How to Prepare for an ARD Meeting with Diagnostician Chelsey Robertson

Rhandyl:

Hey y'all. So today we're discussing how to navigate and understand the public school process for disabled children. Those of you that have been through this process know how intimidating and overwhelming that this time can be. For me, I was clueless but I feel like I've learned every school year something new about the process.

And so today we have my good friend Chelsey on with us. She's a diagnostician in the Texas public schools system. She's gonna help us understand more about the process from the school side of things, and hopefully the listeners that are years into the public school system or those that have yet to navigate it, learn something from her.

I've known Chelsey my entire life. She's very compassionate and she has every child's best interest at the forefront of every decision that's made for their education and their school experience. And so we're, we're only talking about the Texas public school process today because obviously we are all in Texas, but we know all states have similar systems. So even if you're not in Texas, we hope that you find this episode insightful. 

Deonna:

Okay, so first of all, Chelsey, we just want you to introduce yourself and tell us a little bit about your career, your specialties, degrees, just whatever you wanna tell us. 

Chelsey:

Thank you guys for having me on. I'm Chelsey Robertson and I have been an educator for 16 years in the public school system and seven years as an educational diagnostician. I finished my teaching piece as a dyslexia teacher and then I went on to be a diagnostician. I've taught pre-K through sixth grade as a classroom teacher and then I went back to get my principal certification in 2021 and continued to be a diagnostician.

Rhandyl:

So we hear all these things about IEPs and ARDs and all these acronyms. And so Chelsey kind of explained to us the difference. What is an IEP? What is an ARD? How are they different? What are the procedures? 

Chelsey:

So an IEP is the Individualized Education Program. Okay. It's a legal document and it's a plan for the students' educational program. It's created by the team where parents are a part of that team, along with the teachers and administrators. Diagnosticians, any service providers, they're all part of that team that create the plan. 

And then the ARD is the admission review and dismissal. And it's, we usually say an ARD committee. Mm-hmm. When  the diagnostician might call you, they might say “would you be able to come for the annual ARD meeting?” Mm-hmm. And so that's what they use that acronym for is. Kind of what we're calling the meeting. Gotcha. But it's basically the committee that we meet together to determine eligibility for special education. We talk about present levels, their progress on their goals. We talk about the impact of the disability on their education and how that might look. Mm-hmm. The goals, we hit accommodations. Okay. That they might need. We get input from parents and teachers on that. Modifications- we ask about any health concerns that might have changed any medications. We also talk about the setting, the location where the student will be provided their education. That's a good time to request additional testing or discuss the previous testing. Mm-hmm. Plans for state testing and of course any parent concerns, teacher concerns, that's all part of that ARD process. 

Rhandyl:

So what advice do you have for families to prepare for these meetings before going in things they should think about or write down or ask in the meetings that will benefit their child’s school year?

Chelsey:

So it's always helpful if the parent can speak on the student's strengths, what they're able to do, weaknesses, areas that they have concerns with things that they would like to see different in the school setting for their child. We'll propose goals and if they have any feedback on that, whether they think that goal is appropriate, they would rather see additional goals, anything that they can provide to help us.

Rhandyl:

Yeah, because they know their kid best. Like they know like, oh wait, no, my kid's better at math than you think they are, or, yeah. You know, Their reading skills are way higher, like those goals are not appropriate, or they're a little too lofty of a goal, you know, so..

Deonna:

and I think, I think parents need to know too, like that have never done this before. I mean, I was a teacher for a while and when I walked into my first ARD two years ago with my daughter well, she wasn't with me, but I walk in there and, there's like six or seven people in there and I didn't know that was going to happen. And so that was super intimidating and I, I mean, I just remember feeling like it's all of them against me, basically at the beginning. And I know that was not the intention and that's never the intention for them. But I do think when parents come in, they have to know like, okay, there's gonna be a lot of people sitting at this table. It can be kind of scary sometimes. You have to kind of go into it knowing there's not gonna be one or two people in there. It could be seven, eight people. 

Rhandyl:

Yeah, I remember when Remi first started, so we, we chose to do… actually the hardest decision we ever had to make, I mean, besides a lot of her, like medical surgeries was whether we were gonna send her to school or not. Yeah. And I had already made up my mind that, you know, I knew after she turned three and that she could go to this it's called PPCD program through the schools. Right. And it's like a pre preschool for children with disabilities. And I was like, no way. I was so scared of her getting sick and all the things. Yeah. 

