Town Council - Regular Meeting

I just hit Hello, good morning. Good morning, everybody. My name is Kimberly trellis. I'm here. Along with my amazing committee special needs Advisory Board. We have Vivian in the back. Thank you, Vivian. We have Madeline, Vice Chair here. So today we're going to talk about everybody's favorite subject, IEPs. So who better than to help us than Ivan from UM NSU Card, as well as Danielle from Parent to Parent. So now I'd like to hand it over to Ivan. If you have any questions at the end, you know where to find them. We also have the Miami-Dade Public Library here with us today. Thank you so much for making the time to be with us today. And please help yourselves to any food from Bon Vivant and to coffee by Mamacita. So Ivan.

Good morning, everyone. Let me try to get used to the mic here. So let me pull up the presentation. Are you guys going to be able to see this live? Let's see. Yeah, all right. Okay, good. All right, so today we're going to be talking about IEPs and 504 plans, okay? Let me take away the caption. Okay, now we're good. I had an echo on my computer because my volume was up. It was driving me crazy. So today I want to talk to you guys a little bit about IEPs in Section 504, kind of like just demystify what they're all about and how can you guys learn more about them. It is not a substitution for the workshops that parent to parent have. It's really more of an introduction, really, and kind of tell you guys a little bit about, you know, what my experience has been with families. And then hopefully that will encourage you to continue to want to learn more about it so that you can feel more empowered and you can get the most out of this, you know, this documents that will really help your children in the future. Okay. So, the idea is that I want you guys to be able to distinguish between an IEP and a 504 plan, essentially, from the beginning. And then kind of understand how to best prepare for meetings, right? I think in general, it's really overwhelming to kind of come into these meetings. There's a lot of people involved. It usually feels like... parents are not the experts within the meetings, or at least maybe it can feel that way. Right. And so we want to kind of shift that and make you guys be the experts. And we want you to really start being skeptical, you know, like there might be people in there that might be sometimes rephrasing things and kind of repeating stuff. And it's not quite factual. OK, so don't just take what people give you when you're in those meetings. The idea is that we want you to really start being like, hey, is this true? Where does this come from? Can you show it to me? You know what I mean? Because there's a lot of ways to interpret the law and people are not always interpreting in the way that best benefits your children. Right. The other thing that I think it's gonna be important for today is to be able to review supports. So basically understand what are some of the things that we need to prioritize and how do we do that? And that's gonna look very different for every child. So I think the takeaway point is that That's why it's called an individualized educational plan, because it's going to look very, very different for everyone. That is not to say that when you're given the document initially, it may have a very broad sort of like general writing in it. And that's where your role comes in, right? You want to try and change that as much as possible so it fits your child. And then finally, it's just understanding your rights, understanding why it might be a better option to stay within the public school, even if there's challenges, even if you have to fight for things, you know, because the other option doesn't necessarily give you much better leeway to kind of get things accomplished, right? So let's start with how the process sort of begins, right? So initially there's a concern or a referral, which means that either you guys as parents sort of notify the school, like, listen, we have a diagnosis. We want to get proactive on this and sort of like, you know, learn off, like, how can we assist my child a little bit better? Or, in some cases, the school may sort of approach the parents and be like, listen, we're seeing some sort of challenges in certain areas, and we would like to suggest that we do some further evaluations. It usually starts with just kind of making some minor adjustments in the classroom, and then after those adjustments, if those are not enough, then they will kind of move into the evaluation process. There are a couple of things that are important to know with the evaluation process. There's a big distinction between the kids that are entering pre-K, especially if they're entering pre-K at age three when they're coming from early steps. Those kids can get assessed right away as they're transitioning and sort of not have to wait to have an IEP before they start school. Okay, that only really happens at that point in time. For everybody else, you could request an evaluation, let's say if you're in a private school, but it's not going to be the priority, right? So you might be sitting there waiting months and months to get that evaluation taking place. Same as if you enroll in the public school, like let's say your home school. and you know that your child needs support, you're going to have to get in a queue to kind of get that assessment done. So I just want to kind of put that out there because that's why we are here to kind of help you guys so that we can try and troubleshoot what's the best case scenario for you guys. And if you feel like you might be stuck in that loop or like, hey, I may have to wait four or six months to get evaluated, then it would be important to kind of reach out to us so that we can tell you, hey, let's try this trick or let's reach out to them in advance. Because even though you might not get the assessment right away, there are some accommodations and certain things that can be done even though they're not put on paper as of yet. This is not necessarily communicated to parents, but in theory, an administrator can make the decision to place somebody in the most appropriate classroom, even if the IEP hasn't been finalized, okay? The other part that, you know, it's important to understand is that when it comes to the evaluation, yes, you are entitled to bring in your own assessments that perhaps you have from the past. But the school really deserves the right, or in this case, the district, to decide if they want to use that or not. In some cases, let's say when the district has a really big backlog and they're not able to meet the cases in the timeline that they want, they might take those evaluations and kind of speed up the IEP process. That could be both good and bad. It can be good because you get the IEP finalized. You will probably miss a lot of information because then they haven't observed your child enough. So it's something to also think about. It's not a substitution. It just means that if you want the IEP to be taking place, you can suggest that, provide those evaluations, and then you would still have to push and be like, hey, but let's get your evaluation at some point as well. I think the other thing that's important to also know is that these evaluations don't give you a diagnosis, right? okay so yes there are psychoeducational evaluations they're very thorough they have great reports but they will not work for you for insurance purposes if you want to get approved for therapies okay um and that's something that i think parents struggle with a lot they're like oh my god like i have this great assessment like why can't i use it essentially the district doesn't give diagnosis they just give eligibilities okay so they're really looking at the profile of the individual to determine do they meet criteria to get services within this district okay And that's where the eligibility decision comes in. A few things that I would say about that are that in some cases, there might be some disagreement between the parents and the team as to whether or not somebody meets criteria, okay? That could be for a number of reasons. Sometimes the child is very young, and perhaps the team doesn't really see the delay as much, even though the parents have real concerns. And you could use a lot of data to try and argue that. Other times, the presentation of the individual in terms of their autism diagnosis or whatever else it may be, it's not typical in the sense that it doesn't meet the criteria that they have for being impacted academically. Okay, so I'll give you an example. If you have a child that perhaps is extremely verbal, can communicate effectively, can do well academically, but just needs supports, gets overwhelmed, you know, things of that nature, they're most likely going to say that they don't meet criteria. Okay, so again, it doesn't mean that that's a final decision, but you might have to kind of fight back a little bit on it. All right. And that's why we're here for. Then after that's kind of been decided, let's say, you know, everything goes well, you get your eligibility, which is, Just so you know, the eligibility doesn't drive the placement, meaning that it doesn't determine which classroom your child's going to be in. It really just talks about what kind of services can you access, all right? So at the beginning, when the kids are younger, they might get just other health impair or a developmental delay in there. It's not the end of the world. It doesn't mean that you're not gonna get the services that you need. Eventually, as they get closer to nine years of age, then they will move them into the autism eligibility, okay? But from there, we go into the plan development. And this is where your ideas and your skill set really becomes truly important. Why? Because the rest of the team members, there's two things that are happening. One of them is that they're really observing your children only under certain conditions. And when it's the initial IEP, they've only really observed them for maybe two days tops, right? That's not enough information to really kind of build a good profile on someone. The other thing that's important to know is how overwhelmed these teams are. And so that's not to justify perhaps maybe trying to overgeneralize the document or maybe trying to rush through some of these things, but it's just a testament to the reality of the system today. And I think with that in mind, it's important that you guys really come with a game plan, being prepared for certain situations without necessarily taking it personal, without necessarily getting upset. As long as you have the right rebuttals with your data to support that, bringing your therapist, things like that, it will really help in trying to make sure that you're getting the things that you're trying to accomplish for your child. And then the last piece of this is going to be the implementation and the review. I think this part typically falls through the cracks in the sense that Even though it's a written document, it's a legal document, right? You guys are not in the classroom to really observe and see, is this being implemented? So this is where falling back on data is super important. Anytime that you have any doubt as to whether something's being implemented and how it's being implemented, you ask them for data, okay? And that's gonna be an important thing. Anytime that they're making decisions as to changing something, whether it's a goal, an accommodation, whatever it may be, it really should be based on data. not their perspective on it, not their school of thought, nothing like that, just data. And the same will go for you guys. If you feel strongly about something, just try to find a therapist that will give you the data to support that so that you can present it in the meeting, okay? So a couple terms that are important for you guys to be familiar with. It happens to me all the time, like I'm sitting in an intake with families and I'm kind of throwing all these different terms and they're looking at me like, you know, we have no idea what you're talking about. And it happens during the meetings. Nobody really takes necessarily the time to kind of go over all of these terms unless you ask them what they are. Rule number one, don't be afraid to ask. Anytime you don't understand something, you tell them, hold on, let's go back. Let's take a step back. Can you explain me what this term means? Some of the ones that you're most going to see are going to be the ESE, which is the Exceptional Student Education. So if your child's being placed in a... in a more restrictive kind of classroom. You're going to hear a lot about ESC, being in an ESC type of classroom. You're also going to hear about accommodations, and those are going to be any kind of changes that you are making to the environment, right, where it can impact and support the learning. Or there could be modifications, so to the content or the way the content is being presented. But there are other terms that you might not hear as often, right? FAPE is going to be one of them. It's a very strong term. So if you're in a meeting and you're trying to get something accomplished and they're kind of not listening to you and you throw in the word FAPE or you put it in an email, all of the sudden things are going to change. That is part of IDEA, which is the Individuals with Disabilities Educational Act. And FAPE states that every child has a right to a free and appropriate public education. If for whichever reason you feel like your child is not getting access to their education, whatever the reason may be, maybe the school doesn't have the staff, maybe they don't have the resources, that is not your problem, right? It's still sort of like not meeting what the law states. And so you can kind of argue, hey, we're kind of not meeting FAPE here. What are our options? Do we need to look at another program? Do you guys need help from the district? What can we do to kind of work this out? Also LRE, that's going to be the least restrictive environment. And so in theory, it's supposed to be that when you're trying to educate a child, you're really trying to go for the least restrictive environment, meaning the classroom in which it looks as much as a general education classroom. If for whichever reason the child can really not be in the classroom because they're too disruptive or they need a very personalized instruction that's kind of distracting to the class, then we can look at other models. But in general, if you have, let's say, a child that can communicate effectively with a tablet, even though they don't speak verbally and they are not disruptive to the class and they can do other assignments, even if it's not the one that they're distributing, they could be in a general education classroom. That is really what we're going for so that we can have the most inclusion possible, okay? And then I think the last term I would like to mention to you guys is going to be AT or assistive technology. So many families are not aware that you can actually request for assistive technology through the district. This is not likely going to be offered to you, okay? You have to tell them, hey, my child has some communication challenges. I would like to know how you guys do an evaluation and I would like to sign consent for it. They're going to be like, oh, but you guys already have a tablet or, oh, we have some visuals here. Yeah, that's great. But I want you to do the evaluation anyways. Why? Because there's a department that will be able to support them if you do that assessment. If not, you're going to have teachers and paraprofessionals trying to figure out how to do assistive technology without necessarily having the background. So it's important to do that. And again, it will not be offered to you. I can tell you that because I sit in a lot of meetings and I've never been in one where they're like, hey, should we do an assistive technology evaluation? No. But if you ask for it, they'll tell you, no problem. Here's the consent form. Go ahead and sign it. so this is the game that we're playing it's really kind of like knowing what's available to you and asking for it and the more you learn and the more you ask the more you're going to get compared to everyone else it's not a very fair system in that sense but this is why we want you guys to learn as much as possible okay So, you know, I mentioned IDEA just recently, and I mentioned that it's the Individuals with Disabilities Educational Act. It is a federal law. It really applies to public schools. It somewhat