Back to School ...
I didn't sleep very well last night. I tossed and turned. I had bizarre dreams. I woke up tired and groggy.
Today was the first day back for the teachers. The aides will be back on Wednesday and the students will come back next Monday. Our classrooms are a wreck since the floors were stripped and waxed. We had meetings all day today so I barely had time to even clean off my desk and chair.
We are a private special education school that specializes in severely emotionally disturbed students ranging from 2nd grade through 12th grade. We also have a special class that handles more severely disabled students through their 22nd birthday. About 80% of our students are co-funded by either their county mental health or other rehabilitative services organization. These students are being funded to receive intensive therapeutic interventions that coincide with the school day. Our meetings today revolved around how we can provide the required amount of academic instructional time and still meet the therapeutic requirements. What a precarious balancing act this is turning out to be. We are supposed to be providing 6 hours of academics and 4 hours of therapy all within the same 6 hour timeframe. Without extreme flexibility and cooperation between both the scholastic and the clinical teams this is simply not going to happen. We are each ethically bound to fight for the preservation of what we are there to do.
We brainstormed and tossed ideas out at the speed of light. Many were shot down as simply not being workable by one side or the other. Some ideas led to other ideas and we just kept rolling the solutions around until it really looked like we had scheduled the day to cover both academics and therapy. There may be kinks that we'll have to iron out as we move along but the spirit of cooperation that I saw this morning gives me a feeling of hope that this will all work out and that the students will get everything that they need in order to make changes and be more successful in their lives and that's really what we're all there for.
I had really been dreading this first week of meetings and trainings.
I'm glad that I was wrong. This was, indeed, a good day.
Today's Plan: Dinner at mom's house and a good night's sleep tonight!
Today was the first day back for the teachers. The aides will be back on Wednesday and the students will come back next Monday. Our classrooms are a wreck since the floors were stripped and waxed. We had meetings all day today so I barely had time to even clean off my desk and chair.
We are a private special education school that specializes in severely emotionally disturbed students ranging from 2nd grade through 12th grade. We also have a special class that handles more severely disabled students through their 22nd birthday. About 80% of our students are co-funded by either their county mental health or other rehabilitative services organization. These students are being funded to receive intensive therapeutic interventions that coincide with the school day. Our meetings today revolved around how we can provide the required amount of academic instructional time and still meet the therapeutic requirements. What a precarious balancing act this is turning out to be. We are supposed to be providing 6 hours of academics and 4 hours of therapy all within the same 6 hour timeframe. Without extreme flexibility and cooperation between both the scholastic and the clinical teams this is simply not going to happen. We are each ethically bound to fight for the preservation of what we are there to do.
We brainstormed and tossed ideas out at the speed of light. Many were shot down as simply not being workable by one side or the other. Some ideas led to other ideas and we just kept rolling the solutions around until it really looked like we had scheduled the day to cover both academics and therapy. There may be kinks that we'll have to iron out as we move along but the spirit of cooperation that I saw this morning gives me a feeling of hope that this will all work out and that the students will get everything that they need in order to make changes and be more successful in their lives and that's really what we're all there for.
I had really been dreading this first week of meetings and trainings.
I'm glad that I was wrong. This was, indeed, a good day.
Today's Plan: Dinner at mom's house and a good night's sleep tonight!
posted by Michelle at
5:59 PM
3 Comments:
Isn't it wonderful that something that you dread is not so bad after all and that something positive did come out. Now get some sleep with you ((((hug))))
By
Anica, at 8/22/2005 6:46 PM
Oh good, a huge sigh of relief. Glad that you got things accomplished and you are feeling better.
good nights sleep will do wonders.
;-)
By
Mermaid Melanie, at 8/23/2005 8:22 PM
I like what redpig said.That is a most wonderful feeling.And I'm noticing a change on your blog.Very nice.
See ya around Doll,
Jay
By
Anonymous, at 8/24/2005 6:23 PM
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