Then we, yeah, it's, we were at one of my nephews birthday parties and all these kids were running around and I had not seen her that happy, probably ever. She was so right, excited to be around all these little kids. And from that moment on, I changed my mind. I left there, I left that party, I called my husband and I was like, Remi's gonna go to school and we're just gonna have to deal with like, if she gets sick, it, she, it's just, she needs the socialization. It's so important.

And so we went through the whole process and I remember being.. I was a little forewarned cuz Remi had been doing therapy through ECI at the time and Early Childhood Intervention and they're also through the state and they're the ones that kind of transition kids into the school system and, if they qualify for the PPCD and so, oh right. I was given a little bit of a heads up of how the meetings were gonna go. Like, there's gonna be a lot of people and they're gonna have all these goals for your kid. And so, I actually took like a whole team with me. Like I took Remi's Physical Therapist, Remi was there with her nurse, and I had, I had like three or four people with me and not just for, just for support really, cuz I mean I was the one advocating and  in control, like of the decisions they were helping make for her. But I just felt like, you know, they, people had offered, “Hey, I'll come with you and just be there for moral support.”

But it, it still, even with having those people there, it's very intimidating. And of course we have to deal with intimidating things with our medically fragile kids in the hospital having to learn how to advocate with doctors. But this is a totally different cuz it's like about their education.

And I, yeah, honestly went in there not knowing really what, what Remi was necessarily capable of, and still to this day, I don't, it's just hard to know exactly. Anyway, so basically it's very intimidating when you go into your, it's especially your first one.

Chelsey:

I try during a referral meeting with our parents to make sure that they're aware of how it's going to go, who might be involved in the process, just to try to ease their mind a little. But I know that that's not near enough. It's still intimidating, but just to try to make sure and that meeting when they come back, whether the student qualifies or not, that we're gonna meet back and here's kind of the way it's gonna go. 

Deonna:

How do y'all feel about parents bringing in, you know, their tribe to be with them? Because I'm sure, I don't know if y'all are like, “oh, here we go..they have got four people with them; this is gonna be like a battle or something,” or I mean, how do y'all feel about that? Do you like it? Like do dads come in very often? Like, I've done two without my husband and he said he is going with me this year. So …

Chelsey

Yes. Like when Rhandyl was just talking about bringing in her therapist, all of her crew with her people most knowledgeable about Remi, that is always welcome and very, very helpful. As far as dads coming we have a mix of both- sometimes they come, yeah, sometimes they don't. Sometimes moms come, sometimes they don't. That's true. They're definitely all welcome, as far as bringing in people with that knowledge? 

Rhandyl:

Yeah, so typically there's an annual ARD, obviously, but there can be ARDs that happen in the middle of the year if something comes up that you need to change the plan. So. I mean, are there a certain amount of art you can have per school year? Like how does that work? Or I think we've done, they do some things called amendments, like they're small changes that I've done with Remi in the past. So like how does that work if you need it, if you come up with something later past the original art, like, Hey, my, my child I feel like needs this, you know, what's the process of changing the original ARD decision?

Chelsey:

Right. So yeah, you can call an ARD meeting at any time and then the other options are revision ARDs that we meet back just to make small changes to the annual ARD; that might change the service location where they might be getting their education, maybe less time in the special education classroom or right, more time, whatever they might need. That's when we need to do a revision art. An amendment is, like Rhandyl was saying, on small changes that just need to be updated to their plan that the district and the parent both agree on. Oh, okay. 

Rhandyl:

Yeah. So I think Deonna and I have completely different, or I shouldn't say Deonna and I, Allie and Remi have completely different educational experiences, so Remi's in the special education classes, every district calls it something different, like our district calls it Life Skills. But basically in a nutshell it is, it's overall the special education classes. So. And so over the last four years, she's been in a couple of different districts. And every district is different and how their processes work and how the classroom settings are and things like that.

Deonna:

Well and Allie's in the classroom and, we don't even have any special education stuff at her school that I'm aware of. 

Rhandyl:

She's in general education right?

