Ugh...why can't it ever be easy?

JJJ

Active Member
Tigger had another meltdown at school. Four hours after the meltdown his blood pressure and pulse were extremely elevated. That's a pretty reliable sign that he had a seizure but, of course, I doubt the school will believe me cause they think it is 'just' behavior. He is finally asleep and I took his vitals while he was sleeping and they are normal again.

He had the metal part of a sharpener in his folder and the building principal is pushing for a 5-10 day out of school suspension. Mr. Pretty Boy is seriously deranged if he thinks I will tolerate that. We just spent 3 months getting Tigger over a major case of school avoidance and anxiety and he wants to keep him out for 1-2 weeks because he had a piece of a pencil sharpener in his folder???? Add that to the holiday break and we could be looking at 25+ days off from school in a row, yeah, that will work. Let's teach a school-phobic child new ways to get out of going to school -- ways that mom can't ignore :(

He didn't threaten anyone, and when questioned he stated that another student gave it to him when her pencil sharpener broke the other day and he kept meaning to take it home but forgot. He said he wanted to bring it home so he could sharpen pencils 'the old-fashioned way'. The other student was gone for the day so they will question her tomorrow, hopefully she remembers giving it to him and tells them that and when they question him again, that he doesn't start making stuff up to make them happy (cause clearly they want a different answer than the one he gave them).
 

Wiped Out

Well-Known Member
Staff member
Oh my your principal sounds like he is just looking for ways to get Tigger out of school! Seriously a 5-10 day suspension? I can't remember if he has an IEP. If he does 10 days would mean a manifestation determination. Hugs to you JJJ. I wish you and Tigger weren't dealing with this.
 

JJJ

Active Member
Yep, it totally stinks that the only building in the area with the 4 classrooms needed for this program was Pretty Boy's. There was another, more experienced principal who really wanted the program but her building had only 1 open room :( What is so frustrating is that the teacher called me yesterday to tell me how great Tigger was doing and that other children had been having very rough times but he was doing great (she jinxed herself! ;) )
 

Shari

IsItFridayYet?
oh lord, jjj. things were going so well last year...what happened....?

and i just do not get the suspension when the school knows it doesn't work for a particular child. that is so frusrating.
 

LittleDudesMom

Well-Known Member
"By the Book" is the motto in this case it seems.

So how did this all happen? Did the meltdown occur because they found the "blade" (and I'm sure that is what they are looking at it as because it is virtually a single edged razor blade) in his stuff and accused him? If not, how did the pencil sharpener piece get into the discussion after he was already melting down? Were they going through his things?

Those are questions I would want the answers to.

The "no tolerance" policies would look at that as a weapon that could definitely cause harm. For a lot of our kids, they don't draw the connection something they think is cool and something can could be used for harm.

Hugs,
Sharon
 

gcvmom

Here we go again!
Seems completely counterproductive to me, too. Our district has zero tolerance, too, however when difficult child 2 brought a knife to school, the school and district admin determined after our big "crisis intervention" meeting that the series of complex events which unfolded that day did not begin as anything malicious on difficult child 2's part, and only after being forced into a victimized situation did anything escalate. So he got off with a few days ISS and the school backed off the matter.

Unfortunately, not everyone is reasonable nor would take the time to consider the context.

I hope this doesn't blow up for him!
 

JJJ

Active Member
Sanity prevailed!!! Despite Pretty Boy pushing hard for it to be called a weapon, the "new" program supervisor, who had final say, went with 1 day in the crisis room for having an unsafe object (for a total of 2 days in the crisis room cause he was there today for damaging property during his meltdown). She scoured the 'zero tolerance policy' for a way to avoid a weapons charge and she found it. Our school's policy defines a blade as being longer than one inch and the pencil sharpener piece was just under 3/4 of an inch. I'm so relieved. (She is the new program supervisor, but not new to Tigger's case as she has been with our district's Special Education program since Tigger was little.)

Tigger is fine with it. He was afraid that he was in the crisis room for the rest of the year!

The program supervisor still feels that moving him to the Learning Disability (LD)-room (from his current ED-room) for next year remains a realistic goal, not a promise but still on the table depending on how he does after the holiday break. Barring Tigger getting worse, I'm going to push very hard for it as that classroom is in our home school and the ED-room for the junior high is two towns away (an extra 30 minutes at least on the bus). Either way, he is out of Pretty Boy's building :)
 
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