I completely can relate to all of your fears. I will say, when you said this school uses a demerit system I thought I wouldn't want ANY chlld there. That is such old thinking. But I get your fears of his being with other kids with behavior issues, is he a kid who copies other behaviors? Is he someone who gets upset when other kids meltdown?
I ask these questions, among others:
1. what do they do if a student is having a meltdown/rage in a class with other students?
2. is there a relaxation/sensory room that is NOT a punishment room (in other words where they can choose to go and relax or take scheduled sensory breaks, sometimes these rooms turn into neg. because people say to the chld, "you need a break! " in an angry way. and they go AFTER behaviors.
3.Do they have a locked isolation room, in my humble opinion if they do RUN. They are not allowed in our district but Q was contracted into another district when he was in 1st grade. they told me they hadn't used it more than 3 times at all the year before and showed me the log (empty). The year Q started, he was put in there several times in a month. the law is if more than 3 times in a month then the home district has to come and bip has to be changed, tehy lied about everything. The reports I got showed they violated mn rules and he was put in for power battles like tapping his foot and not stopping so EA put him in there... and the doctor said NO to any alone time at that point because they were worried about ptsd and abandonment issues. IT was NOT in his bip to use this room. I went to the state of MN and they ended up in trouble and their whole district had to change policies (q was all of 30 dangerous lbs at the time).
so, what are their policies if he has a meltdown, do they restrain, do they isolate, do they have the class move out and let him ride it out, does he still get suspended over and over when the point is to be there to help work through these issues?
5. waht kinds of equivalent activities do they have to the gen. ed. school if that is something you need or he likes, like clubs or sports or activities? If not there can be be bussed for equal access...(I think they are supposed to if the rest of the district gets it.)
6. what kind of training does the EA staff get?
7. SHOW you every single space you child might actually end up in...not just the class room, the lunch room gym, chill room, library, computer, etc. Think of your child, how close the exits are, is it near a busy street.
The level 4 school q was in had 10 kids in his class and 10 in the older. the next school in this little mall (connected) was a teen program for addicted kids and conduct disorders. I showed up one time and they didn't knwo where my kid was. They had two classrooms, a cafeteria/gym, an isolation room, a couple of small resource rooms for computers and meetings. then a teachers office. REALLY? It was rented space in a MALL, he could have been on a highway and killed. I was livid. I searched the dumb school and found him. The fact is they didn't even know he was missing.
Obviously not every program is this terrible but they really snowed me. They couldn't understand why I pulled him out! That was 7 yeas ago and much has changed, as I said we can't even have isolation rooms so??? In our current district they have two programs that I have talked to parents about and they like but their kids dont copy behaviors. I dont mean to scare you, just giving you what to look for (by the way, there are isolation rooms in some of the therapetuic schools with truly violent kids and they try to set them up as a safe place to have a meltdown, I went to a cont. ed. seminar where they talked about it, but they truly sounded like they used it as a tool and it seemed very different, and these kids did need it so if yours does that is different...that is why I say to ask. In our case, it was misused (only supposed to be for imminent danger of hurting self or others, not a power struggle over a tapping foot).
OH...if it is not in a typical school building, how do they do lunch??? this dumb school had pizza like 3 times a week becasue no kitchen!
do they have a llbrary, gym, outside space??? if not what do they do to meet these needs?