Deonna:

Yeah. And so, and that was surprising too because I wasn't sure if her physical disabilities with no cognitive disabilities was gonna put her in a room. I just had no idea where she was gonna end up at the end of the ARD, and at that time, I didn't even know I had a say now. I mean, I did obviously, but yeah, that was, that was a learning process for sure. 

Rhandyl:

Well, it's super important that, that she is, I mean, if she's cognitively with her peers, that's where she needs to be. And so, yeah. Oh, for sure. I think sometimes in some cases like that, especially say with, with children with like intellectual disabilities they could, they could be in the general education classes, but if someone isn't there to really advocate for them.. I think sometimes, yeah, it's just kind of the process of things that they get put into maybe special education classes and they're not really learning or, or progressing like they should. And having families advocate for that and even teachers advocating that, hey, like I think this kid would do great in general education class.

So Chelsey, if that happens, I think Allie has an AT attendant? Is that something that they typically can do, I think it's called like inclusion. I mean, I know there's different ways that these kids with disabilities can be included in the general education classroom. 

Chelsey:

Yes, so our kiddos can also have, we call it inclusion, in class support, and it's just where they either have the special education teacher or a paraprofessional that works with the kiddo go into the classroom and be able to help support them with their needs in the general education setting. And that's typically what we would like. We want them to be included. We want inclusion for our kiddos so they are a part of the classroom. If it's their least restrictive environment, if that's the best place for them to be educated. Like Rhandyl said, the parents parents know, they know what their kiddos can tolerate what they can handle.

And then teachers, I was telling Rhandyl earlier it's, it's not that something can't be tried. If it doesn't work, you can go back and make those changes. If that's something you feel is what needs to be done for your child. 

Deonna:

Right, and like we were saying, ally does have an assistant and it's, that's something I was kind of wondering about because we actually were told after our art that Allie was going to have an assistant and I have a nurse that goes with Allie. And so at the beginning that felt incredibly unnecessary because she had this nurse with her who was going to kind of be that role. And we found the right person and it ended up being really great. But then I've also spoke to other parents who, you know, we weren't sure we even wanted one at first, and they gave us one.And then it's ended up being really great. 

But a lot of parents I've spoke with, they want that assistant for their kid and they can't get it. So how would a parent ask for that?

Chelsey:

Right. Yeah. So in just from an annual ARD meeting where parents would talk about the amount of support, teachers would talk about what's best needed in the classroom, and that's when you would kind of make those decisions about do they need additional support to help them in the. 

Rhandyl:

And help them learn and Yeah. Yeah. 

Deonna:

Like that's a request that can be made that day?

Chelsey:

Yeah. In the ARD meeting, that's typically when that happens, we talk about if additional support is required and so we put that into their IEP. Mm-hmm. And so yours is a, a different situation since you said she did not end up qualifying for special education. Yeah. So Not really sure on, on that piece where that would come into play. Yeah. 

Rhandyl:

So, they read these procedural safeguards at these meetings. And sometimes those, they're just kind of read through and but do you guys take the time to kind of explain these safeguards and,  what, what does that even mean honestly?

Chelsey:

So, yes. And on the procedural safeguards, we give those at every annual meeting. And then if there's a change of placement, we typically we'll give another copy of that and get a, a signature, like you said. Mm-hmm. Where it's just asked, will you sign this? We, Explain that it's the rights of the kiddos receiving services through special education, the annual ARD actually in the referral meeting, when we get consent, when we talk about that and we give your first procedural safeguards, that's when we try to go over those in more lengthy detail and explain those rights. It's a large document. So it does take a long time to go through and I always try to say, you know, if there are any questions about this, please reach out and make sure that there's no questions unanswered.

If you have questions about something and you're not sure, a lot of times it can be answered through the procedural safeguards. But if you're not sure where to look just always reach out and ask the, the district or, If you're comfortable with your reaching out to your diagnostician, they'd definitely be happy to go through that in more detail.

Rhandyl:

Yeah. So like I actually didn't sign at the end of the very first ARD meeting, I was a little hesitant because I wanted to really read through everything. And so I actually didn't sign right there in the meeting. And but I know there's like a timeline that these things have to be signed by. So kind of explain how that works..