applies to charter schools, but not to its entirety, so it's a little bit different, and it does not apply at all to private schools, okay? So if you choose to go to a public school, any public school, that applies completely, which means that either that school has to give you the program that your child needs if they have it, or if they don't, they need to refer you to a school that does, right? And that can entail a lot of things. It can be being in a classroom that maybe has more supports. It can mean maybe having certain accommodations. It can mean working on certain transition goals. It really depends on the state in which the child is, what age, and all of those things. If you decide to go to charter school, for whichever reason, maybe you like it, it's attractive, maybe they have a very specific program, you have to understand that there are going to be limitations to the IEP because you are choosing to go to that program, right? And so if there's anything in that IEP that asks for something, let's call it sort of like above and beyond, that school can kind of be like, oh, why don't you go back to your homeschool? They're the ones that are really liable by law to kind of provide this. The same could happen if you do a parent choice transfer. You might be in a school that you really like, but that school doesn't have the right program. If you ask for too many things, they might wash their hands and kind of be like, listen, go back to your home school and they will help you figure it out. Why do I say this? Because sometimes we also have to find a balance. Sometimes you might have a school that maybe you are very happy with. Maybe they do have a great administration, but maybe they are limited in resources. We can support them. We at CAR can support them. Parent to parent can support them. The district can support them. They don't always know that these things are available. So we should exploit those avenues first prior to you maybe pushing too hard and now being left out without maybe anything or having to start all over, right? Now, through the IDEA, it's how we create the IEP, which is that Individual Educational Plan. So the IEP is this long document that has a lot of different pieces to it, which I'll kind of talk about in a minute. But it's a written plan. It's supposed to be followed by everybody that works with the child. And the idea is that it really sort of stipulates this is going to be our blueprint and our game plan for the year. meaning that this is going to be updated at least once a year, if not more, okay? The goals that are going to be in there, they really have a timeframe of being able to be accomplished within the year, but they could be accomplished prior to that. They should not be there if they're gonna take more than a year. We see this a lot. where documents may have certain goals that look really nice, but they're not really accomplishable within the school year. And therefore, it looks like you're not making progress and you're probably not addressing the need in the way that you should in a more short-term kind of like basis. It is, again, built on evaluation data and present levels. Now, the evaluation data we kind of talked about, but the present levels are super important. So there is a piece of the IEP where you guys can actually give a parent statement at the beginning. That parent statement should be really like a pitch where you kind of summarize not only the challenges that your child has, but all of the things that they're good at that maybe the staff doesn't know. That is your opportunity to put it in writing. And every time that there's something that you saw in an assessment that points out that they're really good at something and they should be doing something, you mention it there. And every time that a goal doesn't align to that, you're going to fall back to that. And I'm like, but if you see my parent statement, I mentioned this. So why are we saying this in the goal? It doesn't make any sense. It's not aligning. Okay. So that parent statement can be very, very powerful. I recommend that you guys prepare ahead of time. It can be as long as you want it to be. They need to sit there for 15 minutes and listen to me. listen to you and they sit there for 15 minutes and listen to you okay you can give them copies of it so that was a little easier for them to type it into the document um but yeah i think that that's one of the biggest pieces that i've seen in meetings okay because you get to illustrate things that are not necessarily capture within the evaluations okay Now, the other thing that the IEP does is that it really helps identifying the services. So whether those are therapy services like speech or maybe getting a little bit of OT, which, by the way, has to be tied to an academic goal. So if you want OT, you can't just say, I want a sensory diet. You need to say we need to work on handwriting. OK, that's very, very important. And so they'll tell you like, oh, you're not going to get OT. If you tie it to an academic goal, you will get it. But it has to be that way. OK. And then it also helps with setting any accommodations. And there's a long list of accommodations, and sometimes we're very tempted to have as many as we can, but really the important thing is to have the ones that are most meaningful. So when we're trying to identify what to work on within the year, the idea is that we're trying to work on What's the hierarchy? What are the prerequisites that I'm not meeting that are keeping me from being able to access my education? Once I meet those prerequisites, then I can worry about the things that I want to advance in. So, for instance, if my child cannot sit for extended periods of time, then that is a goal that I need to work on. It doesn't mean that the goal should be for them to sit for an hour, but I do need to work on that because I need to work on them having that joint attention and being able to follow through with work, even if it's just for 10 minutes at a time, five minutes at a time, 15 minutes at a time, right? If I cannot do that, then I'm not going to be able to accomplish the reading goals. I'm not going to be able to accomplish the social emotional goals, none of the other stuff, right? And the same applies with, you know, being able to communicate effectively. So if I don't have a means of communication, so I don't have assistive technology or I don't have a program where I'm working of like maybe requesting for help or saying I need a break, then I'm not going to be able to function very well within my classroom because I'm going to get frustrated. I'm not going to have a rapport with my teachers. So that should be the main priority is addressing those basic needs. And then I can move on to some of the stuff that we want our kids to learn, right? But I think in general, we tend to sort of fill up these IEPs with a lot of academic goals and they look very nice, but your kids can learn that at any point. However, if they don't learn the basic things at an early age, they're going to really look like they're much behind than everyone else. And it's going to set them apart because it might determine the kind of classroom that they're in. So we always talk about, you know, with like the little kiddos, we want them to just be as independent as possible. So when we think about pre-K, for instance, it's not about them doing all the work. It's not about them being able to talk with their friends. It's really about them learning how to follow a schedule, learning how to navigate the classroom so that they're not really relying on anybody. If your child can do that independently, they can be in a general education classroom for as long as they want, you know? So that's really what the goal is, is independence. If the independence is there, nobody's going to complain about your child. And then we can worry about the academics. Now, there are two questions that kind of come up when we talk about IDEA eligibility, okay? So the first one is going to be the disability part. And this is kind of like where you guys come in and say, we qualify for this because we have a diagnosis of X, Y, or Z. And it can be multiple ones and they will ask you for this diagnosis or you will provide this diagnosis if you're the one requesting the assessment. that does not guarantee that they will get the eligibility again, okay? It's just what kinda opens the door, but then we need to look at whether that individual needs special education, right? Do they need, after that disability, support in areas that are related to the academics within the school day, that then you can be like, yes, we need to then create an IEP. So I have been in meetings where parents will try to express or advocate that their child needs assistance with, you know, different areas where there are transitions, whether it is maybe some emotional regulation. But the examples that they give are from the home. that will not get you anywhere in an IEP meeting. Do not give examples of the home. You need to give examples of other places too, in the community, when we go to tutoring, when we go to, you know, like some class that we did so that they can see that this is not only related to the home because they'll be like, oh, that's a home problem. You need to get your therapies, okay? You wanted to tie it to the school always. And again, if you're like, well, I'm not in school, so I don't know what that looks like and they're not communicating to me. That's where I come in or anybody at CART and we can go and do an observation and we can do a visit and we can talk with the person assigned to the school so that we can then sort of, you know, create a report and tell you like, hey, this is what we're seeing. This is where maybe they need some support and kind of work together in maybe putting that together into the document. Okay. So the idea is that you're not going to deal with this on your own, but rather that you're going to take advantage of every resource that's available to you. Now, in some cases, you might be struggling with the IEP. Maybe they don't determine that the person meets criteria. Or maybe they say, yes, but we have to wait for an evaluation that comes from the region. It might take three, four, five months for it to happen. In those cases, you would be eligible to apply for a Section 504 plan. This is also not going to be offered to you. OK, the Section 504 dates back a little bit older than IDEA, and it's really meant to just provide basic accommodations to avoid discrimination, right? So the idea is that if tomorrow your child falls down and they break their arm, which hopefully doesn't happen and they have to wear a cast, you will go the next day to school and that request a 504 plan so that either they sit in front of the class or that maybe they have an accommodation so that somebody can kind of write down their notes or maybe they hand them the notes so that they can follow through with school. So that's really the idea behind the 504 plan. because it's such a kind of like much broader where like it really taps into all these different groups of people, not necessarily that have special needs, then that allows you to really get this fairly easy and fairly quickly. So if you go to the school, that should be written within less than a week to say the most, you know what I mean? And that will give you, again, some basic accommodations so that at least there is almost like a statement to the staff, to the teachers that are working with the child, like this child does have a need. We haven't gotten the IEP just yet, but their need is there, and this proves that there's a need. I think communicating that is very, very important. Again, for you guys, it's very easy to see sometimes the challenges that your children have, but for some of the staff, they might misinterpret that for other reasons. You know what I mean? So sometimes they might be like, oh, this kid is really just, they don't follow instructions. This kid maybe, you know, they get away with everything. And so we want to kind of shift that and break that sort of thought. And this is the way that we do it. Because by putting these documents together, you can sort of create a profile and express to them, Not, hey, my child has autism, but rather my child is really good at these things and they need help with these things. And this is how you help them with these things. So you're basically giving them all the answers. That's the idea behind it, okay? Because if you just say he has autism or he has ADHD, that doesn't really answer any questions for them, okay? Now, a couple of things that are important. When it comes to the IEP, Um, we can get much more in depth where we can really talk about measurable goals that I kind of described earlier. Um, we can talk about having specialized instruction, you know, um, and that can look at many different ways. You can maybe modify the work that's being given. Um, you can also have all these different tricks to kind of promote, independence on the individual, meaning that even though I'm giving you perhaps the answer because I'm highlighting it or maybe, you know, making it bigger in the funds, I can do that and help you get the right answer without me having to be there. So it's kind of like finding this balance of like, how do I support this student without the student relying on me being there all the time? Why? Because chances are none of you are going to qualify to get a paraprofessional or a one-to-one. Even if your child needs it, unless your child's running off to the street because they elope or they're hurting themselves, you're not likely to get a one-on-one. You can request it and I would encourage you to do so if you feel like you need it, but it's not likely to happen because they are... in a very dire situation right now you know they don't even have they're not being able to hire all the positions that they have open and they're actually eliminating a lot of the paraprofessionals that they have okay so this is why i put such an emphasis on independence and trying to make instruction in a way where the child learns cues from from what's in the environment, from visuals that you have put in place, okay? So this is what we're trying to do with the IEP that the 504 can't quite do, right? With the IEP, we're really modifying the environment so much more. And because it's a legal document where you're collecting this data, that data is really going to help you, right, in sort of driving the change a little bit quicker and much more informed. Now, I will tell you right now that you might find yourself in positions at some point where you might ask for the data and they might kind of look at each other and not have it. Okay? This is not uncommon. And I urge you to just take a deep breath. and realize that at least they realize that now they have to take the data. Some schools are going to be better than others at this. The ones that have more specialized programs tend to have more experience, right? It kind of makes sense. And every year it could be different. You have different teachers. So you're not going to be able, it doesn't matter if you find the perfect school, some years are going to be tougher, okay? And I don't say that to discourage you, but I just say so you guys have realistic expectations, right? This is why we build all of this platform so that even in those more challenging years, you can kind of already come with all the answers again, right? And kind of support that teacher. If you support the teacher, if you support the staff, they're more likely to really buy in and kind of help out. If you get upset and you call them out, it's not probably going to go well. You know, again, I'm not trying to justify this, but they do deal with a lot on a daily basis. And they're usually kind of looked at us like the bad guys. Right. So we have to kind of find this balance where we recognize their hard work at the same time as we ask them for more. Okay. The other thing that's important is that really the IEP is gonna give you access and instruction, okay? So the IEP, because it has so much more information, you can really, really, really just sort of like expand beyond just those basic accommodations. So it's not only just modifying those instructional plans, but also let's say as the kids get older, they turn 14, you can really work on transitions and kind of thinking, okay, can we work on employment? Can we work on kind of identifying what are some areas and skills that are more related to daily living skills that we can kind of target? There's a lot that you