Printer-friendly versionA new third-grader arrives at your school. He is blind. He is autistic. He is developmentally delayed.
How does your school deal with the special needs of this child?
If your school is in New Orleans, the likely answer is to dump him in with the rest of the students and let him find his way.
That’s exactly what happened when one 9-year-old boy recently enrolled at a New Orleans school. “The regular ed teacher just taught the regular curriculum,” said the boy’s mother. “When a worksheet was handed out, they would give one to my son, even though he is completely blind.”
This story—and others like it—explain why the Southern Poverty Law Center, along with two other legal groups, filed a complaint today against the Louisiana Department of Education. The complaint chronicles the department’s systemic failure to protect students with disabilities from discrimination and to grant them equal access to public schools.
Since Hurricane Katrina in 2005, the New Orleans public school system has become a blank slate for charter school organizers. The city’s 47 charter schools, each operating as an independent school district, have been held up as a national model for school innovation. The city also has 23 schools operated by the state under the Recovery School District (RSD) and 16 schools operated by the Orleans Parish School Board.
At more than 30 of the schools in New Orleans, students with disabilities have been either denied enrollment or shuffled off to other schools. The 9-year old’s mother had little luck when she went hunting among the charter schools, hoping to get better services. Five out of the eight she visited said point blank that they could not accommodate her son’s needs.
The mother finally found a public school able and willing to meet his needs. But it is across town, requiring a grueling bus trip each day for the boy.
“When you have a child with a disability,” she says, “everything is a struggle—things most kids take for granted. Just getting dressed in the morning is a challenge. You watch your child work so hard to do basic things. You expect that professional teachers are going to make life easier for your child. We’re finding that’s not the case.”
This complaint is the second legal action taken by SPLC against New Orleans schools this month. On July 8, SPLC filed a class action lawsuit against the RSD for its brutal disciplinary policies. This latest action is being filed jointly with the Community Justice section of the Loyola Law Clinic and the Southern Disability Law Center.
“This complaint is an opportunity for the Louisiana Department of Education to remove these well-documented barriers facing students with disabilities in New Orleans,” said SPLC lead attorney Eden Heilman. “We hope to work collaboratively with the state to craft a solution that will ensure no child is denied access to the innovative educational reforms occurring throughout the city.”
Comments
Dear parent, As a parent of a
Dear parent,
As a parent of a physically challenged child I know what you are going through. I had the same problems out in Long Island which is part of New York state. I think that every teacher/person needs sensitivity training on how to handle people in general. My question to my students is what is Normal? Until people understand that everyone is equal-we are all people, there will always be problems. You can email me if you need any help- I am proud that you are standing up for you and your son.
They are absolutely right to
They are absolutely right to file a lawsuit. I would make an example out of them. Even if they are a charter school, the entire public school system there should be more accommodating, have resources available. Go get em.
I fully understand how it is
I fully understand how it is to be rejected even if my grandson has an ADHD. For a year, we have been religiously sending our grandson to a special school but at the end of the year, we found out that he was not even a part of the roll of pupils. Though we are in the Philippines, I realized I should have complained but we chose not to.
Justice will never prevail for the poor in our country. I was surprised to note that you have similar cases in USA.
Dear Parent; Unfortuantely
Dear Parent; Unfortuantely this type of situation happens all too often across the United States. Stay strong and look for supports for you, your family and your child.
Thank you so much, SPLC, for
Thank you so much, SPLC, for the umpteenth time, for caring so much and doing so much. And, here's a little something I learned during years of practice in administrative law, representing disabled students and their families: Do not hesitate to use the impartial due process hearing as a means to get disabled kids the related services (i.e. speech therapy, sensory integrated o.t., etc.) and one-on-one ed. and assistance they often require. And, if needed, a classroom setting that may be strictly for kids with disabilities, rather than the automatic tossing of them into a regular class, thereby manipulating parent's tendency for denial, all and under the guise of least restrictive enviroment LRE). In actuality, the districts are looking for ways to save money and undermine, without getting taken to task, the free appropriate public education (FAPE)that is required under all state and federal law.
This is very important news
This is very important news as New Orleans is being touted as a successful experiment in charter school takeovers. America has to know the truth about how charter schools do NOT take all comers, as public schools are required to do, and with joy. Thank you SPLC.
