For crying out loud...

klmno

Active Member
My son was going thru his triennial re-evaluation when he was arrested, sent away to a psychiatric hospital, and now has been sentenced to the state dept of juvenile justice. He'll go to state prison for juvies. The sd was supposedly doing a complete (HA) re-evaluation to determine if he was still eliegible for an IEP because I asked for his class. to be changed. Anyway, I figured this was heading to me asking for an IEE afterwards, but I had to let them go thru their processes. They had tried before to say they wanted to wait until he was stable to test him. I was not in agreement with that because I thought the point was to find out how his illness was effecting his learning ability, not to wait until he was not symptommatic. I think what they really wanted was to "catch him at his best" and when he was back in their school so they didn't have to worry about getting to him out of town.

Now, they want to have a meeting about eligibilty. I asked how they determined eligibility when I didn't think they ever completed their assessment. This is the response just emailed to me:

Well, let me rephrase what I said. We need to meet to "determine" whether he is still eligible or not. What we were hoping was to briefly discuss the current situation, and then move forward with the eligibility with the hopes of re-looking at him when things are more stable and not in crisis. Therefore we would have difficult child still in compliance when he returns back to the school system. Maybe I'm making this too confusing. Would you prefer I call you? Let me know.
No, none of us could do any testing because difficult child was not here and he was in crisis. That's why we thought it would probably be inhis best interest to meet and then go from there.
No IEP will be done though.

Ok- how can we determine if he's still eligible if they have not even completed their assessment? Frankly, after 3 psychiatric hospital admittances in a 6 1/2 week period, NO ONE outside the sd even queestions the necessity for him to be on an IEP. Secondly, how could they take him off his IEP under these circumstances? Their deadline for the triennial review is coming up soon and they haven't completed it. How is meeting to discuss this in difficult child's best interest? What is there to discuss? They need to get to him and test them don't they? And, no, I don't want anything discussed over the phone- I want it documented.

How should I respond to this email?
 

JJJ

Active Member
Dear School Personnel:

As difficult child will be attending school through Department of Juvenile Justice, it is unnecessary to meet at this time to determine placement or additional testing. Once I have a discharge date from Department of Juvenile Justice, I would be happy to meet with you to restart the evaluation process and changes to his IEP.

Sincerely,

Klmno

(If you are moving out of district, don't stress yourself with these people any longer.)
 

klmno

Active Member
How do I ensure that they still have him listed as IEP eligible? Department of Juvenile Justice uses the IEP from the home school as a starting point for their education. It might be that Department of Juvenile Justice educational evaluation over-rides the home school, I'm not sure, but I know I don't want a situation where the sd lists that I refused to proceed or that difficult child's IEP eligibility status is undetermined or put on hold. I thought they were required to go where he is and test him, until he is transferred to a different educational jurisdiction.
 

gcvmom

Here we go again!
I don't see how his eligibility would change at all if they have not re-evaluated him. Wouldn't the IEP simply be put on hold until he returns to the school system? They can't just up and cancel it without proving that he no longer meets the criteria. And they can't do that until he's retested, etc. Like JJJ said, just let them know you'll get back to them once difficult child is released back into to the public school system. A lot may change between now and then.

Somebody chime in if I'm off base here...
 

klmno

Active Member
The IEP is supposed to follow him to state juvy. State juvy can modify it if they see fit. But, I will review the state law before we meet over this- which really, as far as I'm concerned, the meeting is pointless. I think they still have to evaluation him. I've heard that schools will try to stall completing evaluation's. difficult child has not been transferred to the state yet-the home sd is still responsible, as far as I know.
 

Superpsy

New Member
I still have to complete evaluations for students in juvenile detention centers. Their IEPs don't go away and the school district still has a responsibility to complete the evaluation.

Perhaps the meeting is just to clarify the situation? Find out exactly what is going on and plan for the evaluation and IEP?
 

klmno

Active Member
The meeting was scheduled for tomorrow. They never would clarify exactly what it was for but did mention that they still thought the re-evaluation should not be completed until difficult child was "more stable"- which of course, defies the logic to me. Anyway, I had agreed to meet but checked with the state and found out that iep's and/or re-evaluation's are NOT to be put on hold. the home sd is responsible until difficult child is transferred. Being that I apparently have a label on me with those in the county, I decided just to go to the meeting and not say anything, but not sign anything and tell them they could work it out with the state. :tongue: (It's amazing how the mention of a Special Education attny or the state agencies gets such a different reaction from sd's.)

Then, this morning I get an email asking exactly where is difficult child right now. I had told them before, but I emailed and told them again. And, I told them what I had learned last week so I mentioned that it was still unclear to me what this meeting was about tomorrow. Then, between 3:20 and 5:20 I received 2 emails and 2 phone messages saying this meeting tomorrow is canceled. :smug:

Maybe the problem between me and those in the county systems is just that instead of me telling them what I already found out and what I would have expected them to know, or at least look into after I tell them this is what I learned, I just need to let them find out the hard way or act like it's all their idea or something. It seems like such a stupid power game to me sometimes. Not to mention a waste of time. That's ok- their deadline for having the re-evaluation complete didn't move and they are the ones who tried to put it off - thinking it wouldn't matter anymore- and of course, waiting for difficult child to become stable. :faint:

Now here's a potential problem- I was going to ask for an IEE after their evaluation was complete because all they were doing was 2 parent forms, one teacher form (for adhd of course), and one written test and one "interview" of difficult child by the Special Education teacher. Not only is that nowhere close to comprehensive for a kid already on an iep and a diagnosis of a mood disorder, being treated as BiPolar (BP), but difficult child hasn't been in their school since mid Jan and only attended about 5-10 days in Dec and Jan, as far as I'm concerned, any teacher report is null and void. If the kid is in state juvy, can a parent still get an IEE paid for by the sd? A psychiatric would have to travel to where difficult child is.

And the general rudeness and lack of consideration of people employed by the county rubs me the wrong way too. Less than 2 hours after difficult child's court I was getting emails about how it went. It wasn't because they cared- they wanted to set up this meeting and find out when I was returning school stuff. I emailed them, told them how it went, told them I'd return the stuff, but asked that they give me a little time to process it all. They did- about 1/2 day. And- do you think they can answer any question I ask them? Oh, no- it gets completely ignored. It's not just the sd- it's almost everyone on the county payroll- PO, GAL, dss, etc. Is it like that everywhere?
 
Last edited:
Top