Kim Ii
New Member
OneLostGirl/Texana,
Thank you both from the bottom of my heart for responding to my verbose post! Your kind words really do make me feel better about all of this.
Last night, Ryan also informed us that, on top of the things that Peter was saying to him during yesterday's class, Peter also told Ryan that he didn't UNDERSTAND that he was supposed to be reviewing Ryan's homework! Kind of explains the missing homework issue and the incorrectly done homework, doesn't it.
We have literally done everything in our power to advocate for our son here in this district. Unfortunately, our school district (San Ramon Valley Unified) has loads of money at its disposal (even though they'll tell you otherwise) and is not intimidated in the slightest with whatever threat of action you may take against it. They're attitude? BRING IT ON. We have a PR rept, a former radio DJ, who ensures his name and the good name of this district is in our daily newspapers on a regular basis, and we have a school board who is utterly clueless and refuses to motivate themselves to correct/change some of the issues which abound in our special ed program.
We have a special ed director who, in plain words, is just plain evil. She actually was up on a witness stand during one of our district's many OAH trials and stated that she didn't know a THING about the No Child Left Behind Act. Ryan, unfortunately, had to witness for himself during our own trial two years ago, his teachers literally getting up on that witness stand and just lying out of their teeth about all this one-on-one support Ryan was supposedly getting. When I took Ryan out of the trial at that moment to take him back to school, he was crying. It really upset him to see his own teachers lying about what was really going on in that classroom at the time.
Our school district, in just a little over a year, spent almost one million dollars fighting parents! If truth be told, if they'd just do their jobs and provide some of these deseprately needed services, it wouldn't cost them nearly so much.
Our Resource kids, in their core subjects, don't even have up-to-date books, if books at all! Totally illegal, I know, but if our County Superintendent was loathe to do something about this, until several of us parents called them separately to complain about, as it turns out, the very same issues. The CDE (CA State Dept. of ED) has been notified of many of these systemic issues, and I've just been told this week that they realize they need to look into all of this.
We live in an extremely wealthy area. We've no doubt that our Superintendent (who is stepping down this year, thank goodness) and our school board (save one of the members who is a really great guy) are all simply minions for the real political movers and shakers in this district. This school district has become very adept at making it LOOK like they care about these kids, when the simple fact is, they've been pulling the wool over everyone's eyes -- the majority of us, anyway.
Color me naive, but I just really had no idea how political our educational system has become. I have listened to Charlotte Iserbyt's admonitions about this country's educational system on GOOGLE and I have to say, at first, I really didn't know what to think.
Now that we have been put through the wringer here in our own school district and I have been witness to so much deceit, lies and just downright evil, I believe Ms. Iserbyt. These kids don't have a chance in heck in this school district unless they have parents who are really willing to strongly advocate for them.
This all makes me very sad.
Thank you both from the bottom of my heart for responding to my verbose post! Your kind words really do make me feel better about all of this.
Last night, Ryan also informed us that, on top of the things that Peter was saying to him during yesterday's class, Peter also told Ryan that he didn't UNDERSTAND that he was supposed to be reviewing Ryan's homework! Kind of explains the missing homework issue and the incorrectly done homework, doesn't it.
We have literally done everything in our power to advocate for our son here in this district. Unfortunately, our school district (San Ramon Valley Unified) has loads of money at its disposal (even though they'll tell you otherwise) and is not intimidated in the slightest with whatever threat of action you may take against it. They're attitude? BRING IT ON. We have a PR rept, a former radio DJ, who ensures his name and the good name of this district is in our daily newspapers on a regular basis, and we have a school board who is utterly clueless and refuses to motivate themselves to correct/change some of the issues which abound in our special ed program.
We have a special ed director who, in plain words, is just plain evil. She actually was up on a witness stand during one of our district's many OAH trials and stated that she didn't know a THING about the No Child Left Behind Act. Ryan, unfortunately, had to witness for himself during our own trial two years ago, his teachers literally getting up on that witness stand and just lying out of their teeth about all this one-on-one support Ryan was supposedly getting. When I took Ryan out of the trial at that moment to take him back to school, he was crying. It really upset him to see his own teachers lying about what was really going on in that classroom at the time.
Our school district, in just a little over a year, spent almost one million dollars fighting parents! If truth be told, if they'd just do their jobs and provide some of these deseprately needed services, it wouldn't cost them nearly so much.
Our Resource kids, in their core subjects, don't even have up-to-date books, if books at all! Totally illegal, I know, but if our County Superintendent was loathe to do something about this, until several of us parents called them separately to complain about, as it turns out, the very same issues. The CDE (CA State Dept. of ED) has been notified of many of these systemic issues, and I've just been told this week that they realize they need to look into all of this.
We live in an extremely wealthy area. We've no doubt that our Superintendent (who is stepping down this year, thank goodness) and our school board (save one of the members who is a really great guy) are all simply minions for the real political movers and shakers in this district. This school district has become very adept at making it LOOK like they care about these kids, when the simple fact is, they've been pulling the wool over everyone's eyes -- the majority of us, anyway.
Color me naive, but I just really had no idea how political our educational system has become. I have listened to Charlotte Iserbyt's admonitions about this country's educational system on GOOGLE and I have to say, at first, I really didn't know what to think.
Now that we have been put through the wringer here in our own school district and I have been witness to so much deceit, lies and just downright evil, I believe Ms. Iserbyt. These kids don't have a chance in heck in this school district unless they have parents who are really willing to strongly advocate for them.
This all makes me very sad.