Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'll just mention that finding a "better public" is not always easy or reliable. I work in the schools. Your child's experience and learning comes down to the specific special education teacher. That's it. A supportive, knowledgeable Assistant Principal can help (and you can find out their background, if they have any experience in sped), but it's really about the actual SPED teacher. Who may move or transfer.

Not at all. We were at Bethesda Elementary in downtown Bethesda (MCPS), and my son had a different IEP case manager every year. Everyone who was remotely involved with special needs kids was committed to their progress, from the Principal and Assistant Principal (one of them always sat in on IEP meetings) to the case managers, therapists (DS worked with the speech therapist) and the paraeducators.

I don't know which school system you're in, PP, but clearly your experience is very limited.

Like a PP said, Bethesda ES is a unicorn.

Intensive OG therapy helped close the gap for our severely dyslexic child. We went with Lindamood Bell’s version of it. It was expensive and took some time but it sure did change her trajectory.

Take a look at the Linder Academy to see if they would be a fit. They build in OG to the curriculum through middle school. It has been great environment for our kid!

What about something like Fairhaven School to get socialization and continue learning his own way, and then do intensive private tutoring. That combo may still be cheaper than some other private options.

https://www.fairhavenschool.com/

Newton? And id consider getting a lawyer. If FCPS couldn't provide a FAPE, you might be entitled to some tuition money

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'll just mention that finding a "better public" is not always easy or reliable. I work in the schools. Your child's experience and learning comes down to the specific special education teacher. That's it. A supportive, knowledgeable Assistant Principal can help (and you can find out their background, if they have any experience in sped), but it's really about the actual SPED teacher. Who may move or transfer.

Not at all. We were at Bethesda Elementary in downtown Bethesda (MCPS), and my son had a different IEP case manager every year. Everyone who was remotely involved with special needs kids was committed to their progress, from the Principal and Assistant Principal (one of them always sat in on IEP meetings) to the case managers, therapists (DS worked with the speech therapist) and the paraeducators.

I don't know which school system you're in, PP, but clearly your experience is very limited.

I work in a school system and sadly, your experience as a parent is limited when it comes to the school and the classroom and how they implement IEP’s. Please don’t praise the assistant principal that is REQUIRED to sit in on the meetings. Everyone is committed to the child’s progress when you have a meeting. It’s all a show… sit in on your child’s classes and see how the teacher and the special education teachers interact and accommodates your child. See how others in the classroom, his peers, view and interact with him.

PP you replied to. Said kid is now in college. I saw the progress he was making at Bethesda Elementary. It was satisfactory, and I mean that as high praise. They were doing the best they could as a school system, and I know what that looks like from talking to MANY other parents of SN kids in various schools in MCPS, FCPS, DCPS and privates (and in my home country).

If you work in a school system and take parents for ignorant idiots, you have a problem, PP.

I note that no principal, assistant or otherwise, was ever present for his middle and high school IEP meetings. Just the case manager, one teacher, and sometimes the psychologist. The meetings and his schooling there also went well. I actually have no major criticism of how his special needs were accommodated throughout his K-12 education in MCPS. We were knowledgeable and prepared, asked for reasonable things, and they had the resources and goodwill to accede to those requests.

I've said it before on the Special Needs Board, and I'll say it again: I see a lot of parents with unrealistic expectations of what a school can do for their children. At the end of the day, even with all the goodwill in the world, there is a hierarchy of needs in schools and a finite amount of resources, so IEP teams will rightly serve the neediest kids most. Parents must understand that education begins at home, and that educating a child with special needs can't be foisted onto someone else (just like educating a neurotypical kid can't be all the school's job, but a lot of parents don't realize that because it's easier). Parents of SN kids need to put in so much sweat and money into their child's care and their emotional, behavioral, physical and academic wellbeing. For many years, our lives revolved around my son's therapies, trainings, coachings, in every sphere. We did a lot of it ourselves.

So OP is free to look into private schools, of course. I hope she finds the right fit! But psychologically, i want to warn parents out there that it's only too easy to fall into the trap of paying for a service and believing it will solve all problems. It won't. You still have a ton of work to do with your kid.

I agree with the above. We stopped 529 contributions for our child so we could afford private. We also withdraw 10k annually from their 529 to help with tuition payments. It’s not just for the educational aspect but the social. My child’s self esteem was starting to take a big hit. I was on the fence, but my husband made the decision easy for me when he said “we pay now, or we pay later and later is going to be more painful for all of us.”

OP - I would agree to look at your finances and just figure the best thing you can do for your son is to help him learn to read and to build the math skills in middle school. If there is a private that might be able to serve his profound needs, then it makes sense to see if college savings might make it possible because middle school gives him a 3-year window to figure out how he can learn. If you decide to hold him back a year in the transfer to a public
that, too may be wise. I would not shift savings from his siblings, but his may need to be what can give him a future.

