Markert-Week 10

Abby Markert

Noticing Blog 10

This week my MT and had an informative meeting with the school guidance counselor about one of our students. This particular student is one of our five students that go to special education class for the vast majority of the day. He has an IEP that states he has severe ADD but his parents do not want him on any type of medication. My MT and I were both aware of this but what we were unaware of is this student has an IQ of 60. An IQ this low means that he is severely cognitively impaired and needs to be placed in a more beneficial environment for his learning needs. Recently there have been other actions that have taken place that have made myself and my MT wonder what was going on with him. He often sneaks out of the classroom and will be wondering the halls or “get lost” when he should be following the line. These types of actions have been occurring that made us wonder if it was more than ADD. I have also realized that it is extremely difficult to manage such a wide range of students. It is so hard to make sure that you have all of them with you especially if one student chooses to sneak away. When we spoke with the guidance counselor we informed him of these different events and that made him a little more concerned as well. The guidance counselor informed us that he is taking his case up with the board of education and he will eventually be transferred to a school that has fully self-contained classrooms. This news was a shock for me because I feel that he has slipped through the cracks. I am concerned how he has been in this school for over a year and this is just being brought to our attention. I think with classroom sizes being over thirty kids it is very easy for a student to slip through the cracks and not be given the attention that they need. This student in particular is clearly not benefiting from being in an inclusive classroom because he is not learning at this pace or with the lack of one on one attention all the time.

I also have noticed that the process and legal system behind schools is very in depth and quite the process. After we found this out about our student we figured he would be transferred rather quickly. However, we were informed that it would actually be quite awhile before anything happens. This student will need to undergo more testing and meetings before he is transferred. I understand that these things need to be done but it seems like the student is losing. We will accommodate for him as much as we can but it seems difficult. I hope that this student is able to learn as much as he can in the environment that he is in now because I would hate to see him suffer because of the extensive work that needs to be done. I also would like to know how the parents feel about their son’s position in all of this.  As of right now there is not a lot of information that we are aware of but I will be interested to see where he is in a month or so.