I moved to Texas in the spring of 2010 and my son transferred into our local ISD as a PPCD Special Ed Student. Over the passed year I have learned that I must fight to get my son the Free and Appropriate Public Education that he needs. I have learned to become educated and informed of the Federal, Commissioner's, and Texas Laws regarding Educating Children with Disabilities. I discovered that the rights of our children and of us, as parents, are not consistently upheld by the schools, even when they are written laws.
I have requested ARD meetings, disagreed with school findings, filed grievances, asked for services, been granted IEEs (evaluations by personnel not employed by the school), attended Resolution meetings, Requested Mediation, and filed for a Due Process Hearing. Some of these are still ongoing. At the end of all of this, even if my son is granted all of the services he needs, the school will not be held accountable for any unlawful procedures that it has done UNLESS I file a complaint with the Texas Educational Agency (TEA). This will be my next step, and is one that is often skipped by even the most passionate parents. If we don’t take that lest step to report the school’s actions they will continue their policies and the children will be the ones to suffer for it.
As I continue to talk to parents who have been seemingly misled by their educators and ARD Committees, I hope to make it easier for you to find the information that I have spent the last year trying to uncover. The information is out there but when we find times in our hectic lives to research, the web base can easily become confusing or overwhelming. I hope that this blog page will help simplify the process by providing the information that parents are most in need of.
I hope I can make it easier for all of the parent-advocates out there to get the services and placement that their children are entitled to by law; and to give you the tools to report sub-standard and unlawful acts by the schools to the Texas Educational Agency. This is the only way to hold the schools accountable for their actions, and to prevent further educational strife being placed on the children.