I had a child with a similar profile (more than 2 years behind in reading).
Lab is expensive - but the calculations we made were that there is no academic future if the gap in reading was not closed.
For our child, decoding came to grade level - but fluency is still a bit slower. When we were in public school, the school had given up on teaching how to read and was pivoting to accommodations. This was in elementary school and we were not comfortable with that choice.

Again…starting advocating for and using accommodations. A kid going into middle school and still this far behind isn’t catching up. You need to find ways that allow him to show what he knows.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'll just mention that finding a "better public" is not always easy or reliable. I work in the schools. Your child's experience and learning comes down to the specific special education teacher. That's it. A supportive, knowledgeable Assistant Principal can help (and you can find out their background, if they have any experience in sped), but it's really about the actual SPED teacher. Who may move or transfer.

Not at all. We were at Bethesda Elementary in downtown Bethesda (MCPS), and my son had a different IEP case manager every year. Everyone who was remotely involved with special needs kids was committed to their progress, from the Principal and Assistant Principal (one of them always sat in on IEP meetings) to the case managers, therapists (DS worked with the speech therapist) and the paraeducators.

I don't know which school system you're in, PP, but clearly your experience is very limited.

We're in a neighboring MCPS cluster. Bethesda ES is a unicorn. Our experience tracks more with the previous PP. Also, knowledgeable and supportive teachers exist in the "worse" publics.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'll just mention that finding a "better public" is not always easy or reliable. I work in the schools. Your child's experience and learning comes down to the specific special education teacher. That's it. A supportive, knowledgeable Assistant Principal can help (and you can find out their background, if they have any experience in sped), but it's really about the actual SPED teacher. Who may move or transfer.

Not at all. We were at Bethesda Elementary in downtown Bethesda (MCPS), and my son had a different IEP case manager every year. Everyone who was remotely involved with special needs kids was committed to their progress, from the Principal and Assistant Principal (one of them always sat in on IEP meetings) to the case managers, therapists (DS worked with the speech therapist) and the paraeducators.

I don't know which school system you're in, PP, but clearly your experience is very limited.

I work in a school system and sadly, your experience as a parent is limited when it comes to the school and the classroom and how they implement IEP’s. Please don’t praise the assistant principal that is REQUIRED to sit in on the meetings. Everyone is committed to the child’s progress when you have a meeting. It’s all a show… sit in on your child’s classes and see how the teacher and the special education teachers interact and accommodates your child. See how others in the classroom, his peers, view and interact with him.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'll just mention that finding a "better public" is not always easy or reliable. I work in the schools. Your child's experience and learning comes down to the specific special education teacher. That's it. A supportive, knowledgeable Assistant Principal can help (and you can find out their background, if they have any experience in sped), but it's really about the actual SPED teacher. Who may move or transfer.

Not at all. We were at Bethesda Elementary in downtown Bethesda (MCPS), and my son had a different IEP case manager every year. Everyone who was remotely involved with special needs kids was committed to their progress, from the Principal and Assistant Principal (one of them always sat in on IEP meetings) to the case managers, therapists (DS worked with the speech therapist) and the paraeducators.

I don't know which school system you're in, PP, but clearly your experience is very limited.

I'm a different poster, but we were in a different MCPS school. All special ed staff were committed, but they didn't have the time or training to make much progress with our kid with dyslexia. The shortages of special ed teachers just makes things worse.

Cognitively normal and yet having severe dyslexia with being multiple grade levels behind just does not go together. People that are saying to catch him and get him a tutor are crazy. You don’t outgrow dyslexia. OP, put your child in the public school.

Anonymous wrote:I'll just mention that finding a "better public" is not always easy or reliable. I work in the schools. Your child's experience and learning comes down to the specific special education teacher. That's it. A supportive, knowledgeable Assistant Principal can help (and you can find out their background, if they have any experience in sped), but it's really about the actual SPED teacher. Who may move or transfer.

Not at all. We were at Bethesda Elementary in downtown Bethesda (MCPS), and my son had a different IEP case manager every year. Everyone who was remotely involved with special needs kids was committed to their progress, from the Principal and Assistant Principal (one of them always sat in on IEP meetings) to the case managers, therapists (DS worked with the speech therapist) and the paraeducators.

I don't know which school system you're in, PP, but clearly your experience is very limited.

I'll just mention that finding a "better public" is not always easy or reliable. I work in the schools. Your child's experience and learning comes down to the specific special education teacher. That's it. A supportive, knowledgeable Assistant Principal can help (and you can find out their background, if they have any experience in sped), but it's really about the actual SPED teacher. Who may move or transfer.