can do with IEPs. And I'm going to give you some examples now, okay? So first thing that I want you to be aware is that in IEP meetings, there is sort of like a core set of people that should be there. Most likely, when you have gone to your IEP meetings, not all of those people are there. And what they'll do is that they'll ask you or they'll explain to you, this person is not available. Will you excuse them? um it is your you are in every right to do so i can tell you that if you had an advocate and you were sitting in a meeting the advocate would be like absolutely not and we're not having this meeting until you have everybody here so this is just to kind of explain you meetings go very very differently when it's only you guys and when there's somebody that knows the law okay Can you accomplish a meeting without everybody being there? Sure. But when decisions are being made and maybe the person that has a positive feedback about your child is not present in that meeting, then that tends to be detrimental to your outcome, right? So this is why it's important for you to kind of You know, almost take the reins on this and be like, OK, when we plan this meeting, is everybody going to be available? Because if not, I'll adapt. Like, what's the time that you guys are more likely to do it? Can we do it earlier in the morning? Is that easier for you guys? You know, really kind of work with them. and understand why all of these people need to be there, what each of them kind of play as a role, right? When you have somebody kind of pushing in one direction, you always should kind of lean on the person that you know has positive feedback and kind of prompt them to like, hey, can you talk a little bit more about what has worked in your classroom? We have gotten positive feedback from you, but you're going to have to kind of be the one to guide this because they are in a very sort of complicated situation where they're not really supposed to go against the people that are on top of them, and they're not really supposed to go against the district. So if you want information, you have to really dig for it. They're not gonna lie to you in the meeting, but they're not gonna necessarily offer the information, okay? You gotta go in there and kinda ask for that. In terms of student participation, oftentimes families don't know that kids can go into IEP meetings. Maybe it doesn't make sense when you're in elementary school and you're super young, or at least not for an extended period of time. But when we're talking about accommodations and when we're talking about reinforcement systems, who's better to answer what they like and what kind of works for them than the child itself. So as opposed to kind of sitting in a room with a bunch of adults trying to guess what this child needs, you just invite the child for five or 10 minutes and ask them, what do you like the best about the classroom? What do you enjoy the most? What do you like to work with? You know, how would you like to do your homework? What would you like to do first? And this is going to be very useful information and kind of determining this plan, right? As they get older, their role within these meetings is going to grow more and more. I was sitting in a meeting once in a K-8 school and we brought the student from middle school and I was like, can we bring him? And they're like, yeah, sure. And we asked him some questions and he spoke for like about half an hour. And after that, they all looked at me and they're like, we've never heard him talk this much. This was so useful. And it really, after that, I decided I was going to do that every time I went into a meeting. I was going to suggest, hey, can we bring in this student? And I encourage you to do the same with your children, okay? Again, it depends on the age and how much they can communicate. But it is important to kind of take their input as opposed to trying to guess what they want, okay? Oftentimes, these kids, we're making decisions for them all day long. And this is why we have a lot of problems because it's like we're not really allowing them to have a voice and kind of express what works and what doesn't work for them. The other thing that's important about this process is that you can have additional participants. So you can invite whoever you want. If you wanna invite grandma, you can invite grandma. If you wanna invite your neighbor, you can invite your neighbor. You can invite any therapist that you have. You can invite us at CARD. You can invite parent to parent. Sometimes we're not always able to be at every meeting, but if we are not, at the very least, we will help you prepare for your meeting. And then we can talk with you after the meeting. And guess what? If the meeting doesn't go your way, you don't have to finalize that meeting. So when they ask you things like, hey, so should we lock it, mom and dad? You say, no, we're not ready to lock it. We're going to review it one more time. So they won't necessarily say we're closing the IEP. They'll use kind of other terms in there. You'll be like, no, we're not locking anything, okay? We're going to review it. We'll get back to you in a few days. And then they'll give you this whole piece. They'll tell you like, hey, if we don't lock it, it's not active. And then it kind of goes into mediation after 10 days. And you'll be like, yeah, yeah, we'll get it to you before the 10 days. okay it's very important that you get in the habit of not signing things right away because you might go home and be like oh my god i forgot this one thing that i wanted to mention um another key thing in these meetings there is a notes section at the end of the iep So there's a lot of times when you're in the meeting and you're trying to request something and they're like, mom and dad, we're not there yet. Or we can't really do that right now. And you can be like, that's great. I want to add in the notes section. And they might be like, okay, we'll do that later. So you bring out your notepad, you write down whatever it is you wanted to put so you don't forget. You circle it so that you really don't forget. And before you leave that day, you tell them, I want to add this into the notes section. Why? Because even if it cannot be done at that point in time, when you bring it up again in the next meeting, they're not going to be able to tell you like, oh, I don't remember this. You're going to be like, no, no, I mentioned it. And you guys told me we're going to do it in the next meeting. So that notes section can really be a savior in terms of documenting things that perhaps don't really belong to the IEP just yet. Okay. And again, they're not going to tell you this necessarily. Some staff, I think it's a little bit more communicative, but it's because this meeting is going to take a long time. And so for the process of, you know, trying to be a little bit faster and more efficient, they sometimes bypass things that we feel are super important for you guys. So how can you prepare? So before the meeting, obviously you want to grab all the documentation that you have, not only the ones that they're giving you, you can bring again that kind of parent statement that's going to have the strengths of the individual, the concerns and the priorities, right? If you need a translator or anything like that, you can also request for language access. And again, bring those outside reports, not only psychological reports. Anything you have from your therapist, bring it. Any sort of programs that you're working on, any data that they have, anything like that would be useful. If you can attend the workshops that Parent2Parent has, I think you'll find it very useful. They have a three-hour workshop on the IEP and IDEA. You can do it in English. You can do it in Spanish. It's going to be, you're going to feel a lot better after that. You know, you're going to have a lot of questions too, but I think you're going to really understand where to start, right? And you're going to feel confident enough that when they tell you, oh, mom and dad, that's not what that means. You can be like, actually, according to this, it is what it means, you know? So you should feel empowered to do that. You should feel empowered to question people with authority, okay? This is how you get places. During the meeting, always ask questions until things are clear. So if you have to ask three times and somebody else has to step in to explain it, then you do so. Don't be afraid to do that. This is what they get paid for. You don't have to rush to that meeting. Even if they make a face, so be it. You know what I mean? You guys should really feel comfortable and not feel pressure to kind of rush through those meetings. Remember, everything is tied to the data. If they're suggesting a certain goal, if they are saying this is how we're going to work on this, then that needs to align to the assessment that they did. So if the assessment says that somebody is able to count to 10, then I'm not going to write in the effects of the disability before the academic goal, I'm not going to write, well, this person can kind of count until five or they struggle counting to 10 because it would be like, but the assessment says otherwise. So it's important to review those assessments and kind of highlight some of this information because it might happen that sometimes they might omit some information that's useful and kind of just make their own impression. And we really shouldn't do that, okay? And this is why also you should update those assessments much more often than they will suggest. You're entitled to an assessment every three years by law. You could get it prior to that, okay? You're probably not gonna get it every year because they have a backlog of cases, but every year and a half, every two years, you can be like, can we reassess? And I would start probably about the year and a half because it's gonna take a while to reassess. Sign that consent, and then hopefully by year two, you get a new assessment, okay? If you let them suggest this to you, five years will go by and they're not gonna ask you for a reassessment and they'll be building IEPs on information that's completely outdated, okay? The other thing that's important is that remember to ask who's going to do what, okay? So when they're trying to present academic goals, when they're trying to present any behavioral interventions that are going to be taking place, it's important for you to understand who's doing this, how are they doing it, what does this look like, you know? Also, it's important that you keep a copy of this plan. So you always ask for a draft prior to the meeting, if possible, which technically they should give you. If they don't give you a draft prior to the meeting... then you don't have to go to the meeting, okay? But let's say something happened, they couldn't get it to you and they give it to you that day, then again, you don't sign so that you can review it with more time, right? And we can remember that we can request meetings that are not our annual meetings. So if let's say, two or three months down the line, we feel like, hey, we've made a significant amount of progress, or whatever we put in place, maybe it's not working, we need to change it based on the data, then we can request what it's called an interim IEP. Okay. So we have the ability to the by we I mean, you guys have the ability to request this when it's needed. Okay. The key components that I kind of mentioned before, some of them, it's the present levels. So really, what can they do, right? How does this disability affect them with regards to the school? The annual goals, which again, we want to write those in a very specific way, which I'll kind of point out to you guys. Also the services, so this is going to be which therapies, where do they happen, and any other kind of level of support. The placement, this is going to be which classroom and why. You're not necessarily stuck in one classroom the entire time, you might be in multiple classrooms depending on the supports that you need, okay? You guys know what the accommodations are, so it's going to be whether they need more time to either copy from the board, whether they need things to be handed to them and printed because maybe they take too long to write. And so you're not saying, hey, I don't want my kid to write, they get a special privilege. No, you're saying print it out for them, let them take a picture or something. If you have to move on with the instruction, they can still have it there and finish copying what they need to do for homework, okay? So again, it's not special treatment, it's just saying, hey, we have to be mindful of how hard is it for the child to write? How long does it take for them to write? Same with the reading, right? And the best example that I give with accommodations is that I already see some of you guys that have reading glasses here today. Imagine if somebody told you, oh, you've worn your reading glasses enough today, take them off. that would not be very fair. And that's the way that I kind of approach any accommodation with our individuals. It's the same exact thing. We've normalized reading glasses so much that we don't see it as a disability, right? But it is a disability and you guys get accommodations and they're provided to you and nobody ever questions those. It should be the same thing for your children, okay? So we're trying, our role is really to kind of shift that thinking and get people to realize it's normal you know it's just like everything else that has been accommodated in the past okay let's just get us to that point um the other thing that's important is the modification okay so sometimes children that have an intellectual disability may meet criteria for a modified curriculum okay it's not easy to meet that criteria and there are a lot of kids that will be more like on the 80 to 90 range of an IQ. And those kids may really struggle still academically with certain things, right? And they're not eligible for a modified curriculum. But I want you to understand this. Just because they have to grade your child on the standard curriculum and say that they deliver the standard curriculum doesn't mean that they have to only give them standard curriculum work. So they can argue, hey, this kid is failing and that's fine. And that will be useful for us to document and say, we should make an exception and give him a modified curriculum. But after they've determined this child is not able to do this work, they should give him work that they can do so there's engagement. The idea is that a child doesn't sit in a school frustrated and not being able to do anything. No, we meet them where they're at. This is going to have to be a conversation that you're going to have to have with them because you'll have to educate them in that, by law, the only thing that they really need to do is say, I gave them the instruction, here's the worksheet, they didn't understand it, and I put them a zero. After that, that's a checkbox. They can then move on to being like, hey, do it this way. This is a little bit easier, okay? but they will get stuck on like, no, no, no, I'm supposed to teach this way. The teaching only needs to happen once per law, right? Now, what we're trying to do is that we're trying to build the engagement because we want the child to want to come to school and we want them to learn what they're able to learn, right? So this is going to, again, we can kind of help you with this and sort of communicating this to the school. And then, like I mentioned, you know, the assessment and the AT, the assistive technology and all of those things, those are going to be, really things that we have to kind of fight for, right? We have to really ask for them. So whenever you have questions about any of those processes, just let us know, and we can direct you to the right department in the district, okay? So a couple other things, and now I'm taking a... Writing meaningful goals is going to be an essential part of the IEP. It used to be that goals were... Kind of just, you know, they were missing information. And sometimes they weren't very specific and they kind of looked like they were taken out of a template. Now you're going to see the opposite. Now you're going to see a lot of, I don't want to say AI reading goals. but we run the risk of maybe having things that look nicer when you read them and aren't necessarily individualized. So I want you to be vigilant, okay? I want you to learn that just because it's an entire paragraph doesn't mean it's the right goal. It doesn't mean it's