Welcome to Unlimited Parenting. This is a podcast
where we talk about what it's like to be parents
of children with disabilities and or both special
health care needs. My name is Allison. With me
today is Melissa. And what are we talking about,
Melissa? iPoll found it on Facebook. That's exactly
correct. And iPoll, what did you find on Facebook?
I found three common trends that we're going
to talk about today. Already? It's like the beginning
of the school year. Well, it's October. That's
true. That's true. No, and this is good. Actually,
you know what? I strike my previous comment.
It's good to find the trends now. Okay. So that
we can be supportive, proactive, not reactive.
We're getting in front of these babies. Yes,
absolutely. Ten out of ten. For real, these were
trends, and these trends have echoed some of
the calls and takes into our lives. office this
week as well but this is something different
because every time we've done this i've found
the questions yeah and now you found them and
i'm like oh what are the trends oh i know i'm
excited okay so i'll let you what's new let me
yeah okay what's number one number one is do
i need a neuropsych evaluation before i can request
special education no thank you can we move on
now I mean, yeah, but we have a lot of questions.
Okay, let's dig in. So a lot of families are
being told that they need a full -on evaluation,
diagnoses before. Oh, to meet the first prong.
That first prong, right? Oh, okay. So just for
some backup, let's back up for some level setting.
Beep, beep. Beep, beep. There's three prongs
to qualify for special education. The first one
being, does your child have a diagnosis? That
means one of the 14 categories. And I'm not going
to make you name them all, which I love to. Every
time you do that, I, yeah. But for example, one
of them is autism. Autism. Developmental delay.
yep intellectual disability emotional disturbance
other health impairment a lot of those are teased
out through testing absolutely now oh i'll just
stop okay and the second prong is that there
is a functional academic or academic yeah something
that impedes their learning right and the third
is that you require specially designed instruction
yeah that you're needing some modifications not
an accommodation modification exactly so changes
to what you learn not how you learn yeah but
i guess i understand the confusion because the
first prong says that you need to have a disability
absolutely but it's one that is academic you
don't need a community diagnosis to receive special
education services in the school right because
we need to right because a neuropsych is looking
at that full complex comprehensive evaluation
that you are going to get from a physician is
looking for what is a diagnosis what's going
on in your child brain a child's brain how can
we provide treatments and reason right to help
help with what they're experiencing. But when
we do it in the educational setting, we are exactly
what you said, their educational need. That's
what we are trying to determine is their educational
need. So I'll be honest, when I hear this question,
the first thing that I think of is something
that we have said on this podcast probably more
times than I have fingers. And I have the typical
amount of fingers. She does. Is a doctor can't
write a prescription. for an IEP. Right. A doctor
can't say these accommodations are medically
necessary. A doctor can't say X, Y and Z. And
another thing that I know that if you've ever
heard me talk on the phone or ever listened to
this podcast in the past, you've heard these
words come out of my mouth. The systems are cordial
and collaborative, but they don't tell each other
what to do. So just like a doctor can't write
an IEP and say, school, you need to do this.
The school can't say before I give you academic
supports, you need to go into the community and
get a diagnosis. These systems cannot tell each
other what to do. No. And we have child find
and schools have that child find obligation to
identify when a student is struggling and needs
that extra support. And that can happen before
a true diagnosis takes place. And I think why
this has been such a problem is we have wait
lists to get these evaluations. And that means.
And everywhere, not just not just rural Idaho,
frontier Idaho. I'm reticent to say metropolitan,
but like urban Idaho. The great state of Ada?
Exactly. Yeah. Three years for. And that's a
huge barrier to a student that essentially you
are being told you can't get support for three
years in an educational space because of a lack
of diagnosis. Right. And the other thing that
immediately jumps to mind is. An educational
diagnosis of autism. I know I'm just using autism
as an example. But it's a good one. It's the
one that I think that I see the most with a neuropsych
evaluation. Right. And OK, let me pause there.
I think neuropsych evaluation is becoming this
colloquial term. I was going to talk about that.
