Joel has been with his current EA (educational associate) for the past seven years. We approached the principal two years ago about switching Joel to someone new. We felt that "Barb" (not her real name) was getting too close, too protective and too motherly with Joel. She was starting to cross the line with some things and it began to really bother us. For example, instead of writing a note home to ask us to cut Joel's finger nails, she started doing it herself. Would a regular classroom teacher cut one of the regular student's nails? I think not. If we opted out of buying Joel books from the school book fair, he would still come home with the books. Barb would buy them for him with her own money. She hasn't done anything huge to tick us off...just lots of little things added up that have started to bother us. But the school pointed out that we wouldn't find anyone as attentive or caring as Barb and they wouldn't switch her out.
Three years ago, the school board had wanted to switch Barb to someone else. Barb's husband knew that my dad was a principal, so he phoned my dad and more and less threatened him to make sure dad did what he could to guarantee Barb stayed with Joel. My dad had nothing to do with the situation and tried explaining this to the husband. The hubby hit the roof and went on a tirade about how much Barb has done for Joel, that he wouldn't be the kid he is today without her and blah blah blah. This was the situation that sent up massive red flags for us...the hubby wouldn't be saying those things if Barb wasn't feeding them into his ear.
This year, the school has Barb working half days with Joel. The other half a day, Joel spends with "Max". Max is a wonderfully caring man from Quebec and we adore him to pieces. He's attentive, perceptive and has yet to cross over the line. However, there are still many frustrations that have occurred between home and school.
When we load Joel onto the bus in the mornings, we make sure he is strapped into his chair properly, his jacket is zipped up and his mitts are on tight (tucked into the sleeves). When Joel comes home from school, he is often lop-sided and flopping over to the side (his straps are too loose), his jacket is only velcroed shut and his mitts are falling off. With it being -40 lately, this is not acceptable.
The school has asked us to make certain changes in order to accomodate them. I'm not willing to make those changes for two reasons: (1) the changes would be an inconvenience to us and (2) the school doesn't accomodate things for us, so why should we go the same in return? A little tit for tat, I guess.
The one change they wanted us to make was to keep Joel in his electric wheelchair. As it stands now, Joel goes to school in a push-chair (regular wheelchair) and the EA's have to lift him into his electric. The school said it would be one less transfer for them to make (thus saving their backs). Joel's electric chair is too wide for our hall/doorways and the joystick would get in the way of Joel's activity table. So, this would mean us storing the electric chair out in the living room and us transfering him from his push to his electric in the mornings and after school (because he's too big to carry from his bedroom to the living room). So saving the school one transfer would mean adding two extra transfers for us. Um...yeah...not gonna happen.
This could strike a nerve with other teachers out there, but I also get ticked that the school sends homework for Joel. He's not a regular student and, given his physical limitations, his body works ten times harder than the other kids. So, when he's done school for the day, his home time is for relaxing and playing. I'm not going to sit and teach Joel about money or have him read stories about giant pumpkins. Joel knows how to read and how to comprehend what he's reading (the kid can re-cap all the gossip from Star magazine), but what the school doesn't understand is that Joel doesn't care about pumpkins or planets or quirky stories about lost puppies so he's not going to re-cap them as well.
I could go on about all the minor things the school does that irks me, but there are too many to list. What I do know for sure is that Joel will be done at his elementary school next year and will move to the local high school. Even though Joel is only in "Grade Six", he will be 15 in May and it is time for him to move onto more high school things. And we will be pushing as hard as we can to make sure it is Max and not Barb that makes the change along with him.
Now if you'll excuse me, someone needs a glass of milk and a punch in the face before he goes to bed (don't ask why, but Joel likes it when I pretend to punch him while he's laying on his pillow...I cock back my fist and as I bring it down toward his face, I roll him out of the way at the last second. Where oh where could this kid possibly get his warped sense of humour?).
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