Chelsey:

Right. So at the end of the ARD we talk about whether the committee mutually agrees with everything. And the two people that have to agree in the meeting, it's the parent and the district representative. So myself as the diagnostician, the classroom teachers, all the extra support that's in the room we have our expertise and our knowledge, but we don't get to agree or disagree- It is district and parent. Oh, okay. 

So at the end of the meeting, we we ask if you agree and then we talk about you have five days, or if you'd like to waive these five days, then we can go ahead and start this IEP effective immediately. So what Rhandyl was saying when she didn't sign, she basically decided not to waive her five day waiting period. She wanted to keep those five days. Look it over. Yeah. And if the district doesn't hear back from Rhandyl within those five days, then the IEP will go into effect after that. Yeah. So it's not like, oh, okay. 

Rhandyl:

It's not like if you just didn't sign it, then you just don't agree. Like you need to realize that you have these five days to look over it and if you want changes made, you need to reach out to the district and talk about that, those changes. But if you don't, you know, because like we said, it's a legal proceeding. Like there, we just can't willy-nilly decide what you wanna do when you wanna do it. Once you decide on a meeting date and time, you need to know that you need to make a decision within that five day period.

And so, and a lot of this can be done via email and things like that, right? Yeah. Right. Yeah. It's not like it all has to be done in person. But yeah, there's all sorts of ways to reach out to your diagnosticians, and I mean, all the contact information is typically on the district's website. If you end up having questions or you think of something after a meeting that you wish you would've said you know, that's why they have those five days for parents and, and caregivers to, you know, help figure that out and read over stuff. But don't feel like you have to sign things right off the bat, but also know that you, you need to, you need to figure it out.

Deonna:

Yeah. There's a deadline on it. 

Okay. So one of our friends said we were asking some of our fellow  disability moms about their experiences with ARDs and IEP and things like that, and one of them said, you know, “don't let them tell you that something can't happen because of budget, because that's not really a legal reason for that to happen.” So is that true? Cause I, I've kind of wondered about that too. 

Chelsey:

Right. No, it's not a legal reason for the district to say that they can't provide a service. It's definitely has to be based on an individual need for whatever service you're asking for, it has to be based on their need that they can't make progress on their IEP without such whatever you're asking for. So that makes sense. Just saying we don't have the money for it. No, that's, that's not gonna work. They have to have a real reason that. Prob a lot of data to show that like would student was making progress without this. Mm-hmm. Right. To say why we wouldn't do..

Deonna:

So, would that apply to hiring as well? Like for assistants and things like that? Because that's very expensive to hire an assistant, right? 

Chelsey:

Yeah. There would have to definitely be something to prove that there was a need for that. 

Deonna:

Right. Okay. Well, yeah, I've, I mean, I kind of had an experience with this last year because when my daughter was starting school, all the other kids had iPads and my daughter is a quadriplegic from like the shoulders down so that was gonna be a pointless thing to give her. And so they were asking me this may have not even been in the ARD, but they were asking me, what can she use. Because they had seen her using our computer at the house and they bought her that exact computer, and obviously that was pricier than the little iPads they're using, you know, but they,

Rhandyl:

 …and she uses the Eye Gaze right?

Deonna:

Yeah, it's, it's the MacBook Pro, but I mean, that's not a cheap computer, but they bought that for her because it has special face recognition technology, like it gets like the eye gaze thing. And so, you know, that was a really good feeling to me that the district was willing to put out that money to buy something for her that made her feel included, because they have a lot of iPad time so she would've just been sitting there doing nothing, not able to participate in the games or learning things. And as she gets older, that'll be super important. So yeah, I kind of had an experience with that where they were willing to pay for something that she needed. You know.

Chelsey:

I love hearing that. I'm so glad that they were able to do that and did the right thing for her in that instance. Yeah, because I mean, that's helping  her progress. I mean, that's part of her education. Like that's how she Oh yeah. Is able to do  a lot of her schoolwork, right?

Deonna:

Yeah. Well, yeah, and, the state loves to test our kids and that's going to be her way of taking those tests. And so without that, there wouldn't have been this easy way for her to independently take a test. So it was also probably for that a little bit but yeah, no, I mean, it made me feel good knowing, okay, they're not worried about the money, they're worried about my kid. And it just, it felt good, so..