Right. That people just use to refer to any kind
of assessment. Exactly. Because I have been asked
for a neuropsych. assessment on my son we've
never done a full -blown assessment we don't
need to he has a rare neurological deletion of
a chromosome that that shows up in various facets
and that's why he's qualified under other health
impairment or multiple multiple that's what it
is he was ohi for a while but We go, I digress.
You go back and forth again. But that's proving
another point that the meeting the first prong
and having that category that you fall into into
doesn't dictate what supports are provided. Absolutely.
Because just because you qualify under autism,
for example, doesn't mean that you aren't also
dyslexic and that you may need those supports
as well. Right. I think they're also. This is
what I have heard when talking to families because
there is such long wait list in the community.
Now this burden almost is being pushed onto schools
to evaluating. The psychiatrists in schools,
the counselors in school, they are there to give
educational diagnosis, not clinical diagnoses.
So even if you were to say get diagnosed with
autism at an educational level. It doesn't carry
the same weight in the community. Yeah, for sure.
And another thing that I think about is I'm worried
about the impacts of everyone believing or being
told that they need a neuropsych evaluation.
I agree. For example. in order to assess for
autism you could do and again please i am not
a doctor i am not a physician i'm not even qualified
to give these assessments but i do have a couple
of children who have received them yeah so you
could get a stats for autism you could get an
ados too and neither of those are a full battery
of neuropsych assessments so you could get an
autism diagnosis without the full -blown But
I think another problem is, is that the institutions,
the providers that will deliver these diagnoses
also do full neuropsych testing or say, you know,
we're I don't know exactly how to describe it,
but like we're a facility that provides the full
battery of assessment. So people just assume
that that's what they're getting. Or think that
that's what they need to say in order to get
the assessments that they need. It's that buzzword.
Exactly. I think it's becoming a buzzword. And
schools are kind of stuck in the middle, honestly.
Yeah, agreed. The community isn't doing schools
any favors because we have these wait lists and
these provider shortages and blah, blah, blah,
blah, blah. And so parents are floundering and
they're saying, but my child needs support. And
we at iPoll have the saying that systems don't
wait for our kids to grow up. And so kids are
getting lost and kids are getting, you know,
not receiving supports. And that's scary for
a family. And we don't want kids to not receive
supports because parents think that they need
a full neuropsych evaluation in order to receive
supports in school. And we don't want the schools
to think that parents need that before they can
help. Right. Yeah. So there's just some gaps
in knowledge somewhere. Yeah. A school evaluation
is going to say, yes, the student needs specialized
instruction, essentially. It's the educational
diagnosis. It's the educational need. Whereas
that home and community base is saying, why is
a child struggling? How can we put these supports?
How can we provide these therapeutics to then
maybe help them? But yeah. So if we were to get
to the root of it, if you want your child to
be assessed for an IEP, the first thing we would
say is put it in writing. Put it in writing.
Put your requests in writing. And I would say
put it in writing and really spell out where
your child's struggling. Yes. Right? So don't
just say, I want you to diagnose him with autism.
He is struggling in X, Y, Z. Yeah. Be specific
about what supports you want the school to provide.
Not, you know, my son is autistic. What is your
autism curriculum? Correct. Yeah. Because sometimes
we get parents that will ask for the, well, what
services can I get because he has autism? And
it's not a menu. It's what he's eligible for.
And that's what's found in a. Now, having said
that, there is a service array. In the community.
Yes. Oh, yes. Like if you're talking about, you
know, you're looking at Blue Cross and what Blue
Cross will provide, if you're looking at the
Idaho Behavioral Health Plan and what they will
provide, their service array, that doesn't necessarily
equate to the school system. Again, they're cordial
and collaborative, but they don't tell each other
what to do. They really don't. I wish they talked
to each other better. They don't. They're never
going to. Well, in our lifetime, I don't think
so. I don't know. I'm going to live really long.
Okay. So I might figure that out. Haunt me and
let me know. I'm going to be like the chick from
Interstellar, the daughter at the end who lives
to see Murph. Anyway, sorry. That's Matthew McConaughey.
