supplementing your child yourself.

This is what I am slowly learning.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
Schools usually honor requests to avoid another child, so you can ask why this request was not honored.

However for all the rest, shame on you, OP!

What you expected was highly unethical and immoral.

I have been on the PTA Board for years, and would not tolerate it if my child received favors as a result. That is NOT why I volunteer.
I want to help all the students, not my children in particular.

And as the parent of a child with special needs, I find your remark about the slow learner particularly offensive. At our MCPS school, children with special needs do not slow down the rest of the class - they have aides in the classroom, who help others as well as the child in question, so it's actually a bonus for everyone.

You are a disgusting human being.

As a teacher, I can assure you that the special needs kids DO slow down the pace for everyone else, or at a minimum unevenly divert teacher attention away from the other students. And I have never seen a school where the SN kids who are placed in mainstream classes have an aid sitting with them all day.

OP here. I don't have a problem with "our" SN kids. There are two and they both have aides most of the time in class. they cannot be both in one classroom, I get it, each class will get one. It's ok.
But I have a problem with 2 kids who are repeating a grade both being in one classroom. Plus another child who has some LDs but no aide. I may not know something about the other classroom, but I don't think they also have 2 kids repeating a grade?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
Schools usually honor requests to avoid another child, so you can ask why this request was not honored.

However for all the rest, shame on you, OP!

What you expected was highly unethical and immoral.

I have been on the PTA Board for years, and would not tolerate it if my child received favors as a result. That is NOT why I volunteer.
I want to help all the students, not my children in particular.

And as the parent of a child with special needs, I find your remark about the slow learner particularly offensive. At our MCPS school, children with special needs do not slow down the rest of the class - they have aides in the classroom, who help others as well as the child in question, so it's actually a bonus for everyone.

You are a disgusting human being.

+1 I was a room parent last year in my oldest child's class. Her teacher was awful and I hated her, in large part because she sought to ignore the accommodations my child needs and made things harder than they needed to be. But I didn't volunteer to curry favor with the teacher - I did it because my child asked me to do it and to make the few class parties allowed at her school fun for the whole class.

Volunteers shouldn't be able to "buy" influence. And kids with special needs have every right to be in the "good" classrooms too.

Maybe things would be even harder for your child if you didn't volunteer.
I am volunteering because I want my son to have great field trips, new books in the classroom (placing scholastic orders which the teachers might not have time for), the most productive time at science lessons (where they need more hands on volunteers). It is all intertwined. I want my child to have a good, productive learning experience.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
Schools usually honor requests to avoid another child, so you can ask why this request was not honored.

However for all the rest, shame on you, OP!

What you expected was highly unethical and immoral.

I have been on the PTA Board for years, and would not tolerate it if my child received favors as a result. That is NOT why I volunteer.
I want to help all the students, not my children in particular.

And as the parent of a child with special needs, I find your remark about the slow learner particularly offensive. At our MCPS school, children with special needs do not slow down the rest of the class - they have aides in the classroom, who help others as well as the child in question, so it's actually a bonus for everyone.

You are a disgusting human being.

As a teacher, I can assure you that the special needs kids DO slow down the pace for everyone else, or at a minimum unevenly divert teacher attention away from the other students. And I have never seen a school where the SN kids who are placed in mainstream classes have an aid sitting with them all day.

OP here. I don't have a problem with "our" SN kids. There are two and they both have aides most of the time in class. they cannot be both in one classroom, I get it, each class will get one. It's ok.
But I have a problem with 2 kids who are repeating a grade both being in one classroom. Plus another child who has some LDs but no aide. I may not know something about the other classroom, but I don't think they also have 2 kids repeating a grade?

Maybe the two kids who are repeating a grade were put together in the same classroom so that they wouldn't feel like the only kid repeating a grade? That is just a guess. But I can say that it is a bit intrusive and presumptuous of you to be speculating about these other children like that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
Schools usually honor requests to avoid another child, so you can ask why this request was not honored.

However for all the rest, shame on you, OP!

What you expected was highly unethical and immoral.

I have been on the PTA Board for years, and would not tolerate it if my child received favors as a result. That is NOT why I volunteer.
I want to help all the students, not my children in particular.

And as the parent of a child with special needs, I find your remark about the slow learner particularly offensive. At our MCPS school, children with special needs do not slow down the rest of the class - they have aides in the classroom, who help others as well as the child in question, so it's actually a bonus for everyone.

You are a disgusting human being.

I agree with you that OP's request was improper. But you have unrealistically rose colored glasses in claiming special needs students don't slow down the class and actually benefit others because of aides. In truth, it is a mixed bag and depends on a lot of factors, including the SN kid(s) and the aide(s). I've had circumstances where there have been frequent, significant disruptions and others with few disruptions and the aides were able and willing to help other kids.

I am not suggesting the SN kid shouldn't be in the class or get extra help, but that extra help does sometimes come at the expense of other kids and the pace of the class. Pretending otherwise doesn't help anyone.

Also, remember not all SN kids have aides, exacerbating the problems and taking away some of the potential benefit.

Too bad. SN kids have a right to be in the classroom. If you don't get that, go private.

Can you read? That was my point. They do have that right. I just thought the PP was being dishonesty in saying it was always a positive for other kids in the class.

