Tonight is the board meeting for our charter school & I was planning to thank the principal and board pres for being so supportive of my 6th grade DS (modifying almost every class for him).
But--I wanted to get your opinions about whether to keep it to that or say something else that's been nagging at me. Several of DS's PEGS classmates went on to the charter school with him and for the 1st time in the school there's maybe 8 in the class of 20. I hear the teachers & principal remarking about how awful the class is--behavior, mostly, but also work ethic. I have already talked to the principal that this is all new to them, they've never switched classes before, and they're assigned huge amounts of homework and big projects. My son is able to keep up. He's fine. There are others who have really struggled. When they miss deadlines, they get 0's and 3 zeros mean they stay for Saturday school. The first Saturday school was 8 days after school started! It's not an issue for my family (until we'd have to go), but philosophically I have an objection to no grace period for new 6th graders. It seems "militaristic" as one mom said. The other thing that makes me mad is that there is often a comment made like, "..and the PEGS kids are the ones who aren't doing their work". Part of me feels I should speak up for them. I want the staff to understand that they are "special needs" kids and just because they have high IQs doesn't automatically make them great students. Should I say something, or keep my mouth shut because it's not my kids and their moms/dads should speak for them?