written appropriately. A goal should say what we're trying to accomplish, how we're trying to accomplish it. So let's say if I'm trying to teach somebody how to write, How am I going to do that? So I'm going to ask them to first maybe just trace a line. Okay. Am I going to do it hand over hand? Am I going to come and help them directly physically? Or am I going to just have like dotted lines so that they can follow that? And in the event that they cannot do it, how am I going to come and support? All those things should be answered within that goal. They're going to tell you like, oh, mom, but like, obviously that's how we're going to do it. And you'll be like, yeah, okay. But the para doesn't know that. So we're going to be explicit as if nobody here understands how to do that. You're going to have to ask for that. They're not going to be super explicit in the goal necessarily always, okay? But this is very useful because when you want to go back and say, what did you guys do? When they're saying he's not writing, you'll be like, okay, did you do it like this? If it's general and broad, you're not going to be able to argue that they weren't able to meet the goal. If it's very specific and you ask them, well, tell me how you did it. And they're like, well, we did it like this. And you're like, but remember, that's not how we said we were going to do it. Then they are actually... out of compliance with the IEP. And that puts them in a position where they're more likely to do what you're asking them to do. Okay? So more specific is going to be better for you guys. The other thing that's important is that we want to really specify what is it that we're trying to teach. And this can be confusing sometimes. Like what's the skill? What's the behavior? Oftentimes we kind of get caught up that if we're trying to, like, let's say people will say like, oh, we're teaching how to do work. What does that really mean? Because doing work means a lot of things. It means sitting down. It means joint attention, looking at a page. It means grabbing my pencil. It means following instructions. So which one am I trying to teach? Which is the one where I'm missing? And that's the one that I should focus on, as opposed to kind of saying, well, I'm just, we're going to be able to do work independently. That doesn't mean anything. Okay. You need to define that a lot better, more specific again. Okay. And we are here to help you in doing that. All right. And then remember that you can request for weekly reports within your IEPs. So if you feel like the communication piece isn't quite happening with the school, you can actually put it in the IEP where you're like, hey, can we get some weekly reports so that I know what you guys are doing? And I can try to do that at home so that the child can generalize what you guys have accomplished already. So you're not questioning whether they're doing it or not. You're saying, if we want to maintain this, I need to know what you're doing very well so that I can practice it at home as well. That's the only way that it sticks. If the child learns to do it at school and they never do it outside of school, they're not going to do it at work. They're not going to do it anywhere else because they're going to learn. It only really applies to school. So that's a very important piece. And that obviously falls on you guys, right? This is where you also, and I think if you do that, the school and the staff will really see you from a different lens. They're going to be like, okay, this parent's really involved. This parent's really trying very hard and understands what we're trying to accomplish here. Now, In terms of the data, remember that the data is not always going to show us what we want. And so sometimes data is going to show that, Hey, we weren't right about this. We need to make some changes, but that's okay because at least we know, and we save time as opposed to getting stuck on something, assuming that it's working. Right. So just because the data isn't pointing to that, we were right about our prediction or a hypothesis doesn't mean that we've done something wrong. It just means that now we know to go in the right direction. Okay. Um, quickly about behavioral supports. Um, there is something called a FAB, which is what the district calls a functional assessment of behavior. Usually that's called an FBA in other places like therapies. So it's a little confusing. Um, but that's where they kind of collect some data in determining what is the function of the behavior, how often is happening, what's the frequency or the magnitude and things like that. Okay. This needs to happen prior to them developing a behavior intervention plan. A behavior intervention plan is really done when there is a behavior that we're trying to decrease. We usually try to target only one or two at a time, not much more than that. So these are really behaviors that are getting in the way of the student being able to be in the classroom or attend to class. If there are any behaviors that are really that significant and are happening often enough, then we would kind of come up with a behavior intervention plan based on the data from that FAP, okay? Again, we can help you with this. You don't have to kind of go crazy. And then parent to parent can help you explain this a little bit more as well. In terms of selecting the accommodations, we're just really trying to fit the need of the child, right? So understanding what is it that's difficult, why is it difficult, and which support is going to remove those barriers, okay? So essentially, it's really putting myself in the shoes of the individual and understanding how hard is this? And you have to understand that It's not always so easy to do that, even as a parent, because we only live and experience things from our own end. Right. So our kids learn how to mask things and they don't have anything else to compare it to. So a child might not be able to tell you it's really, really hard for me to read or write or anything else because they don't know how easy it might be for you or for us or for the rest of the people. Right. And so that's really where the challenge lies is, how do I try to understand as best how much effort it might take somebody to do this? Because if I understand the effort, then I can really connect with that person and be able to assist them as much as possible. You have to become the advocate of this effort for them oftentimes, especially when they're young, right? So you have to be the one to explain to individuals, it's not that they cannot do this, it's that it takes them a lot longer, or they need to do it with these types of supports, okay? Um, we can skip this slide and I can share this slides with you. Um, because I don't think I, you know, I think for purposes of today, really the 504 plan was really just to kind of give you guys a backup plan, right? In the case that you're waiting for that IEP. Um. But remember, we're trying to empower students. So self-advocacy is also going to be a very, very big piece because you're not always going to be there and you're not always there in the classroom, right? So eventually your kids need to learn how to say, hey, I work better this way, or this is what my IEP says. And if they learn how to do that, they'll do really good in life and they'll do really good at any job or in college or anything like that. If they struggle with that, they will struggle with that for the remainder of their lives too, right? So we have to work on this because right now, even if it's challenging, we have a way of supporting them so we can see where the challenge is. So if let's say, we say, we're going to work on self-advocacy, I'm going to ask you to maybe present this to your teacher at the beginning of class. And they're like, ah, but I get really shy or I get really nervous. that's great i have a mental health person that can come in and kind of help you or i have somebody else that can come in and help you in those situations and we'll facilitate that communication little by little desensitize you and get you comfortable enough to have those tough conversations i think that's really really useful and it's not often given enough time right there's a lot of ways that you can go about this obviously You can have goals on the IEP. There is also something called the Standing Up For Me curriculum that was developed by Project 10. Project 10 is one of the discretionary projects for the Department of Education. So I like to use the Standing Up For Me curriculum because it's part of what they created. So you're not suggesting something that they don't have, and you're not going to get any pushback from the state. So right now, with the way the politics are, sometimes if you try to suggest something, they might be like, well, we don't do that here, you know? Not that, because they created it. It's approved, right? And so that will give a lot of guidance even to the staff on like, how do I work on self-advocacy? How do I work on vocational stuff, daily living skills, things of that nature, okay? They have some worksheets there for your children to complete as well. That will give you some more information as to, what accommodations they might like, why they might like them, okay? So it's a very long document. It's divided by elementary, middle school, and high school. I think you can request it through the Project 10 website. If you cannot, I am more than happy to share a copy of it with you guys, okay? And with the school as well. And then transition planning, for those of you that have kids that are getting a little bit older, we can start as early as 14. Now what's going to happen is that that will kind of be said, you know, but you don't necessarily see it being reflected on the IEP until the kids get closer to like 16, 17. And for me, that's just too old, okay? I want to try and kind of work on this thing since 14. So if I am teaching a kid, how to write, and they're coming closer to 14, maybe I want to focus on typing. You know, I want them to be able to have a job one day. So my goal is going to shift from maybe from writing to typing because that's going to be more meaningful for them. If I have a kid that maybe is still working on reading, can I shift from reading novels and stuff to maybe reading a resume, to maybe reading instructions and really following instructions because that's going to determine if they have a job one day. So you're not... not developing the academics, but you're tying it to real life examples. That's really kind of like the shift that happens at that point in time. And it's a very important shift. And then you're supposed to be connected with certain agencies, VR, vocational rehabilitation, being one of them, okay? Now, that referral, again, is not going to be made at age 14 because you don't have to register at age 14. You can register as late as like 18, but they do have programs, like the pre-employment programs, that you can start participating since age 14, okay? They're there. You guys should take advantage of it. They have like this kind of career camps. They usually will even sometimes pay the kids a little bit just to kind of get them reinforced for participating. So I implore you to kind of look through that. And then if you want information, we can share it with you guys. In terms of the procedural safeguards, just remember that they're going to always give you a written notice of what your rights are and anything that you can refuse. So they'll ask you in the meetings, did anybody discourage you from bringing somebody to the meeting? They will always ask you that. They have to ask you that. But there's a big handbook on all these different rules and kind of rights that you have. And you should ask for those ahead of time. I think that usually they should be sent when they send you the invitation to the meeting. um but if it's not included in there just ask for it okay we talked about the independent evaluations already and then the last part of the mediation um That part can be a little intimidating, right? So sometimes if you're not in agreement with what the team wants to do, and you really don't want to sign that IEP, you can go into something called mediation, which happens after 10 days, right? And basically you will meet with people, not only with the school, but some district staff as well, right? And maybe some people from the region. Hopefully at that point in time, things can get resolved. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. that doesn't work, then you can kind of continue in that ladder of legal processes. If you guys are stuck in a situation where you feel like you're at the verge of maybe having a situation like that, please reach out to Parent2Parent so we can try to maybe help out as much as possible. And if need be, then we will give you information on where to get an advocate. If you cannot afford one, then we'll try to send you in the direction of an agency that maybe does those services for no fee because they have a grant or something like that, okay? so we don't want you to necessarily feel like you need an advocate always sometimes you can get a lot accomplished without one but if it comes to that then by all means don't be afraid to let us know so we can get you the help that you need okay and then i think this is so The other thing is that I mentioned the AI before, but I want you guys to also feel like AI can be a tool for you guys. This is a lot of information. It's a lot of legal jargon. It's kind of hard to navigate. So when you're kind of looking through that procedural safeguards, where you're looking through the IEP, use ai tools to help you kind of understand what certain things mean to kind of help you you know summarize certain laws and rules that maybe you want to bring into your meeting okay that can be very very useful for you guys okay it's not a substitution for an advocate by any means but i think it will really help you digest information that's new and kind of extensive it will also help you with like you know any letters or emails that you want to kind of send to to the team um that you wanted to maybe be formal and have a certain kind of language right um From now on, anytime you want anything accomplished, put it in writing, okay? Don't talk to somebody and have a conversation after school when you pick up. That didn't happen, okay? It needs to be put in writing. So if you have the conversation, send a follow-up email. As per our conversation, these are the things that we discussed. I will be waiting for these documents or whatever, or the consent or whatever it may be. If it's not in writing, it never happened. And believe me, if you have a track record of things in writing, if things don't go the way that you expected, that's going to be very, very useful, okay? And so we talked a little bit about the advocacy. And so again, if the plan is not working, you start with the data, we request a meeting, and then we look at any formal options that maybe we need to do to escalate things, okay? Just know that if you're not happy with the school, if the school is not able to serve your child, there are other schools out there. So you are likely to find a program that you feel more comfortable with, okay? And we can help you in that process. So even if it feels kind of exhausting and it feels like you've worked so hard and it's taken a year or two years, it does take a while for most families. OK, but it's worth it because once you find the right place, once you find you create the right program, then you'll be able to make a lot of progress and you have all those rights to kind of help you. All right. Here are some helpful resources. And again, we'll share the slides with you. But I think Project 10 is going to be a really good one. Also, Parent to Parent, Family Network on Disabilities also has, FND has some trainings as well. And then Legal Services of Greater Miami, I think is one of the agencies that had some grants that maybe they can help families with, you know, anything related to to education. Okay. And obviously us at CART, we're here for you guys. If you're not registered, just come to the table, we'll give you information, same for parent to parent. And that is it for me. I'll leave you guys a little QR code for an assessment if you want to complete it. It's totally anonymous. And then yeah, I will end here. I know that I took a little bit of time. So I don't know if you guys have any questions that you want me to answer or if not, I'll let Daniel present and then maybe we can answer them at the end. So that way. Yeah.

