I've had no luck whatsoever explaining DS to anyone who doesn't want to understand.
I am considering having someone else do my explaining, because apparently I do not have the magic touch.
That's actually not a bad idea - does the 504 coordinator understand? I'd seriously consider asking the person who oversees the 504 at your school to have a conversation with the teachers who are being inflexible. There really are people who might *never* "get it" - but if the 504 coordinator can explain what they should be doing both from the disability angle *AND* from the legal compliance angle, and that should help.
Re the points taken off for missing art class - is this the same teacher you had issues with last year (sorry, I can't remember if it was the same school or not last year, but I think I remember the art teacher was difficult?). I understand not wanting to file a complaint with OCR at this point. How high up have you taken your complaint within the school or district? If the school's 504 coordinator can't help with it, you could consider writing an email to the district 504 coordinator explaining the situation. We've had a different situation with our ds (not the same issue, but non-compliance that was in fact a violation of the ADA that we could have filed with OCR if we chose too.. but it was fairly quickly resolved by bringing the issue to the 504 supervisor at the district level.
Sending you lots of good wishes -
polarbear