Yes. Yeah. Okay. I know what you're talking about.
I love him. All right. All right. All right.
That's him, right? That's him. Yep. Okay. So
we got it? We got it. I think if I were to say
one more thing, I would say. A school evaluation
answers, does this child need specialized instruction?
And the neuropsych evaluation answers, why is
this child struggling? Yeah. How do we support
them? How do we support the family? Yep. Get
together with your child and family team. Absolutely.
Okay. I think, I feel like that one's good. Yeah.
Would you say anything else? No, I wouldn't.
What's the second question? Second question,
we're seeing a lot of these, either my, so my
child has an IEP and he got suspended again,
or I keep being asked to come pick up my child
early. We hear that a lot. So I kind of lumped
these all in together so that we could talk about
that together. Because this comes up a lot. They're
always for behaviors. So we're seeing some big
behaviors. Can you come pick up Tommy? That happened
on Wednesday. Then that happened again on Friday.
And then that's happening again on Monday. And
those are called what? Those are called informal
removals. That's right, baby girl. And I would
say any time that that is happening, it should
be documented. And teams don't always do that.
And the reason that we want to document that
is because then we start looking for patterns.
Right. Yeah. Because. If you've been suspended
for 10 or more days or you are being, you know,
your child is being picked up for informal removals
or they've been suspended one day at a time and
it turns into a pattern of, you know, you're
being sent home for similar behaviors, even though
it's not the same every time and it's not 10
days in a row. It's a pattern of behaviors that
can trigger a manifestation determination. And
that meeting is to determine, truly, is this
behavior a result of the child's disability?
And then is... some of this a failure on behalf
of the IEP and the IEP team to support the child?
Do we need to go back to the drawing board? There's
obviously an opportunity somewhere. Right. Or
do you need to do an FBA, a functional behavioral
assessment to determine if this is a new behavior?
Why is it occurring? What supports do we need
to put in place? Because the answer cannot be,
I need to call. I need to call Sandra and David
to pick up. To pick up Chad. Yeah. From the Periwinkle
School District. Well, come and get your, please
come and pick up your child because we don't
know what to do. Right. And that's not, sometimes,
in most cases, that's not on the school. We don't
know what to do. Yeah. I'm a paraprofessional.
I don't know what to do. And at that point, when
everyone's. essentially i see it as the parent
of a child who has been in this situation i see
it as the school crying for help yeah please
i don't know what to do please come and get your
child because i don't i want i want him here
i want her here right i don't know how to help
them and that's when we need to get the other
members of the school team involved the school
psychologist a counselor somebody who can help
us do a functional behavioral assessment to figure
out what What need is this behavior trying to
meet? Because mom can't meet all needs. No. Or
dad or whomever the guardian is. Exactly. And
that way, this is requesting an FBA helps the
team. Exactly. It helps the team help the child.
And then from a functional behavior assessment,
that FBA, then hopefully we get a really good
behavior intervention plan that is setting in
place. some support so that maybe we don't trigger
certain behaviors, right? We're proactive instead
of reactive. Oh, my gosh. Isn't that what we
said we were going to do today is talk about.
I'm trying, dude. I'm trying. But some of the
Facebook posts, there was one that said, you
know, Chad's having a bad day. I've been asked
to call and come get him three times this week
or that someone was told their daughter was just
too upset to finish the day and she was called
early to pick. So this is when we if you call
our office and this is something that you are
experiencing or your child is experiencing. Always.
We're always going to say, have we done an FBA?
When's the latest functional behavior assessment?
And say you've already gone through that step.
Right. And you're like, OK, Melissa, Allison,
what do I do now? Well, number one, call. Please
call because we can discuss your specific situation
in greater detail versus being intentionally
vague on a podcast. But another thing that I
would say is, is that if you're in that position,
you can also tell your school. or remind your
school or invite your school to reach out to
their sesta coordinator yes that stands for special
education technical technical assistance we are
so lucky in idaho to have that other states don't
have oh for real and i have actually i've actually
had a parent reach out to me and say well my
school team says they're going to reach out to
something called sesta and i'm like That is actually
so, that is working in your benefit. Absolutely.