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It's good. Okay. Thank you. It's a good morning. Good afternoon now. Good afternoon, everyone. First off, thank you, Ivan, from UM Card for a great, wonderful presentation. We partner with UM Card, and I appreciate everything. It was very valuable information. My name is Danielle Leis. I'm with Parent to Parent of Miami. I'm the outreach coordinator. And today I'm going to, it kind of blends in with what Ivan was talking about, but how to communicate with the school. It's very important to know who you should talk with and how to get your concerns addressed with the school. Okay, so our objectives for today, we are going to learn basic communication skills that can assist you to effectively communicate with others, learn to use the Miami-Dade County Public School chain of command effectively to communicate in writing with the school. Hold on, let me move this box. It's in my way. No. trying to move this box, but whatever, provide an overview of the six principles of IDEA Part B. And I know Ivan kind of went over that a little bit, but I will share some more information. So research has shown that when schools and families are involved and they work together, it can have a positive impact on students' outcome. And you want to build a relationship with the school, right? We don't want to have any animosity with the school. You want to have a great collaboration and partnership so that your concerns can be addressed with the school. And as we all know, while parents and schools share a common mission of educating children, they do not always share the same vision of how to accomplish this goal. And I've been mentioned this, and you're going to hear me say this throughout the whole presentation, everything in writing. Okay. And that's how we can avoid any misunderstanding with everything. Communication is the key to education, understanding, and peace. So here are some tips when we're communicating with the school. And this applies to public, private, and charter schools. This is just having a conversation with the schools. Know who and how to contact the right person to address your concerns. It's not always going to be your child's teacher who you want to address your concerns, especially when we're talking about the IEP or even the 504 plan. You might want to reach out to the ESE chairperson. That might be your person of contact. Put your concerns and requests in writing and keep a copy for your records. Again, everything in writing. For many reasons, there are timelines. Once you, as the parent, request for a specific evaluation, The school has 30 days to respond to your requests. It doesn't mean that they agree to it, but there needs to be a conversation within 30 days of your request, okay, to have a meeting. So always put everything in writing. State the issues or concerns, but keep it simple and be positive. One, writing to the schools. I know we have a lot to say as parents, okay? But keep it simple and bullet points. Get to the point. We're going to put away our feelings and emotions and stick to facts. Put everything in bullet points. And think about it. In today's world, many of us have short attention span, right? So if you write a whole story, they're not going to read it. And they're going to miss out on important information that you want to share with the team. Say what you want and make a clear request. So basically, like I said, bullet points, state the facts, not your emotions. Okay. Always everything when it pertains to the IEP, your child's behavior in the school, the teachers implementing the IEP, stick to facts and not feelings. Okay. So if you feel like your child is failing, use the grades. Show that they're not meeting the criteria. So focus on that. Do the research and learn about the subject. Know what you are talking about. It's like going to court. You know, you can't go in front of a jury and just say whatever you want. You need to have facts and be able to back up whatever you are saying. So focus on that because there will be a rebuttal. So you want to be prepared to respond to whatever they have to come back with you. Communication tips when writing to school. So when you're sending an email, because again, everything is in writing, you will include your name, your child's full name, along with their student ID, because sometimes we might have two John Garcia's. So make sure you include their student ID, their teacher's name and grade, your contact information, and the timeframe to respond. So you can say at the end of the email, I look forward to hearing from you within three to five days, business days, okay, so that they can respond back. Prepare, write down your concerns. It's like going to the doctor's appointment. If you don't write down your questions you want to ask your doctor, you're probably going to forget. So when you're going to speak with the school, write down all of your questions. Have it ready. Share possible solutions and desirable outcomes. You don't. Just want to point fingers. Work as a team. Remember, it's a team effort. It's not just a school. Us parents have a responsibility, too, and we need to work together so we can see the best outcome for our child. Because at the end of the day, everyone has a common goal. It's to see our children succeed in their education. So let's, you know, work with the team. Prioritize, decide what issues need immediate attention and what can wait or be addressed at a later date or meeting. Very important. I know we have a lot of concerns and you just want to say it all at once. Nothing will be accomplished that way. One, people get defensive sometimes, right? Can you imagine your boss coming up to you and telling you everything that you're doing wrong? You kind of shut down. You're like, man, you know? Again, we are a team that's worked together. So focus on the two top concerns. Work on that. And maybe three months later on, you guys can revisit and discuss the other concerns that you have. This applies to the IEP as well. When you're having that interim IEP meeting, you know, focus on the top two concerns that you might have. Listen to other people's perspective. Sorry, it's blocked off. Then ask questions and clarify if you do not understand something. When you're communicating with the schools, it's important to really listen to the other person's perspective. Because maybe they might share something with you that you didn't see or didn't recognize that, hmm, they have a good point. So it's okay to listen. And you don't always have to agree. But the same way we want the school and team to respect and hear our perspective as parents, the same way. Because they might share something new with you as well. And while you're in those meetings and communicating with the schools, and I know I even mentioned this, have them clarify if they're saying things that you're not sure about or don't understand, or they're using those acronyms like LRE or FAPE or, you know, it's okay to stop them and say, what does LRE mean? I myself, sometimes when I'm talking to parents, we forget because we're just going. And I might say, oh, yes, you know, it's important we consider to place your child in an LRE environment. Stop me and say, Danielle, what does that mean? Same with the school. It's okay to stop them, have them clarify. You know, there's no wrong questions or, you know, it doesn't, no one will look at you any differently if you ask to clarify even something that you think might be, you know, common sense or simple. That's okay. We're talking about your child and we want to make sure everyone is on the same page. So have them clarify with you. And asking questions can prevent misunderstanding and also helps you get the information you need to make informed decisions for your child. Keep asking questions. And I know Ivan said this a lot during his presentation, it's okay, we want you to. And you don't have to have the answers. The team will help you figure it out. So know the school's professionals on who's working with your child. I know in today's climate, things have changed from when we were all younger, where our parents were able to go into the schools, meet the teachers. With all the new regulations, things have changed, but that's okay.

