Lowered expectations... how low can we go

I've given up on Boo getting an education. Let's face it, kids w/ severe disabilities in IL are second class citizens at best. You can only pound your head so much against the immovable wall that is special noneducation in this state before you figure out that something's gotta give - and if it isn't your determination to obtain FAPE in LRE sometime in your child's life, then it will be your very sanity.

So... son educated in admin bldg? Whatever. Has the privilege of eating a whole 3 days a week in a real high school? Aren't we just too lucky. Classroom has to be moved to a new site because admin bldg is moving to a HS, which is moving to a brand new HS that ... shock of all time, doesn't have "room" for disabled kids? Blahblahblah. So my son, the soon-to-be senior, gets the *honor* of actually going to a real school next year. Of course, said school is a junior high, in a community 20 miles away, because no one really has room for "those kids". He will once again get the privilege of being bused to a HS 3 days a week, just to make sure he gets a taste of what he is being denied. Like I said, second class citizens.

His IEP isn't followed, his aug. com. device has been out of order more than in, and pretty much there's not a chance in hell of anything meaningful ever coming about as the result of his so-called "education". Screw 'em, we'll deal with it ourselves.

But apparently, it is simply too much to expect that basic safety can be followed. My son arrived home today with a broken wheelchair because some lazy/incompetant/just-plain-stupid women couldn't be bothered to swing out the thoracic pad. This isn't rocket science here - the thoracic pad holds him upright in his chair. It swings out for ease of putting him in and out. Genius nurse informed me that Mrs. Clark "never" does that, but she wasn't there today. It was another pair of equally dimwitted women who put him in his chair so hard that they literally ripped the bolts out of the pad. Genius nurse and dimwitted pair apparently thought it was ok to send him home w/ the pad in his backpack and the raw bolts digging into his ribs. Why the hell genius nurse didn't insist that appropriate procedures be followed is beyond me... besides the fact that Mrs. Clark does a damn good job of intimidating the hell out of the nurses. I guess Genius is too cowed now to do her job at all. Wonderful.

I'm beyond livid. Means Boo will miss the last week of school (though truth be told, he's probably safer at home at this rate). I have left a message at school advising them that I am available to train staff since they are obviously incapable of basic transferring of my son to/from his wheelchair.

I cannot lower my expectations any more. They *must* keep him safe, must transfer him appropriately, must use the wheelchair as it was intended.

But, OTOH, being the cynic that I am, perhaps this is the way they will get him out of the school system at 18 instead of 21... graduation by endangerment, when it becomes too unsafe for me to allow him to attend. Certainly within the realm of possible when it comes to noneducation in IL.