Chelsey:

And to finish up on that one was, a lot of things will help a kid. It will benefit a kid. But one area that the districts will talk about for whether they'll purchase it or not, is whether it's that need, if they need it to make that progress. Cuz a lot of 'em, yeah, it would help, It would help a lot. Yeah. But they might not do it if not, so in Allie's case, she did need it. It was definitely needed for her. 

Deonna:

Yeah. I'm glad. No, I know what you mean. Yeah. 

Rhandyl:

And another, another parent had said something like, be familiar with the IDEA guide that Disability Rights Texas puts out, and that's a great resource. So what is, like, what is the, it's I-D-E-A guide.

Chelsey:

So that is the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act. It was. It's a federal law that was established in 1975, and it goes through and explains that school districts are required to provide free and appropriate public education to all students with disabilities. So they have to determine using the IEP, what is appropriate, what do they need.  It's a legal, Federal law that they have to provide services for our kids and that they'll be educated, just as our students without disabilities are educated.

Rhandyl: 

right. That's something that, I know personally I need to be more familiar with. Me too. Cause I'm, I'm definitely not, I mean, I feel like I'm learning rights and things, but it's probably something I definitely need to look into. And I assume that most faculty, staff members at the school are very familiar, or at least should be familiar with, with this cuz I mean, it's, it's a federal thing. 

Deonna:

I'm actually not sure if they always are though. Like Yeah, I mean, just being honest. Maybe the diagnostician is, but like everybody else in the room, I'm not really sure all the time. So you're kind of, yeah. 

Chelsey:

And on that you'll hear when I was saying Free and Appropriate Public Education. You'll  hear them talk a lot about FAPE and that's what that stands for.

Rhandyl

What is it?

Chelsey:

FAPE - Free and Appropriate Public Education. 

Rhandyl and Deonna:

Oh, see there are so many acronyms in these meetings. I know. It's so annoying. I just like, what does that even mean? Yeah. That's kind of why, why we're asking like, what does this stand for? Like mm-hmm. Because every, I just feel like it's, yeah. Like we said in the beginning, it is so intimidating, the whole process. It's just like the medical business. There's so many abbreviations. Oh yeah. For everything.

Deonna:

So I had another question that I just thought of, but you know, let's say that you'd go to your ARD and they're saying no to something that you feel very strongly about or you want, or you think your kid needs or whatever. And then you call your state, which I've done this before, but you know, you call your state I don't know the right word for it, but you know, the people in charge of the disability or SPED or whatever for your state education, and they tell you, no, that's not accurate. And then you go back to your district and your district is still like, no, we're not doing that, you know, for X, Y, Z reasons. You know, this is like a super generalized question. What do you do after that? Like if a parent is just like, I know that this is within the realm of possibility for me, but my district is saying no.

Is there that next step that a parent can do that's not, like so aggressive. I mean, I know some parents don't mind being aggressive. Me and Rhandyl have had to be aggressive in different ways. Mostly with like medical people, but but you know, this is harder cuz your kid has to go to that school. I mean, you don't want to be the wicked witch west all the time. You don't wanna be like those. Yeah, because you want, and I mean, yeah, you want your kids, you want them to like you and you want them to like your kid. Yeah, because I was a teacher and I remember when the parents were a pain, it was hard to like the kid. It was just like, oh my gosh. 

But what's that next step? If they're saying no, what do you do? Or is there anything you can do? 

Chelsey:

If you're still in that ARD meeting you can ask for a recess that's 10 days to… District to come up with something, parent to come up with something and hopefully reach an agreement of some sort. Yeah. If the ARD has already ended and Yeah, it was already agreed upon, and then you go back and you talk to someone and they tell you that that wasn't actually right, can request another meeting to try to get it mediated between the district and parents.

Yeah. You can also reach out to the district. Yeah. But there's always someone, the next step, you know, there's a superintendent, there's They always have their own local policies. Right. The director of special education is always a good resource. I don't know, I think bigger districts have their own, yeah for the districts. Yeah, they do. For our co-op situation, we definitely have a director and they, they can always be a resource to reach out for if there's questions to kind of go between and come up with something that works for both parent and District in the best interest of the kiddo. 

Rhandyl:

Hopefully  in the best scenario , if that happened, that you would come to an agreement. 

Deonna:

Well, and I think it's okay sometimes to call this date and just know, like even before your ARD ask, like, is this something I can ask for?