I know in some cases it kind of makes parents
feel a little apprehensive, like, oh, my school
can't figure it out on their own. They have to
reach out to technical assistance. But really,
in my opinion, those are the schools that are
like, I don't know what to do. I need help. Those
are the really. supportive schools who are like,
this might, I've tried everything. Let me see.
Let me get another eye or an ear in on this situation
because I don't know what to do. And then again,
the more people that reach out to their SESTA
coordinators, the more the state is aware of
other problems and then can be further helpful.
Right. I mean, how many times have you just stared
at the same problem for 15 minutes and you cannot
or for three days? Why are you selling me out
like this? Her door is right next to mine. And
she's like, the amount of times I've walked by
and gone, hello, are you there? No, but anybody,
we do that to ourselves. We get so stubborn.
And I mean, I will speak for myself. 100%. And
look, because I can figure this out. But bringing
in, in this case, another set of eyes like Sesta
is not a bad thing. It's just helping the team
out. It's another person to support the team.
It's a... It's a show of strength and support,
not a sign of weakness. Yeah. No, I agree completely.
And so just to kind of wrap that up, I would
say if a parent calls and these are things that
are happening, I would say document everything.
So when you're asked to pick up your child, ask
the school to document that. You document that.
Have that in writing. And it could be something
super simple. Like you bring in something already
typed up that says mom. Allison Hiley was requested
to come in and pick up Chad from school due to
behaviors. And then someone at the front desk
signs or teacher or anybody. We got it. And now
we have. We have written documentation that on
this day you had to come pick up Chad early.
And that's data. We're starting to collect data.
And I do not believe, and I stand firm ten toes
down when I say this. I'm all about digits today.
Fingers, toes. Anyway, sorry. I stand firm when
I say that's not adversarial. No. And that should
not be seen as adversarial. That's not a gotcha
on the school. That's... you doing your due diligence
as an iep team member taking your data or even
504 yeah it applies in a 504 too it really does
no teams will go what but it does and all of
that is data if we are having to remove a student
because of behaviors we need to document those
behaviors so that we're collecting data and and
it could also support your behavioral intervention
plan a thousand percent or trigger the ability
to receive a behavioral intervention plan right
and both of those are good options and helpful
and that's what fba does sometimes is is say
the student has more eligibility than we previously
thought and we need more behavioral intervention
minutes 100 yeah um we talked about a pattern
so i think we're Are we good there? We don't
even need pointers. We have this paper with pointers
of things that we don't want to forget to say.
And I look down at it and I'm like, oh, we already
said all that. We don't even, look at us. Look,
shoot. Shoot. Okay, so the last question that
there was a whole bunch of in the Facebook. community
communities by the way we love this community
please continue to ask questions i do and i like
the anonymous ones lately there's been so many
anonymous you know what though i encourage that
i do too i encourage you to post anonymously
i i wholeheartedly agree because i think we have
some lurkers in there from the district i think
that these groups have been really really thoughtful
about trying to really protect family privacy.
But at the end of the day, sometimes we have
educators that are also parents and it's hard
to remove your educator hat sometimes if you
hear something about your district. I don't know.
Also, I think anonymity is important. And I really
try not to speak about what I don't know about.
And I've never really lived in rural Idaho. So
I'm just going to put that out there on the forefront.
But from what I hear about rural Idaho is that
it's a very small, tight knit community and your
ability to ask your genuine, honest questions
with full anonymity. is probably a really good
shield sometimes when you're in very rural. Everybody
knows everybody. We all see each other at church
on Sunday. I thought about that. So post in anonymity
so you can really get your full question answered
without wondering who saw that or who told. Yeah.
Yeah. I get that. I love it. Cool. There's a
lot more of it and I'm down. I'm here for it.