As the grandparent of a 12
As the grandparent of a 12 year old special needs student, I have attended many IEP meetings held about him in his school district. It is often intimidating to find yourself in a room full of professionals who assure you that they know best, but you are the people who know your child best and you know what experience in school your child has had. Never doubt the importance of what you know about your child. I would also say never go to these meetings alone, bring a relative or friend to help listen and show the school that you are serious. My grandson's parents and I have worked politely and persistently to get him the services he needs. There is no substitute for parental involvement because our children cannot advocate for themselves. Don't be reluctant to speak out, to ask questions, and to ask for explanations of terms you don't understand. Look for other parents who have children in your district. Ask for help. Be prepared for meetings. Stay as long as necessary to get the services your child is entitled to. If time in one meeting runs out without an agreeable decision, ask for another meeting. Time is your best ally. Don't agree to the plans until the plan is right for your child. How do you tell? Your child should be happy to go to school and should be demonstrating new skills to you at home, regardless of his or her disability. You can ask for a review of an IEP any time you see it is not working. Keep asking. Be polite, but keep talking to the school until your child gets what he or she needs in order to learn. Your child has a right to have real opportunities to succeed at learning every day in school.
Now I'm stuck on this. As a
Now I'm stuck on this. As a new teacher, I had enough of a learning curb, but with 25% of my class qualifying for and needing more services than were given, it was tricky to meet all the needs of my students.
At the same time, my husband (spina bifida, wheelchair since birth) and I learned that the FEDs wanted $10,500 back simply because we'd gotten married. He was also knocked off of disability and it took a year of calls and explaining to find out that their records showed he no longer had a disability!
I'm not sure how bureaucracy works, but for the people who work in the school, they really worked with my students and with my husband. His third grade teacher spent 5 or more hours a week trying to help him write. Ultimately, he's got a great typing speed, but she tried to help him.
I guess I want to say that teachers and administrators are trying, but time, money and energy constraints prevent the ideal.
With that said - I heard that I'm still at the beginning of my career and that I may, someday, become like those who are defeated and stopped trying to care for the individual student.
MAY THAT DAY NEVER COME FOR ANY OF US! Let us continue to wade through policy designed to cautious with our tax payer money while being ever patient in getting what our loved ones need.
I echo your sentiments
I echo your sentiments regarding SPLC and Teaching Tolerance as exemplary catalysts for change for underrepresented populations of students who are at high risk for failure, humiliation and mistreatment. In point of reflection, I appreciate the constant reminders of what is and isn't equitable across the United States. Having the good fortune of working in some of the most progressive districts in the state of Massachusetts, my initial reaction to the blatant disregard of the student's civil rights was to be aghast. How could that possibly happen? Surely, someone on the staff would understand the legal and moral repercussions of the school’s and the teacher's actions! In the next instant, however, I realized that such maddening injustice as occurred in this case is most certainly not an isolated incident. In my school and district, the Director of Special Education, and most likely the Director of Curriculum and Instruction, along with the building principal, the classroom teacher, the entire special education staff, and of course the parents/guardians along with an advocate if one was involved with the family would have met prior to the child beginning classes to develop an IEP, implement any and all modifications and accommodations the team deemed necessary, and purchased adaptive equipment and materials the district could reasonably provide to promote optimal learning conditions for the student. In my best guess, this would most likely happen the same week the parents enrolled their child. As part of the process, the parents would be given a guided tour of their child's classroom and school, contacted by the parent organization etc. If a expert in the field such as are available through outplacement services from the Perkins School for the Blind was needed to train the staff and student, one would be provided. Of course, no system or process is perfect; nonetheless, this practice serves its students and families well. For me, the privilege of working in such a community is a double-edged sword. It makes me feel blessed to be able to grow as a professional and as a human being within this environment. It also highlights for me the great divide between wealth and poverty in this country as well as the misguided allocation of funding and teacher training to the point where one child is given every opportunity to succeed, another is left “in the dark” without so much as an aide to read to him what is written on the worksheets placed in front of his unseeing eyes. So, tell me then, who in this case is truly turning a blind eye? Once again, I applaud SPLC's mission and actions.