That's why we have emails, okay?

We can send emails now. I always recommend to my families at the start of the school year, Send an email to your child's teachers. Attach their IEP or 504 plan. Do a quick about me sheet. Put your child's picture, you know, and introduce yourself and let them know, hey, we're here to work together and support one another. So here's my contact information. Please reach out to me. I want to, you know, work with you. And then you might have other individuals that are responsible for working with your child, like a speech pathologist or the guidance counselor. So you want to know who is working with your child so you know how to direct your questions to and who to direct your questions to. I do want to mention, especially right now since school just started, open house. Many like I'm on the phone with a lot of families and they're like, oh, I can't wait for open house to have a conversation about my child's IEP during open house. That is not the time to have that communication. It's just they're there to put a face to a name to the child's parent. It's just introducing yourself personally. It's not the time to talk about accommodations, the IEP, how they will support your child in the classroom. For that, I would recommend scheduling a parent-teacher conference. In writing, again. We're going to send an email. We will request for a parent-teacher conference. And it doesn't have to be two hours. It could... A parent-teacher conference could be 15 minutes, you know? Hey, what is the goal for this year? What are we hoping to accomplish from the IEP? How can we work together? Some additional tips, keep a file or folder with specific dates and a summary of the important verbal conversations you have with the school. You know, again, great things with emails, we could keep threads, right? Those emails do not go away. But also have a folder on your laptop, you know, says your child's school, save everything there, all the documents, all of your emails, keep a copy of it. Because if you need to bring it up to discuss progress or lack of progress, you want to have those communication and be able to present it. Again, it's always facts and data and not feelings. So you want to keep those information safe somewhere where you can find it. Follow up with an email summarizing those conversations, what is pending and who is the person you need to follow up with. You see the teacher after school. You're having a conversation. You guys agree. You know, you're right. Johnny does need to have an occupational therapy evaluation. Great. Going to go back home, send an email to reiterate what you guys discussed in writing. Whenever you have a conversation with the teacher, put it in writing after that parent-teacher conference. So thank you so much for your time. I appreciate and quickly bullet points what you guys discuss. Because because, again, we are trying to avoid that misunderstanding or I never said that. OK, so put it in writing every time you have a conversation with anyone from the school, not just the teacher, anyone, the principal. You put it in writing. Create a digital folder to save emails and documents. We said this. Avoid using text or WhatsApp to address important issues. Again, you want to keep everything in writing because if we have to use chain of command, it's easier to have that email thread. So this page is very important because chain of command, okay? This is the rank that you want to follow. Always we start with the general ed teacher or the special education teacher when we need to address a concern. Then we move it up to the ESE chairperson of the school. That's the person who oversees the special education department. Sometimes the assistant principal acts as the ESC chairperson, but that will be the fourth person you will need to move up in the chain, which is the school assistant principal. Then we go to the school principal, the ESC regional center. And I think for you guys, you guys are the North Center, I believe. then the ESC district office, and then the superintendent's office, and then the Florida Department of Education school board. Again. How would you feel if someone goes straight to your boss, the CEO, rather than your supervisor to address a concern that they might have? So let's try to avoid going from the teacher straight to the region or the district or the Florida Department of Education. I'm not saying that you shouldn't address it when it's needed, but let's first start with moving up in the chain of command. And here's the reality. If you spoke with the teacher and she ignored your requests or your concerns and you go straight to the district, what they're going to do is reach out to the school first. Hey, this parent reached out to us. What's going on? And if they have noticed that you would never try to communicate with the principal, the district is going to say, handle it, figure it out with the parents. And then if needed, come back to us. They won't even intervene yet because they want to make sure the school can handle it first. So to avoid that, have your proof, do chain of command. And if the assistant principal and principal, they don't respond to you, then yes, go to the region and district. And we'll be happy to help you draft an email if necessary. But chain of command. And you don't want to burn bridges either. These are people working with your child. So you want to keep that relationship so that you can avoid any tension or, oh, there goes that parent. None of us want that. So chain of command at all times. Most of the conflicts between parents of students with special needs and schools are related to the violation of one of the six principles of IDEA. So Ivan kind of quickly kind of review what those are. As he mentioned, we do a Parent to Parent of Miami once a month on Saturdays, that three hour, I promise we keep it entertaining, presentation about the special education law, IDEA. And the more you know, the better. I promise you, you're going to feel confident in your meetings and be able to advocate for your child. And knowing that what you're requesting is real is real. So what are the six principles? Really quick. We have free, appropriate public education, FAPE. And I love what I said, because I said I always say this. You use that acronym FAPE. You'll see how people change their attitude. The second one will be appropriate evaluation. This is within the timeline that the schools have to complete an evaluation and what tools that they're using. and so much more that are involved. The third is the individual education plan, the IEP. The fourth will be the least restrictive environment, which is LRE, which is the classroom setting. Parent participation in the decision-making process. Always remember, you guys are part of the team. It's important that you participate in all of your child's IEP meetings or any meetings. And then we have the procedure safeguards, which goes over what your rights and your child's rights are. So these six principles ensure that your child is receiving faith and they all kind of work together. So I'm going to go over some scenarios so you guys can see how these principles work. And then I want you to think about the chain of command and who is responsible for the outcome. Okay, so scenario one, parent attends a formal meeting with school personnel at the beginning of the new school year. During that meeting, she signs consent for a psychoeducational evaluation. Six months have passed by. It is the end of the third grading period, so we're in March, and the evaluation has not been finalized. Student is failing several subjects, has an F in reading, a D in science, and a D in math. Student is struggling with homework, feels frustrated, and does not want to go to school. So the school personnel, when they're conducting an initial evaluation, I have to clarify that, like the first time having an evaluation done, it must be done within 60 days, okay? If they can't, the school must inform the parents that they're unable to complete it within 60 days. So in this case... If you don't mind, if anyone wants to say anything, who do you guys think in the chain of command, who should you reach out to regarding the evaluation not being done in a timely matter? Will it be the general ed teacher, the special ed teacher, the ESC? I'm sorry? ESE. Yes. You will reach out to the ESE chairperson and or the assistant principal. You could copy the special ed teacher in there. Yes. Yeah, so that would be the private school. They have their own email. You might have that. Yes, you have to be persistent. Persistent, keep pushing. And I think I even mentioned it earlier, when it's private school, It's a little bit different. Priority will always be the public school students and then the re-evaluation students that are in the public school and then private school. Sorry, but they do have their own departments. You can reach out to them, but you have to be persistent. I'm telling you from experience. You have to be persistent. But yeah, so in this scenario, we will reach out to the assistant principal or the ESE chairperson or both, okay? And then regarding the sixth principle, which one do you think is in violation? If you want, I could go back. Let me see. There are delay in the evaluation process. close but to appropriate evaluation because yes if you come to the status seminar we go really into details about it but yes so it is actually but but you are right because it does kind of I don't know what happened. Oh, sorry. Okay. But it can be both. Yes, because the procedure safeguards goes into details what your rights are. But in this scenario, it will fall under appropriate evaluation because an initial evaluation should be done within 60 days from when you sign consent. And I keep saying initial because if you're requesting for a re-evaluation, They call it within a reasonable timeline. So that's why there's not an actual date. But it should not take a whole entire school year if you started from the beginning of the year. I'm going to give one more scenario because I think we're running out of time. Maybe that's why this thing was going off. Student is eligible under specific learning disability, SLD. He has difficulty with reading, distractibility, makes careless mistakes, and tends to rush through the work. Student has the following accommodations. Preferential seating, extra time for tests, assignments, and projects, no penalization for poor handwriting, frequent monitoring, and redirection. The concern is the teacher is deducting points on written assignments for handwriting, grammar, and incomplete assignments. The child has a C in language in the first grading period and a D in the second grading period, and student is sitting by himself in the back of the class. So the chain of command for this one, you really wanna reach out to the teacher and the ESE chairperson. Because what's happening here, the child is not receiving their accommodations, and that's why they're failing. It's not being implemented. So we need to address this with a person who should be implementing the accommodations and the person who can make decisions, which is the ESE chairperson. So that's who you want to reach out to. And this will fall under principle number three, because this has to deal with the IEP. And also the first one for FAPE, for the Free Appropriate Public Education, because we are denying a child an appropriate education by not implementing the accommodations that is stated in a legal document of the IEP. So in this case, you want to send out in writing to request a parent-teacher conference, because maybe you don't necessarily have to have an interim IEP meeting. But address it with a teacher like, hey, don't forget he has an IEP. This is what's listed on his accommodation. If we continue not to see that, then I would recommend that you request in writing an interim IEP meeting so that you have the entire team there to discuss what's going on. Because maybe we need to look at other avenues for that child. Now, if nothing is resolved and the teachers are responding, chain of command, that's when we keep moving up, okay? You get the AP, the principal, and they're just disregarding, then we go to the region. Again, try to solve your concerns with the school team, but it's there if you need to. I have folders with the packet, so you guys can look at the scenarios, because I think we're out of time, right? Yes, no, where is... I don't know what time it is, but because we have two more scenarios, I'll do one more, and that's it, I promise. Parent requests a paraprofessional to be assigned to the child due to behaviors affecting learning and safety. The IEP team agreed to evaluate the need for a paraprofessional services. This is very important. Two months later, oh man, I can't Two months later, the parent is informed verbally by the ESC chair in a casual conversation that the paraprofessional was not approved. This is very important for many reasons. One, they cannot just verbally tell you, oh, no, your kid is not approved for any type of services, not just a paraprofessional, for speech, OT, anything. Everything should always be done, written down on a prior written notice. So nothing informal about your child not receiving services should ever be done. It should always be formally done, written, using a prior written notice. So in this case, you want to reach out to the ESE chairperson and the assistant principal to find out what's going on. And then this one is affecting principle number six, which is a procedural safeguards. Because if we don't have the prior written notice, they're in violation. It is important. And just a quick little point of why you always want to have that no documented, because if we continue to see that child eloping or is a danger to himself or others and they keep denying you that paraprofessional, you could use that as proof. Hey, I brought this up to you. I requested for these services. Clearly, what we have on the IEP is not sufficient. We need more support for our child. But you guys denied my kid to receive these services, you know, X, whatever. So. You always want that written down. No one can just tell you, oh, no, I don't think your child will qualify for speech therapy. Only the speech pathologist, after an evaluation has been conducted, can then decide if your child's eligible for services. And if they're not, again, please get that prior written notice. Okay? Never just a verbal no. It's accepted. Okay. So here are some resources or we pull some information. What I want you to leave today is everything in writing. Even if you had a lovely conversation with your child's teacher, you go home, reiterate everything in writing. Bullet points. Get to the point. Focus on your main concerns. Emotions and feelings we have to put aside. And I'm a parent to a child with a disability. I get it. It is not easy, you know. But facts, data always comes first. Anytime. So you want to put that in writing as well. And remember, you are part of the team. Your child's education. Work with the teacher. Have a conversation. Maybe bring donuts once in a while. No, I'm kidding. You don't have to do that. But Explain to them what your goal is for the school year. Let's say your child's currently in special education and self-contained, and you think that they're getting closer to being in the general setting. Have that conversation. Don't wait for the annual IEP meeting to address concerns on the IEP. If the goals are not working, have that interim IEP meeting, please, and make changes. Like Ivan says, those goals need to be specific and achievable within 12 months of the IEP. So we don't have time to waste, okay? And remember, the IEP, the purpose of it, It is for our children to gain skills so once they leave high school, they're able to get a job or go to college or just have that independent skill. That is the point of an IEP. It's not just to have things written on a piece of paper. It does serve a purpose. And it is our duty as parents to help advocate for our children to ensure that what is written on that piece of paper, it is being implemented and supported for our children. So thank you very much. I know I went a little fast. So sorry. But any questions or any? Yes.

