Summary
Parsing the law's language, such as defining the term "individualized" or "reasonable," has put parents at loggerheads with the district. "Parents don't have a right to demand a particular teaching method," says Jane Wettach, director of the Duke University Children's Education Law Clinic, which provides legal assistance to low-income families. "But they do have a right to demand reasonable progress. And reasonable is not defined."
"It was appropriate for him at that time," [Becky Stern] says. With help from an excellent teacher, [Caleb McElreath] began emerging from his shell when he was 4. Despite letters from therapists and TEACCH and district staff vouching for Caleb's progress, Stern says the district wouldn't place him in a less-restrictive kindergarten classroom. "They said we tailor the program to meet the child's needs," says Stern, also a teacher. "That's not true. [Margaret Blackwell] [Blackwell] wouldn't even consider it on a trial bask. There were no options."Failure wasn't an option for Farzan Rahman and her husband, who moved to Chapel Hill from Pakistan for their son, Ahman, who is mildly autistic and has developmental delays. "There was no way of educating him in Pakistan," Rahman says. The district placed Ahman, then 12, in a basic life-skills program, even though Rahman says he was more advanced. "We had no idea he'd been demoted," Rahman says. She went to the district to request he be reassigned to an occupational track. While the district agreed, Rahman says her son's teacher "gave him a hard time" because his English was poor. Hindi is his native language. "This boy thrives on encouragement and recognition; he would study every day and put in a lot of effort," Rahman says. "The teacher kept leaving me messages saying he was difficult because he doesn't understand."See the full content of this document
Extract
Great Expectations
Whenever 2-year-old Caleb McElreath was placed on the changing table at his day care center, he would tense his body into a taut arc and cry at a caregiver's touch. Trapped inside himself, he could not explain why the hum of an overhead fan, the drone of a distant airplane and the clamor of a preschool classroom ricocheted ferociously inside his head.
One of 500,000 children and adolescents in the United States diagnosed with autism, Caleb, now 6, leaps downstairs to greet a stranger, and easily bounces among several conversations, unfazed by clanking silverware and chairs scooting across the floor."Pizza?" his mother, Becky Stern, asks."Pancakes.""Pancakes?"They agree on yogurt. While his parents eat pizza, Caleb spoons pink goop into his mouth, sings "Barbara Ann" and muses on his future: "I want to be a truck driver."But Caleb's journey from withdrawn toddler to gregarious kindergartner nearly hit a dead end. His family pulled him from the Chapel Hill-Carrboro School District because, although he was "bursting with excitement" to go to kindergarten, he would have been placed in a classroom with children who couldn't speak.Dozens of families with special-needs kids hav...See the full content of this document
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