I don't know. I mean, because there's such random weird things that I might be asking for that Rhandyl would never ask for, and vice versa, you know? And so yeah, I mean, I think it's okay to just call the state  and be informed before you go in, because if you're not informed before you go in, it's not good.

Rhandyl:

Yeah, Chelsey was telling me before, like these things are changing so often these procedures are changing and if, if you for some reason have a diagnostician that's not as up to date with like new procedures then it is a good thing to obviously do your own research. 

Do you think it would be helpful to offer optional education classes for parents interested in knowing and learning more about the processes even before, or even during the school year? Maybe not even classes, but like a office time that maybe once a week for, you know, so many hours. You have these diagnosticians have an office time that all the parents that would be going through the IEP/ARD process has an option to go in and ask questions when it's not as an intimidating situation as an ARD meeting. Right. I don't, I don't feel like this is something that, that I've ever heard is offered. But I mean, what do you think? Is that something that, have you ever heard of that Chelsey, or is that you, do you think that would be something that would be good for families?

Chelsey:

Yeah, definitely for larger districts, I think that's something that could really be beneficial. They do have like parent courses through different service centers and things like that, but not specifically like a Q&A on the ARD process or how to navigate difficult situations during an ARD meeting, things like that.

And I think if even Diags or district representatives heard these type of questions, it might help with that disconnect. Mm-hmm. And help us understand more where we need to take more time during the meetings to make it more understandable or hit all the areas that you know, we go through our agenda, but there might be areas that need to spend more time on and focus more on for the parents to feel more comfortable with. 

Deonna:

Well, and I think too, after my ARD, I kind of instantly knew who I was gonna be able to call and email and who was gonna know the answers. And for that, it was one of the people at the SPED department at the main office, but she gave me her email that day, and I knew that she was gonna be that person.

And so it was nice. You know, who knows their stuff and who's gonna be able to kind of help you navigate with that even after the ARD, because things do change. But I think after those meetings, you kind of can tell who is going to be able to help you navigate the rest of that school year with your child.

Rhandyl:

Yeah, a hundred percent. And I mentioned earlier the safeguards. There's a, you know, there's so many different procedures that I'm not aware of, but the safeguards that we talked about that Chelsey explained, those are in the beginning of an ARD meeting. They kind of go over those and then at the end they usually go over the assurances. It's kind of, they kind of read those off at the end. And so Chelsey what are the assurances, what is that about? 

Chelsey:

Yeah, so the assurances are read at the end of the ARD meeting, and it's typically done by the administrator or the representative, and it goes over just we're assuring the parents that their student is only gonna be removed when necessary, and based on the severity of their disability, that they'll still be able to participate in those extracurriculars. Mm-hmm. And non-academic things. Yeah. And it's all gonna be done to the maximum extent appropriate. And it's basically, you're gonna hear that every ARD meeting at the end every time. Oh yeah. They read 'em every meeting where we, yeah. Yeah. So Yeah, when they say the assurances, it's just assuring you. Gotcha. These things.

Deonna:

Well, and when you think about this, this isn't a five minute meeting.  It can be a little lengthy and you have to be okay as the parent, holding them in there and going through every single thing and when you talked about the health thing, I think this is a good time. Because there's not gonna be another time where you're gonna have all these people who are making decisions in the room. Again, it's, you know, it's kind of your one shot to talk to them. And so even like last year, that was Allie's first year at school because the first year when she was in kindergarten, we had to do home bound cuz she was not medically safe enough to go to school yet. 

But last year when we decided she was going into school, there were so many medical aspects of her education that I'm sure they were all just like, oh my gosh. I mean, we actually even had the nurse in there so that the nurse would be hearing what it was like to take care of Allie and we have a nurse that goes to school with Allie and takes care of all that but that was my chance to tell them what my nurse's role was with Allie and what my nurse's role was not, you know, with the school. Like she wasn't going to be working for the school, her focus was on my daughter, and that's it.. and which, you know, that line got blurred, obviously, like there were kids. Mm-hmm. Always coming up to her for help and things like that. And she loved it. Oh yeah. So, I mean, it's a, she's a part of that culture in that room, but It was a time we had to come up with plans. 