I was going to qualify for like a one-off care. but you do have the private services like for RBC or something like that. And are they allowed to deny the RBC access? How does that work? Is there any way to like,

Unfortunately, yes, because an RBT is a private entity. It's not part of the IEP. And if you ever notice on the IEP, there's no section for the RBT. It is up to the principal discretion that they will allow the RBT. But that's why we keep everything in writing, right? If they allow some students at the school to have an RBT, but they're telling your child he can't have theirs, you collect that data. Every time that teacher complains, you save that, you know, to show proof. And UM card is really good where they do come out to the schools and observe and they could participate in the IEP meeting as well to share how to support that child. But getting a paraprofessional, and I didn't mention it, I'm going to be honest, it is very difficult. Not impossible, right? But it's becoming a lot more challenging. And I've been a parent to parent of Miami for seven years. When I first started, it was like giving it out like candy to like almost everyone had a pair. Now it's I'm working with a family and we're fighting. This child elopes, self-injures, and we are having difficulty getting a pair for that child. So. I would say so. What do you say? I think lack of, for a paraprofessional, I think there's a lack of, yeah, it's more just hiring. If you, the parent, know someone, the school district will do the hiring. Obviously, they'll do the background check and all that. But if you have somebody that wants to be a paraprofessional, you could bring that to the principal, and they will do their part and see if they can hire that person. So they actually ask for that. Yeah. Yes. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah. So, but, but having a pair of, remember it's more for safety, you know, I, and again, I'm a mom too. My daughter, she is a high supports needs child. She has CP. She uses a wheelchair, nonverbal. You have to help her feed, you know, feed her and everything. But you want to focus more on safety because we want our children to gain the independent skill. And I know Ivan said that earlier. It's very important. We really want to work on those goals. I know we want to protect our babies and shelter them, but yes. Yes.

