When IEP meetings turned bad
For those of you that don't know, autistic children in school receive an yearly meeting that involves setting up goals for them, as well as staying updated with the parents of the children. They are called IEP meetings, or Individualized Education Program. I hand't mentioned this before, but I dread these meetings. Why you may ask, because they do the same thing every year, and it's stuff that makes me look and feel stupid. How many credits do I need to graduate? Do I know what classes to take? Have you received help often? I've known the answers before I even came to high school, and the fact that when they check my grades, which is all A's but one B (I hate math so much), they act like this was impossible for me, and when they saw me after they checked my grades, they acted like my grades were a typo. To be fair, that's their loss and not mine, because that's not going to stop me from achieving my goals, but what does make me feel upset is when my mom has to be involved in this. When they invite her to the meetings, she asks a bunch of questions that makes me look bad, such as "whenever he needs help, he just needs to ask you, right?" I hadn't asked help since the day I came to school, so does it really matter? Sure, IEP meetings are more important to other families than mine, because it's actually useful for them, but in today's blog, I want to explain why IEP meetings are the worst thing for me.
I caught my first glimpse of an IEP meeting around the 3rd grade (I probably had one before this one but this is the first one that I remember). I really liked it because they were saying lots of positive things about me, such as how I was the smartest student in a normal class, all of my friends weren't autistic (yes they actually mentioned that), and how they won't be worrying a lot about my future. I loved those parts, that that's about it, every other IEP that came after were complete trash. The day of this IEP meeting was on a Friday, so on Monday when I came back to school, I told my friends about the IEP meeting. They asked questions like "what was it all about" and "why did you have a meeting and not us". Obviously, I was just as confused as they were, so I asked my mom after I came home. My mom responded that they didn't have a meeting because they aren't special ed. She started to cry. Once I went to my room, I got a little upset because I realized, they're separating the gap between me and every other student in my school with these meetings, which obviously didn't work for my mom cause she would've been proud of me instead of crying. From that point on, every single IEP meeting that came was pretty much hell for me. 4th and 5th grade's meeting were pretty such the same, save for a few goal differences and improvements. I wasn't happy about these meetings at all, because when I asked them that I didn't want to be part of the meeting, they told me that I had to be part of the meeting. I never understood why (and I still don't), but nonetheless, I wasn't happy at all during the meeting. Sure, they were still saying positive stuff about me, but what was the point if it made no advantage for me. I was still in a normal class (I was supposed to be in a advanced class thanks to my grades and test scores, but RSP prevented me from joining that class), my mom still saw me as inferior, and people were still discriminating me. It was more negatives than positives, so I viewed IEP's in a negative way. These IEP meetings weren't too bad, but once middle school approached, I actually had a better reason to hate these yearly meetings than before, and it began to affect me badly.
Middle school, lots of positive things to talk about, but there's way more negative things that makes things worst. The only positive thing that I could think about my entire middle school years was that my RSP teacher was nice. That was it, he wasn't supportive, nor a good contributor towards helping me. I'm going to skip to the eighth grade to explain something that happened. Basically, I had the grades to join a accelerated class in high school, and teachers were recommending me to join that class. The high school counselors denied my request, despite making the requirements. They made me go through lots of suffering because they were basically discriminating me right in front of my face. The worst part was that the school made no efforts of trying to get me in that class because they didn't care at all. It took my mom taking to the district just so they can take me in that class that I was supposed to be in the first place. IEP meetings were no different, as they just came up with goals that I surpassed the next year. I didn't need their help, so it was tough persuading my mom to remove the RSP support for me, as it was obvious that I didn't need the help at all. They would come in some of my classes daily, which was completely embarrassing because I wouldn't need their help at all, yet they would still ask me, do you need help? Do you need help? The meetings were worst than before, RSP was ruining my life, and I felt like no one cared about me as a result of them. I was being badly discriminated and it made me feel like I had no purpose in life. No one understood that, no one took the time, or even made the time to understand that I wasn't really live a good life at the moment. Because of these little obstacles, they were making huge impacts in my life, and the fact that no one had my back made things so much worst. After the eight grade IEP meeting where they ruined everything for me, I wanted to avoid them altogether. I managed to do this for the first few weeks. Whenever a teacher told me that my RSP teacher called her to notify me that he wanted to see me, I would leave the classroom and "walk to his classroom." Ya that's not what really happened. I went to any nearby restroom instead and stayed there for 5-10 minutes until I returned back to my classroom. I eventually got caught about two weeks later, when I arrived from the "RSP classroom" and the same time that the bell rang, my teacher asked "where were you." I responded "the RSP room, isn't that where they called me from?" My teacher asked "then how do you explain three calls from him asking where you are?" It was really terrible, cause no one understood that I didn't want to step foot in a place that was causing more pain than help for me. I don't want to make the aftermath story too long, but I basically got in trouble and I had to talk to the principal and the RSP teacher. They asked me a bunch of questions, I told them the truth, and they never bothered me again for the rest of the school year.