And this isn't gonna apply to every disabled kid, but, for me and Rhandyl, our kids could just try to die on you at school. And we had to come up with, if this happens, you need to evacuate the kids from the room. So they're not all traumatized for the rest of their life and needing therapy and so we went through all these things and it made me feel good. Like, okay, they understand the severity of the health side of this. And that helped them also,, determine what she was gonna do as far as even like how long she was gonna stay at school, I didn't realize Allie could come to school late or leave early until that day, and those were accommodations they made for her because she just couldn't do that, you know, 7:30 to three o’clock schedule that the other kids are doing. So it's a good time to talk about all that.

Rhandyl:

Yeah, for sure. We, we started out Remi started out only going three days a week, half a day. And then the next year she went half a day, five days a week, and then five the third year she went. And so I think families knowing that, that those are options, especially with these, medically fragile kids. And knowing that, that the private duty nurses can for sure go to school with your kids. They may have to go through all the processes the school district makes them do, you know, background checks, finger prints, et cetera. Yeah, yeah. because I was very open and, and was like, she is never coming to school without a nurse. It is not safe. Yeah. And so, yeah, so that's definitely the time where you need to make sure I. Honestly, though they won't know until they see your kid do something really scary how actually important it is.

Yeah. I mean that's happened probably, I know for sure with us, and I'm sure with Allie, it’s..

Deonna:

Allie hasn't had any bad moments there yet, but, and I, something I had to realize is that, as a parent of a very medically fragile child, I don't, I, I can't care if the teachers or whatever understand why Allie needs a nurse there, because they don't have to understand that that's not their job.

And so you have to explain it to them because it is kind of confusing. Cuz on the surface our kids might seem fine, but it can go south real quick. So that's a good day to talk about that and help try to help them understand why this other adult has to be in the room that's not part of their school's culture, you know? Right. And I feel like I, so they become that way. 

Rhandyl:

And there's things I, yeah, and there's things I've learned even over the past year that I want to address in the next ARD meeting, because Yeah. You mentioned the nurses. I feel like sometimes because Remi's nurses are there they use them, not necessarily like purposefully, but I think the nurses not only are there for their medical care, but maybe in the classroom setting, they just kind of get in routine..but they're literally, they, they should only be there to care for Remi's medical needs. They are not their teachers, they are not the school faculty. Yeah. But yeah, so not only for talking about, you know, education in these ARD meetings, we need to make sure and express how important their medical needs are and, and what these other people are, their roles that they're playing in the classroom for  them. 

Deonna:

And if you're in a situation like us, I do think it's okay to tell the school, Hey, the school nurse needs to be there during that one because they need to understand what their role is in an emergency or something like that. And that won't be for every kid, but, in my case that made sense. But yeah. You know? 

So we hope this information gives you guys some insight into the processes of these meetings on both sides and how these decisions are made. I know for me personally, it's, it's hard because I want my kid to be treated like everybody else. But they're special. And there's just so many things about them that we have to advocate for them, for them to have a good school experience because it's not gonna just happen. It's the school working with the parents to make that happen.

So Chelsey, do you have any additional advice you'd like to share here at the end? 

Chelsey:

Just the one thing that I really did wanna hit on is don't wait and let things build. If you have questions, you know your child best. We're there to support and help you and navigate this whole process. But definitely if there are concerns, reach out to someone.

Deonna:

I think it could be a good idea to even have notes in your phone or something, and every time you think of something, if it can wait, you can put it in for later, but if it can't wait, address it right then, like you're saying, because yeah, with us parents, we're under so much stress as it is, and just when you do let it build like that, that can be bad. 

Chelsey:

Right. That's a great idea with the notes. And then just when you come to the meeting, knowing what you would like to see happen, having that list of all the things that you had questions about, ready to go. And like y'all just had mentioned earlier on the health, anything that y'all can bring to us that we wouldn't know otherwise to help make those decisions. That is so helpful.

Rhandyl:

Chelsey, thank you so much for coming on and hopefully the listeners have learned and taking something from this episode that they can use in their next meeting or their first meeting, whichever that may be. So, thank you so much for all of your insight. 

Chelsey:

Yes, thank you guys for having me on. It has definitely given me a different perspective and a different way to look at how I go into an ARD meeting and how to handle things more Parent friendly.