PP you accuse of being dishonest. I specified that this is the way it is in our elementary school, where we have spent 6 years so far (2 kids), and where I volunteer extensively.

Of course there are disruptions! But when I observe the children leading others by the hand, accompanying and explaining things, telling newcomers not to make fun of certain of their habits, etc, the advantages FAR OUTWEIGH the disadvantages. And that comes from the top, PP. Our MCPS school is known for how it handles children with special needs, it is a center for our cluster, and receives students who cannot be accommodated in nearby schools. The school counselor, principal, EVERYONE, is trained and very hands-on in that regard. It creates a culture of acceptance. Children with or without particular needs, who become disruptive, are escorted out of classrooms, walked in the corridors, sent to the gym or outside. The younger students have two, sometimes three, recess periods.

I have actually observed that it's the children without a diagnosis that are the most disruptive! It's so easy and nasty to target the children with visible special needs - but the reality is that with a willing administration and trained teachers, instruction can progress at any level MCPS chooses to provide. They are all pretty low, but that's a topic for another thread...

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
Schools usually honor requests to avoid another child, so you can ask why this request was not honored.

However for all the rest, shame on you, OP!

What you expected was highly unethical and immoral.

I have been on the PTA Board for years, and would not tolerate it if my child received favors as a result. That is NOT why I volunteer.
I want to help all the students, not my children in particular.

And as the parent of a child with special needs, I find your remark about the slow learner particularly offensive. At our MCPS school, children with special needs do not slow down the rest of the class - they have aides in the classroom, who help others as well as the child in question, so it's actually a bonus for everyone.

You are a disgusting human being.

+1 I was a room parent last year in my oldest child's class. Her teacher was awful and I hated her, in large part because she sought to ignore the accommodations my child needs and made things harder than they needed to be. But I didn't volunteer to curry favor with the teacher - I did it because my child asked me to do it and to make the few class parties allowed at her school fun for the whole class.

Volunteers shouldn't be able to "buy" influence. And kids with special needs have every right to be in the "good" classrooms too.

In our school if you have an IEP, all kids are placed in one classroom regardless of SN or academics. So, if you have a kid strong in academics who needs minor supports they are placed in the SN classroom with a slower curriculum. My child has been stuck there for two years and teachers refuse to give her higher level work. The other issue is she gets very upset by other kids behaviors and is very distracted each time a child is pulled out or having a meltdown. Since for a few kids the meltdowns are frequent, it interferes with my child's learning and I get calls complaining she is distracted. The other issue for us is one child for the majority of the year was grabbing her (I think it was to hug or be affectionate) or touching her in other ways which made her scared to go to school. I complained frequently to get the kids separated given it was physical and they refused to do anything about it saying the child had SN and not his fault. It may not be his fault (which I agree with) but its a huge issue when my child has to be forced to go to school and comes home crying after being harassed all day. And, because her needs were so mild in comparison, she never got the support she needed because they had to focus on the kids whose parents insist they be mainstreamed when clearly those kids should be in a more supportive environment.

Your school is breaking the law by putting all kids with disabilities in the same classroom and not providing the same curriculum. That is not the least restrictive environment, as required by IDEA.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
Schools usually honor requests to avoid another child, so you can ask why this request was not honored.

However for all the rest, shame on you, OP!

What you expected was highly unethical and immoral.

I have been on the PTA Board for years, and would not tolerate it if my child received favors as a result. That is NOT why I volunteer.
I want to help all the students, not my children in particular.

And as the parent of a child with special needs, I find your remark about the slow learner particularly offensive. At our MCPS school, children with special needs do not slow down the rest of the class - they have aides in the classroom, who help others as well as the child in question, so it's actually a bonus for everyone.

You are a disgusting human being.

+1 I was a room parent last year in my oldest child's class. Her teacher was awful and I hated her, in large part because she sought to ignore the accommodations my child needs and made things harder than they needed to be. But I didn't volunteer to curry favor with the teacher - I did it because my child asked me to do it and to make the few class parties allowed at her school fun for the whole class.

Volunteers shouldn't be able to "buy" influence. And kids with special needs have every right to be in the "good" classrooms too.

In our school if you have an IEP, all kids are placed in one classroom regardless of SN or academics. So, if you have a kid strong in academics who needs minor supports they are placed in the SN classroom with a slower curriculum. My child has been stuck there for two years and teachers refuse to give her higher level work. The other issue is she gets very upset by other kids behaviors and is very distracted each time a child is pulled out or having a meltdown. Since for a few kids the meltdowns are frequent, it interferes with my child's learning and I get calls complaining she is distracted. The other issue for us is one child for the majority of the year was grabbing her (I think it was to hug or be affectionate) or touching her in other ways which made her scared to go to school. I complained frequently to get the kids separated given it was physical and they refused to do anything about it saying the child had SN and not his fault. It may not be his fault (which I agree with) but its a huge issue when my child has to be forced to go to school and comes home crying after being harassed all day. And, because her needs were so mild in comparison, she never got the support she needed because they had to focus on the kids whose parents insist they be mainstreamed when clearly those kids should be in a more supportive environment.

Your school is breaking the law by putting all kids with disabilities in the same classroom and not providing the same curriculum. That is not the least restrictive environment, as required by IDEA.

Maybe but there is not much we can do but go to private. We are going to ask the IEP be removed to get out of that classroom.