Now that I'm currently a high school student, how do things stand for me in terms of the whole IEP situations? Well, nearly the same in fact. IEP meetings are still useless for me (what a shocker!), since they do no help whatsoever for me and my mom in my opinion. I still hate going to IEP meetings since they say the same thing every single year; that I'm an exceptional student, I don't cause any trouble (school wise), and I'm going to succeed in my future. I still pass all of my goals, some exceeding them without even realizing that I had some of these. It's the same thing every year, and I just find it to be a waste of my time. I'm better off them helping someone in the same time slot if it means them receiving more benefits than me, in which I'm receiving no benefits at all from these meetings. On the bright (and way more important side) now, me being part of RSP doesn't influence the classes that I take in the future. For example, I was able to choose 4 AP classes for next year (seems like an overkill but I'm pretty sure I'll handle it), and even though somewhere in my transcript it said that I'm a special ed student, my grades made the bigger impact. I'm so glad that it's this way now, and I wish it has been this way a long time ago, since it would've saved me the suffering and the pain that I had to go through for a long time. Like I said before, this isn't the case with everyone. Some students actually benefit from RSP support, in fact I can even think of a few from the top of my head, but my point is that these IEP meetings that I've had for a long time has caused lots of more trouble for me and affected me in the long run. What they thought was better for me, was actually worst, not putting me in any accelerated classes being an obvious example. It just gets me really furious that I first started hating IEP meetings for one reason, then it escalates to a completely different (and worst) reason. I still don't like the fact that these meetings still open the gap between me and a normal individual in school, but if it means that over not getting my proper classes, I'll take the first one anytime.
Well, I finished yet another blog. I'm going to try and upload the rest of my blogs tomorrow since I didn't have enough time today. If you guys enjoyed it, why not comment down any of your comments that you may have. Also, why not follow my blog page so you can be the first to read my blog before I publicize it. Until next time, have a great day :)
People judge me, yet they don't take the time to know me
Middle school, lots of positive things to talk about, but there's way more negative things that makes things worst. The only positive thing that I could think about my entire middle school years was that my RSP teacher was nice. That was it, he wasn't supportive, nor a good contributor towards helping me. I'm going to skip to the eighth grade to explain something that happened. Basically, I had the grades to join a accelerated class in high school, and teachers were recommending me to join that class. The high school counselors denied my request, despite making the requirements. They made me go through lots of suffering because they were basically discriminating me right in front of my face. The worst part was that the school made no efforts of trying to get me in that class because they didn't care at all. It took my mom taking to the district just so they can take me in that class that I was supposed to be in the first place. IEP meetings were no different, as they just came up with goals that I surpassed the next year. I didn't need their help, so it was tough persuading my mom to remove the RSP support for me, as it was obvious that I didn't need the help at all. They would come in some of my classes daily, which was completely embarrassing because I wouldn't need their help at all, yet they would still ask me, do you need help? Do you need help? The meetings were worst than before, RSP was ruining my life, and I felt like no one cared about me as a result of them. I was being badly discriminated and it made me feel like I had no purpose in life. No one understood that, no one took the time, or even made the time to understand that I wasn't really live a good life at the moment. Because of these little obstacles, they were making huge impacts in my life, and the fact that no one had my back made things so much worst. After the eight grade IEP meeting where they ruined everything for me, I wanted to avoid them altogether. I managed to do this for the first few weeks. Whenever a teacher told me that my RSP teacher called her to notify me that he wanted to see me, I would leave the classroom and "walk to his classroom." Ya that's not what really happened. I went to any nearby restroom instead and stayed there for 5-10 minutes until I returned back to my classroom. I eventually got caught about two weeks later, when I arrived from the "RSP classroom" and the same time that the bell rang, my teacher asked "where were you." I responded "the RSP room, isn't that where they called me from?" My teacher asked "then how do you explain three calls from him asking where you are?" It was really terrible, cause no one understood that I didn't want to step foot in a place that was causing more pain than help for me. I don't want to make the aftermath story too long, but I basically got in trouble and I had to talk to the principal and the RSP teacher. They asked me a bunch of questions, I told them the truth, and they never bothered me again for the rest of the school year.
Now that I'm currently a high school student, how do things stand for me in terms of the whole IEP situations? Well, nearly the same in fact. IEP meetings are still useless for me (what a shocker!), since they do no help whatsoever for me and my mom in my opinion. I still hate going to IEP meetings since they say the same thing every single year; that I'm an exceptional student, I don't cause any trouble (school wise), and I'm going to succeed in my future. I still pass all of my goals, some exceeding them without even realizing that I had some of these. It's the same thing every year, and I just find it to be a waste of my time. I'm better off them helping someone in the same time slot if it means them receiving more benefits than me, in which I'm receiving no benefits at all from these meetings. On the bright (and way more important side) now, me being part of RSP doesn't influence the classes that I take in the future. For example, I was able to choose 4 AP classes for next year (seems like an overkill but I'm pretty sure I'll handle it), and even though somewhere in my transcript it said that I'm a special ed student, my grades made the bigger impact. I'm so glad that it's this way now, and I wish it has been this way a long time ago, since it would've saved me the suffering and the pain that I had to go through for a long time. Like I said before, this isn't the case with everyone. Some students actually benefit from RSP support, in fact I can even think of a few from the top of my head, but my point is that these IEP meetings that I've had for a long time has caused lots of more trouble for me and affected me in the long run. What they thought was better for me, was actually worst, not putting me in any accelerated classes being an obvious example. It just gets me really furious that I first started hating IEP meetings for one reason, then it escalates to a completely different (and worst) reason. I still don't like the fact that these meetings still open the gap between me and a normal individual in school, but if it means that over not getting my proper classes, I'll take the first one anytime.
Well, I finished yet another blog. I'm going to try and upload the rest of my blogs tomorrow since I didn't have enough time today. If you guys enjoyed it, why not comment down any of your comments that you may have. Also, why not follow my blog page so you can be the first to read my blog before I publicize it. Until next time, have a great day :)
People judge me, yet they don't take the time to know me
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