Okay. So. We are in October, so some state testing
has already happened. And I know that's so this
might be kind of late to the game to talk about.
But there is a lot of discussion about accommodations
in state testing. And is that allowed? Yes. Yeah,
of course it is. But only if. Oh, only if they're
already in your IEP. Yeah. So that is a really
good pointer to say to families, dial in your
IEP. And I see where that gets really hard because
say you've just been found eligible and you maybe
don't have everything ironed out and then testing
just starts and you're like, well, this is a
child with a known disability. But there's some
of those logistical. I see that. I could see
where that. a com and i will also say this accommodations
are also allowed for testing under a 504 yes
as long as they are in your 504 which then becomes
convoluted because legally a 504 does not have
to be in writing so i guess for the purposes
of this conversation best practice is always
to have your 504s in writing and i think most
people do but for the purposes of this we'll
just assume chad has an iep okay yes let's do
that okay so chad has an iep he's about to take
state testing can he have accommodations yes
as long as they are written in as iep and as
long as they wouldn't change the measurement
of the test so like reading the reading comprehension
passage out loud to a student might validate
a reading assessment if that makes sense so oh
it's for comprehension okay so we have to yes
within okay does that make sense So there's no
blanket, let's say, for example, your example.
There's no blanket accommodation. So if your
student requires that questions be read out loud
to them, that might not be an accommodation that
we can honor if the purpose of the test was,
can you read these questions out loud? And you
know what? While we're saying that, I think that
that flows really beautifully into the ISAT alts.
Yeah, exactly. where a lot of parents have reached
out and said, I just don't feel comfortable with
my child taking those ice hat alts for a myriad
of reasons, right? I've heard all the reasons.
And you know what? You're one of the four core
members of the IEP team. And you are the expert
in your own child. And you do what is right.
And I don't speak about what I don't know about.
I don't have a child who takes ISAT alts, but
I do know someone who has a child who may or
may not. So I will let them speak. That would
be me. Yeah. And so I agree with you. You are
an IEP member and you know your child the best.
I know my child the best. I know that he doesn't
have test tanking and anxiety. I know that he
does qualify to take the ISAT alts. I want to
give him the honor of being able to take state
testing just like his peers. And whether he makes
it through one question or 20, he's just doing
it. He has that opportunity to do it. And there's
no repercussions. No. Right. I think another
thing that I want you to speak more about. is
maybe potentially schools or community members
or other parents who think that potentially individuals
with disabilities could take scores. Absolutely.
Can you speak to that? Yeah. So when we are on
an ISAT alt like that, those scores are looked
at completely differently outside of. Okay. Does
that make sense? If I'm Chad and I have Angelman
syndrome. And I am taking the typical ISAT because
my mom wants to have high expectations when she
doesn't know what to expect. Right. Good for
your mom. I'm only going to get through two or
three questions. Yep. And feasibly. That's not
taking the school district scores, right? I mean,
in a, well, it could. So if you had. But that's
one. That's one test in a sea of. potentially
hundreds of thousands, depending on your size
of your district. So if you have a very rural
district and you have four kids in the fourth
grade and one of them is taking not the ISAT
alts, but do you know what I mean? So that could
potentially. Do you? Do you know off the top
of your head how many students take the ISAT?
One to three percent. You really knew that? I
was ready to Google it. God bless. You are so
smart. It cannot be more than three percent of
a student body in a district or they have to.
There's a waiver that they have to apply for.
Ladies and gentlemen, the PTI director for Idaho
Parents Unlimited. So it's one to three percent.
Yeah. So that's not many people. And and. We
loosely say roughly 40 ,000 students are on IEPs
in the state of Idaho. So one percent. Right.
So it's not we're not talking about a wide swath.
No. And that I don't I won't even say it. I was
going to say that one to three percent is usually
the ones that we talk about are probably those
individuals that will would need something more
formal in place like guardianship or power of
attorney when they go on. to be 18 or older.