Mm-hmm. Thank you.

Well, you have options. If you have a private evaluation, you can always present that to the school. Because if you bring anything private, they have to review it. And I mean, they don't have to use it, but they have to review it. And in a case like that, they might actually review. want to use the private evaluation. I mean, another option will be maybe, I mean, you guys coming out as well to support the team and helping the student or having the RBT come join in helping the child complete the evaluation process. So there are ways they can just say no, you know, especially if there is a concern that there is a disability. So they have to complete the evaluation. I haven't had a situation like that but I mean it can fall under the procedure safeguard under IEE if the school is not able to complete it yeah it is a possibility I believe yeah Yes. Yeah. Yeah. Because then you could do an individualized educational, wait, individualized evaluation education. Which one is the first? I forget. But it's an IEE where the district will go ahead and pay for a private evaluation if they're not able to conduct it themselves. Yes.

Yes. So we did, I personally did with my son, like all the evaluations I had for months. Different areas, different schools I had to take him and get evaluated by this psychologist, everything through the school system. And then when I had my ID anyway, I don't feel like it reflects what their evaluations were. So I have to ask them to actually give me the evaluations because it doesn't reflect. So I was like, And then they kept telling me that it's cold because the warning that we have to use for the IEP is so-and-so, but I'm like, but the Google Translate doesn't translate, right?

Yeah.

So, like, what, like, the faith and stuff like that, like, what can I tell them to, like, kind of make them understand that it's not going to apply to not having a plan? Like, what the evaluation that they did themselves,

So you're saying the evaluation is not showing up on the IEP, like the concerns. Yeah. It's like a generic IEP, like copy and paste.

It doesn't translate. It just doesn't reflect. It looks like it's two different things.

I would definitely request an interim IEP meeting and by then also that teacher should have been working with him and can give their input. Oh, okay. So you can, I mean, request, since he's not in the school, it's going to be a little difficult to kind of push for it. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So two things you could try to do. One, you could request for another staffing specialist to see if they're willing to listen to you and make the changes. Or once you enroll him in the school, request for an emergency interim IEP meeting to make the changes to the goals. They have about... They should... Two weeks to four weeks. At least 30 days, there should be a meeting for sure. But at least within two weeks, out of respect, they should at least contact you to talk about scheduling a meeting. Yeah. Yeah, I know that when they're young, it is difficult, right? But it's once the teacher gets to work with your child too, because honestly, like Ivan mentioned, even those evaluations, it's two days working with the kids. It's not really a true testament who our children are in the classroom. It's when the teachers are working with them, you get a better feel. Like I always tell my parents, if you can wait until October to have an interim IEP meeting so that that teacher knows can have some information to share with the team to adjust the IEP to reflect the student because now she's working with the child, understanding what the child needs. So sometimes, if you put him in school before the interim IEP meeting, send an email, have a conversation with the teacher, let her know what your concerns are while you're pending that interim IEP meeting to make the changes to the goals. Yeah.

Anyone else?

Okay. Well, thank you very much. I'm going to go ahead and pass out the folder so you could have the PowerPoint in there as well.

Okay.

Thank you.

Okay. . . . . Any time.