Response to President Obama’s Address to Congress from the Purple Party

Dear Readers:  I will apologize in advance for the following 1996 words.  Although what can one expect from a passionate crusader!

On February 24, 2009, Barack Obama, the 44^th President of the United States, gave his first address to Congress.  This was followed by the Republican response given by Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal.  I will now give the response on behalf of our children with disabilities.  I proudly represent the Purple Party. 

Puzzled by the Purple Party, are you?  Well, you shouldn’t be.  Do you honestly believe the United States is only about Democrats and Republicans; Blue and Red America?

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Egregious Myths, Tall Tales and violations to the IDEA 2004!

When your child is identified under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act 2004 (IDEA 2004), he or she is then the recipient of an Individual Education Plan (IEP) that will guide their educational lives for as long as they are receiving special education programs and related services.  As a parent you want to believe that each and every special education and general education teacher; along with the social worker, school psychologist, speech and language teacher, occupational therapist, physical therapist, counselor, principal and supervisor and director of special education, is working in the best interests of your child.  Unfortunately this is not always the case.  In fact, too often this is not the reality.

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Morning Joe, Basketball and IDEA 2004

You are one of the almost 13 million parents of America’s students with a disability.  Just imagine you had the opportunity for a relatively prestigious TV gig and question and answer session with U.S. Education Secretary Arne Duncan.  You are on morning TV with millions of viewers watching, waiting and examining the merits of your every word.  In fact you are the host of a growing-in-popularity, cable news and radio show and you actually have a teenager with Asperger’s Syndrome.  Would you have asked Secretary Duncan the following question?  What’s it like to guard Barack Obama in a basketball game?  I am going to take a leap of faith and guess the answer is no…or at the very least it would not have been your first or only question.  Well, I now welcome you to the cold, harsh, uncaring world of Reality TV and MSNBC’s Morning Joe, where I witnessed this egregious abuse of commercially-paid television airtime. 

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President Obama, the Special Olympics and the Mother of all Gutter Balls

Leave it to a comedian to loosen-up even the most practiced and gifted of politicians, legislators and Presidents of the United States.  On March 19, President Barack Obama became the first sitting president to go on Late Night TV.  And, during several minutes of a lengthy and “seriously” funny interview – at least based upon the more typically in-and-out vapid nature of Late Night TV – the following repartee´ was exchanged between Jay Leno and Mr. Obama.  Mr. Leno had assumed President Obama had “burned down the bowling alley” and our President assured him that couldn’t be further from the truth.  In fact, of late he had been practicing his abysmal bowling skills. 

 

President Obama – “I bowled a 129…”

Mr. Leno – “Very good….”  (with sarcasm)

President Obama – “It was like Special Olympics or something…”

 

Recognizing a political gaffe to the glee of Republican leadership and the hopefuls of 2012…Mr. Leno quickly moved the topic onto the basketball court where our President has both physical and oratorical prowess.

 

Still, through this painfully brief exchange Barack Obama bowled the mother of all gutter balls and revealed his ignorance regarding his citizens with disabilities. …

Read More HERE

Doctor scrutinized for drug-firm ties gets kudos from bipolar patients, kin

From the Boston Globe:

http://tinyurl.com/d7ef7c

Ann Arbor News: My Letter to the Editor

Letter to the editor -

 

Parents are supposed to send their children to school with the basic belief they will return home, safe, sound and without physical or emotional signs of abuse.  This is not the case in the Wayne Intermediate School District (WISD) and for far too many Michigan students with disabilities (and without) in both our public and private schools.

 

Physical and emotional abuse, seclusion, restraint, physical harm and even death have and are occurring in our schools, and far too often than written about in our newspapers or in complaints filed by parents.  Two Michigan children with disabilities have died due to abusive practices by education personnel and yet our State has no law that prohibits these practices in our schools.  The State Board of Education passed “standards” that prohibit only the use of “restraint” and with no requirements for teacher or staff training on positive behavioral plans, strategies or interventions. 

 

What will it take in Michigan before Governor Granholm (in her two remaining years and eventual legacy) and our all-too-term-limited Legislature; propose, pass and sign a law that protects all Michigan children with and without disabilities, from potential abuse and abusive practices in our public and private schools?  How many more children will suffer?  How many more will die?  And when will we be able to focus on the meaningful education of our students with special needs (30% drop out of Michigan schools); instead of the devastating distractions of physical and emotional abuse? 

Marcie Lipsitt

Seclusion and Restraint: America’s Children with Disabilities in Crisis

The National Disability Rights Network (NDRN), known to parents of children across America as their states’ Protection and Advocacy agencies, has issued a formal call to action with their January 2009 report, “School is Not Supposed to Hurt: Investigative Report on Abusive Restraint and Seclusion in Schools.” 

Parents are supposed to send their children to school with the basic belief they will return home; safe, sound and without physical or emotional signs of abuse.  This is not the case for thousands of America’s students with disabilities in both public and private classrooms in schools that cross all socio-economic lines.  Physical and emotional abuse, seclusion, restraint, physical harm and even death, has no idea if your child is attending a private or public school; if this school is located in an urban, rural or suburban area, or if it is wealthy, middle class or economically-disadvantaged. 

So what is “seclusion and restraint?”

Read more HERE

Executive Dysfunction Requires More than a Magic Wand

I was recently stopped in my reading-tracks, by an article in the December 3, 2008 issue of Teacher Magazine.  The teacher titled her perky little piece, “Teaching Secrets: Taming the Dragon of Classroom Chaos” (By, Cossondra George).  In the first several paragraphs, the teacher laments -albeit without excuses –  being “inherently disorganized, life’s simplest tasks can be overwhelming.”   She speaks to her “search for tools and tricks that will…exorcise the mighty dragon of classroom chaos.”

As I am always on alert for signs that a child is struggling with his/her executive functions… 

Executive Functions are the brain’s conductor to the orchestra. They provide us with the ability to do the following…and more:

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It is time to hold the national media accountable to students with disabilities!

In the 1976 film, Network, a nightly news anchor played by actor Peter Finch, says, “”I’m as mad as hell, and I’m not going to take this anymore!” And while I have no desire to meet the same fate as Mr. Finch’s character and be shot to death for my passionate stance on America’s abysmal special education programs, services and student outcomes… Nor will I be silent.

My reference to Mr. Finch’s decades-famous quote would be comical if not so disturbing, as my rant pertains to the egregious reporting of special education by a large majority of our national and local news media. I am sick and tired of misinformed staff-writers on our large city and national newspaper education beat…Literally, beating up the students with disabilities.  On a regular basis, there is another poorly written, inaccurate article about how America’s students with learning disabilities and AD/HD are bringing down their schools’ standardized test scores and ability to make “adequate yearly progress” under the No Child Left Behind. 

Read more HERE

What is the Difference between a Pit Bull and a Parent Advocate/Education Activist?

What is the difference between a pit bull and a parent advocate/education activist?  Well, with no intended slight to former Republican vice presidential nominee, Governor Sarah Palin or her comparison of pit bulls to hockey moms…the answer is still, lipstick.

I’ll admit, I had not thought a lot about Governor Palin’s statement other than to wonder why we would want a pit bull in the White House.  I was unabashedly and passionately an Obama supporter.  I also did not know much of anything about pit bulls (I have 3 wonderful rescue dogs but none are even part pit bull) and had not yet been the recipient of this label and persona. At least not to my face! So last week when a parent of one of the children I am currently representing referred to me as “our pit bull” I must admit it stopped me in my tracks. 

Read more HERE