Easy Peasy

Two weeks before school ended in the Spring we approached our school district about out of district placement for Mitchell.  I had visited the Academy of Excellence in Learning a month prior and fell in love with it.  To our surprise, our district agreed with our request but wanted us to observe a few other programs before making a final decision.  Let the touring begin.

The Academy of Excellence in Learning or AEL is an ABA Therapy school whose goal is to teach the child to learn and give them skills needed to return to their home school within a few years requiring little to no support.  It was unlike any program I had seen or heard of.  The ABA approach is what we use at home and how our therapists get results from Mitchell.  He has so much potential that our current school was not able to pull out of him but we see it at home. The director I met with and the staff were awesome to watch while they worked with the students.  I felt at home there and it felt as if all our therapists would fit right in as well.  It was a good match for our family and therapy program.


Over the past month I have looked at 3 schools and have another scheduled for tomorrow.  I visited each school with an open mind but all the while collecting reasons why they did not compare to AEL.  One school had a completely different philosophy of therapy then AB and required our commitment to their program to move forward - ya do not think so.  Another just made me feel sad and uneasy and was not much different in structure than our program at Butler.  The school I visited yesterday was the most promising of them but not as intensive as AEL.

So I emailed our Spec Ed director to tell her our observations will be done by Friday and we can set up meeting for next week.  I assumed I would have to provide a case as to why I felt their options were not appropriate for Mitchell and wanted to get the fight started if there was going to be one.  She called me almost immediately to say a meeting was not necessary.  She did not fully agree with our choice of AEL but was willing to try it out.  She would send an email to AEL and copy me in the correspondence to start his intake.  WOW!  This was all so easy and I was so relieved.  So happy and relaxed knowing this new chapter was going to be a good one and the progress Mitchell makes is going to be phenomenal.

I anxiously waited for an email and at 6:45pm I got one, but was not prepared for what it said.  AEL  responded to our directors intake request advising that as of July 8 they have decided to close their school. @#$*%#$!!!!!!  What the (BLEEP) are we going to do now??? UGH!!

Sighs, tears, giggles at the terrible humor in this, anger, disappointment and sadness.  This program was going to change us, our family.  It would be like having 30 hours of ABA therapy a week in addition to the 15 private sessions we have.  Now we have to decided between the other schools that I really do not feel are going to change anything because they are not all that different from what our school has been doing.  For whatever reason the AEL closed, I am happy we did not start there then have to switch and it is tragic they have to close but what about Mitchell?  What the hell do we do about Mitchell now?

I cannot think of anything else today, I am sick about it.  I guess the school from yesterday would be our plan B but I am hoping the school I visit tomorrow will really WOW me and it will all be OK.  Things are never this easy, as I should have figured out when our out placement process was going to smoothly.  We have little or 1 month to find a suitable fall option and I am very tired even thinking about it.  I thought I could relax.