So that's kind of... I guess what I'm hearing
you say is that's a good kind of baseline. Is
this a student who will potentially need guardianship
in adulthood? Then maybe this is a student who
could benefit. And that's not the be -all, end
-all for everybody. We're not saying that that's
the barometer, but that is a good tool that you
could use to assess and help you answer that
question. Ding, ding, ding. Yep. But there's
also documents that help answer this, right?
Like, doesn't the Idaho Department of Education
publish a statewide assessment accessibility
guide? They do. And so that's what I would say
to your teams. If you have questions that your
teams even can't answer, there's an assessment
guide that SESTA has, right? Oh, not SESTA, girls.
SESTA, SESTA, SESTA. These girls, we should have
SESTA come talk. We need to bring SESTA. Next
time you go to SEEP. I will. we need to get something
from sesta in here preach come talk about how
good sesta is yeah um where was i i don't remember
we i'm so sorry i interrupted you we were talking
about the statewide assessment accessibility
guide i'm sorry if teams have questions on how
to help um help with accommodations for state
testing there's a whole accessibility guide for
teams to work through um and with their coordinator
if they need it I am going to ask you one more
question, and this is not something that we have
written down, so she might glare daggers at me.
I'm scared. Let's say I am. I'll edit it out
if I don't. That's true. I'll edit it out if
you don't know, but I assume, I think I'm fairly
confident that you do know. I am a third grader.
I just got an IEP. I'm new to all of this. Can
you give me some examples of what potential accommodations
are used in terms of state testing? Yeah. Because
I don't know because this is all brand new to
me. But I do know that my child struggles with
staying on task because, again. I'm not going
to ask what accommodations are available. I'm
going to tell you. What? You're the IEP. You're
the other members of the IEP team. I'm going
to tell you what my child struggles with. Okay.
I know that my third grader, Chad, he's really
struggling with attention. He's not a huge fan
of being in a loud classroom. What are some suggestions?
This is the most common one. Really? The most
common one. Dang, I'm good. That students are
separated for their test taking, that they're
quiet. Oh, a small group? A small group. Okay.
Well, I'm going to say computer lab and like
completely date myself. God bless. How old are
you? Pulled out to a separate location to test
taking in a quiet environment. What did you die
from on the Oregon Trail? Dysentery. Okay, so
that's a super common one. Small group. You even
see ones where if it's not. prohibitive to what's
being tested the read aloud option so sometimes
okay read aloud the text to speech um or vice
versa we have some students that are able to
instead of write well you know the type they're
able to do a speech to text or still on the ipad
maybe I think up until third grade. Oh, so like
an IRI, an Idaho Reading Indicator type of a
thing. Those are still on iPads or tablets. I'm
not exactly sure on the modality. I know that
my children took them on tablets because they
don't really start working with computers until
maybe second or third grade. So you're still
just accessing that on a tablet. So yeah, some
of the most common ones that you see in an IEP
translate really, really well to state testing
too. Now, you're not going to have something
like every other problem on a math assignment.
Yeah, or not feasible in this test taking. You
can ask for questions to be reworded. I don't
think that's one that can be done either. And
a lot of them are built in really, really well
into, and I can speak specifically to the IRI
because I've seen that and I've seen how the
accommodations work. To where students can, you
know, the replay button where they can, even
if we have extended time, that's another one
that we see a lot. So students are allowed extra
time to take tests. And, you know, the IRI, some
of these are always timed. We have some students
that are given a little bit extra time. And I
don't know how that differentiation is made,
but teams can make that. And another thing is
you don't have to know everything. No. You don't
have to know. And neither does your team. I guess
that's because there's always someone to reach
out to. There's somebody to support. Yeah. So
that's what we found on Facebook, folks. Thank
you so much, everyone out there for listening
in and know that if you are in Idaho or planning
on moving to Idaho and have questions on systems
or services for children with disabilities, please
consider reaching out to us on our website at
iPullIdaho, that's I -P -U -L -Idaho .org, or
by calling us at 208 -342 -5884. Be sure to tune
in next time. Until then, this has been Unlimited
Parenting. Thanks for listening!