Reply to Applying to mainstream private schools: When/how should I tell the admission about DC's autism?

Forum Index » Kids With Special Needs and Disabilities

Reply to "Applying to mainstream private schools: When/how should I tell the admission about DC's autism?"

Subject:

Emoticons





More smilies

Text Color: Font: Close Marks

[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]OP here. What I meant by "social support" is any of the following:
- Recognizing that even though my DC looks content playing alone, DC needs to learn to play with other kids.  
- Understanding that recess (and other non-structured periods) are the golden opportunity for my DC is learn social skills and willing to help DC to connect with other kids, even just by simple gesture "Let's see what (Friend A) is playing." or said to (Friend A),"(DC) might be interested in what you're doing."
In short, the teacher should TRY to help facilitate social interaction as much as he/she would help other kids academically in the classroom.
- This might be a a stretch for most schools and will make them anxious ...  consider parents bringing in an outside therapist during recess (push-in, not pull out).

I really try to be honest about my DC's diagnosis and needs, if there's an opportunity to talk to the admission privately during school visits/tours, but it always felt that I dropped a bomb and created a tension/awkwardness once the word "autism" comes out.
[/quote]

If these are the type of social supports you are looking for, you need to look at SN privates like Auburn.  [b]Mainstream schools, public or private, do not provide these supports[/b].  Public schools will provide it, if you specify in the IEP.  [b]I cannot image a school allowing you to bring in an outside therapist[/b] during recess past preschool.[/quote]

These are blanket statements, so there's probably some truth and untruths.  Many mainstream privates do have support services like ST and OTs.  Some have social skills curriculums as part of educational approaches.  (I have known some privates that have brought in outside therapist.  Not common, but not impossible.)

Would your kid be able to respond to academic instruction and basically function in a classroom.  From what you describe, your kid has rudimentary skills but could limp along socially without supports. If you are in denial and this is really "pie-in-the sky," then look at a SN school.

OP, I would look at Maddux.  It's a mainstream school with built in educational supports.  I'd invest the time and money now for a social skills group.  Ivymount has great ones.  In terms of traditional mainstream schools, focus your efforts on schools that have small classrooms and preferably already use a social skills curriculum and offer OT/ST.  Even if your kid doesn't need ST/OT, it's an indication that schools acknowledge that some kids need support.

You still have to do testing, applications are generally due in January, and if your kid meets the first round, there is the playdate, which will be in the spring of 2016.  Don't put your eggs in one basket, don't cross off SN schools b/c they are SN.  Apply to a few different kinds of schools.  For SN schools, the Exceptional Schools Fair is coming up:  http://www.exceptionalschoolsfair.com
[/quote]

PP, what are the many mainstream schools that offer these supports? Please name them. I always thought Maddux was a special school.[/quote]

So I'm not PP but I know a couple that do ... and am reluctant to "name them." That would feel like a betrayal in a way, because honestly these schools are forced to talk in very careful code to SN parents.  To their credit, some of them actually are receptive to working with great kids who are a little bit different.  They understand the truth that a generation ago the kids we are talking about would not have had a diagnosis at all.  And none of them will contaminate the special snowflake typical kids with some kind of zombie apocalypse disease through mild social contact.  These are wonderful children, who for the most part are smart (more than occasionally brilliant), naïve and socially vulnerable and almost pathologically honest and far more prone to being bullied and abused by the typically developing kids than they are to impede the typically developing kids' education in any important way.  If you knew a bunch of HFA kids well I promise you would love them, and defend them and their right to try and integrate with the rest of the world, fiercely.  I promise, if you are not a monster, that is how you would feel.  Some of the schools get that.  Most of the typical parents do not, not because they are monsters but because they do not understand and because they have been conditioned by their environment to think in a particular way and to fear what they do not understand.  The schools have to deal with that, and have to be very careful about who they decide to try to help.  And if they ever admitted on their web site that they were open to kids with learning and social differences, they would be destroyed by it--because of the insane, superficial, status-hounding culture of this city.  For heaven's sake, look even at Maddux's web site.  They are indeed a very special place, filled with people who have dedicated their entire lives to helping special kids.  Even they can't forthrightly say what they are doing.  [/quote]

Do you realize you are posting on the Kids With Special Needs message board? Will you please spare us with this "private schools are forced to be cagey about admitting kids with SN" crap? And "If you knew kids with SN you would love them?" Perhaps you thought you were posting on the Private Schools board and this is how people there talk about our kids. I am glad to say I don't read that crap. [/quote]

Options

	Disable HTML in this message
	Disable BB Code in this message
	Disable smilies in this message

Review message

Search Recent Topics Hottest Topics