Author: Suzanne Buchko

transitions, holidays & scratching

F8FE9971-36D3-4C2F-9DAF-16512D3E1919State of my world:

Julia’s head scratching has not abated with the delousing and aftermath.  She is losing hair and areas without hair are increasingly visible to the casual observer.  I think she is doing most of her scratching at night before she goes to sleep and when she is alone in the bathroom.  Anxiety, habit, stimming or something else?  Years ago, the way she finally stopped scratching her skin was on a three-strike-and-she-was-sent-home-from-school program.  It was radical and it worked.  I don’t know right now how much scratching is going on at school — I’m checking.  I don’t think that school staff would be willing to put such a discipline into effect.  Of course, if it is mostly at night, that it wouldn’t work anyway. I am in full worry mode.  We will visit our doctor next Tuesday and her shrink on Thursday.   OT is working on it as well. Needless to say, I am without control.

I spoke with a local reporter yesterday about Shabazz High School and my experience last spring when Julia applied for admission and was first asked for an interview and then rejected before the interview took place.  I talked about inconsistent messages and requirements, and apparent exclusion of kids with IEPs.  I told him that just before school closed for the summer and we were about to travel, how I got a call that they were reconsidering everyone who had applied and was rejected.  (I don’t remember if it was rejected without interview.)  Julia couldn’t interview before traveling and when we returned home, I check out the requirements again.  Julia had been summarily rejected for not doing grade level math.  Neither the requirement for doing grade level math nor her math skills had changed.  I decided not to put her through an interview.  I acknowledged to the reporter that the school has been good for kids there and I didn’t want to jeopardize the school for those kids.  And yet, what of kids like Julia?  I am conflicted. Continue reading →

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vote

I’m having a hard time writing.  With all that is swirling around in the greater Madison/ Wisconsin/USA world, with pipe bombs and the massacre in Pittsburg and the killing of Kroger shoppers in Kentucky–all just in the last week–I find it hard to take the petty concerns of my days seriously. Can we all vote now or on November 6?  Can we vote for Democratic candidates no matter how we’ve voted in the past?  We need to break the choke hold that the current administration has on the rhetoric of our nation.  I’m sorry to ask good Republicans, moderates, fiscal conservatives to betray your party.  But really, is it your party?  I find it hard to believe that the Republican judges I worked for and those I knew in the legal Indy community approve of what the Executive and Legislative branches of out federal government are doing.  Or saying.  It is horrifying to see a major American political party welcome Nazis, White Supremacists and misogynists into its ranks.  It is appalling to hear a president’s speak so disrespectfully of people, institutions, agencies that are vital to our way of life.  Today’s insult, to nullify the long-accepted constitutional guarantee of birthright citizenship in the United States via executive order is absurd.  He must know that.  It is, however, a great way to rally the racists.  And when it proves not possible, he will lie and say he never said it and those same racists will believe him.  How can you stand his lies? 3084 since his inauguration, some possibly not intentional but for a president to lie unintentionally is no excuse.  It just means he didn’t both to find out the truth. Continue reading →

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the dinosaurs are playing saxophones!

News Flash!  Three years ago it was a Dancin’ Dino. This year it’s a Sax playin’ Dino! Visit http://www.papercloudsapparel.com to order shirts, hats, bags, etc. in adult and child sizes emblazened with Julia’s newest design. Also, for those who missed the chance to order their own Dancin’ Dino, check this out: Dancin’ Dino stuff. Paper Clouds Apparel is a great organization! They sell t-shirts, hats and totes featuring artwork designed by individuals with special needs; they hire individuals with special needs to package all the clothing and 50% of the net proceeds from the sale of all merchandise go to a special cause.  Proceeds from Julia’s Sax playin’ Dino will go to SOS Children’s Villages which builds loving, stable families for orphaned, abandoned and other vulnerable children in 135countries, including the United States.

10.22-11.4-07

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lice update

I have a free hour and 24% on my laptop.  Time for a lice update.  (Musical introduction, please!)

Within an hour of publishing the last post, I had heard from five different sources, not all local, about an expensive but definitive lice treatment.  One of the sources was our family doctor (Julia needed a flu shot).  She related her own experience of a multi-month war against the tiny critters with a daughter who has long, thick hair.  After persevering for months, she brought her daughter to The Bright Side salon in Sun Prairie for treatment and the war was over.

Yesterday was two days post Monday’s treatment and Julia took a bath after her doc appointment, washed her hair and I combed it out.  I found many nits but I was still imagining that I could handle those nits myself. 

Comments and email kept coming in.   Continue reading →

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lice

133EA163-9A0E-4311-8F0D-9989F1E2855BWhere do I start?  I’ve been jotting and bursting out on the page for days about public and personal and private things.  There never seems to be enough time to edit and organize.  And I’ve missed my two half days of good weather to get into the garden.  And on Monday, I had a whole, impossible list with the ambition of the first cup of coffee residing in my belly when the school nurse called.  

Lice.

And any thought of business and house and garden and writing slid off the plate like an omelet on a Calphalon Fry Pan.

Backstory: We’ve been dealing with obsessive picking and scratching her head for a few months now.  It got worse after traveling and at the beginning of school.  Me and all the experts diagnosed anxiety. When Julia scratches, there are tiny flakes of skin in her hair.  At some point, those flakes “became” (via spontaneous generation, of course) nits (lice eggs) and I ignored the change.  Also, and of most embarrassment, during the weekend, Julia took a bath and was combing out her hair and reported to me that she saw a bug in her hair.  I said something like, Julia, don’t blame anyone else, including bugs for your scratching. Continue reading →

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heroes, seasons and homecoming

B92CB329-96DB-4F8A-A23E-0D485A239D79I began this two days ago and wrote more in the morning, the day after Judge Kavanaugh complained the his “family and [] name have been totally and permanently destroyed.” He also said what goes around, comes around.  I believe Christine Blasey Ford. I believed Professor Anita Hill.  These women have showed courage beyond my wildest dreams.  My thoughts of the season pale beside their actions.  I honor them.

Still, I write.

Ah, the turning of the season!  Last week or late the week before, I noticed a few fringes of red on the trees I see driving on the Beltway.  Why don’t I know the names of trees? I could say the oaks are redding, the maples show scarlet.  Maybe one day. Not today.  Closer to home, the ashes are yellowing and dropping those tiny yellows so that the street gutters are looking messy with yellows and greens and browns.  I love that clutter.  Every year at this time, I remind myself never to buy a house in this season.  The colors, the wind, the crackle of cold air, the smell of first logs in fireplaces and the clutter of leaves lining the gutters in streets—I would be romanced, swept off my feet.  I would not make a sensible decision. Continue reading →

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explaining julia

02019AFA-850F-4A69-9573-AF437A3175DEThis is, in part, an email that I sent to Julia’s Computer Art teacher.  She wrote yesterday asking for some guidance on how to work with Julia who has been unskillfully flirting with a few boys in her class, reacting to the boys’ awkward reactions with anger and swearing, and also swearing generally when she is unsatisfied with her work.  The work is learning Adobe Illustrator and learning it according to a teacher’s instructions.

My immediate answer to her query about Julia’s behavior was that I was seeing these behaviors more frequently.  

“Julia is showing interest in boys without the social skills or filters to appropriately flirt.  She is also indulging in swearing and anger.  Some of that behavior is her testing limits in new surroundings and with new teachers, and some is because there are a number of very disruptive kids in her math class and she is copying behavior.  However, Julia can control both the inappropriate flirting and the swearing and anger.  She needs a very firm hand and needs to know, in no uncertain terms, that the behavior will not be allowed in the classroom.  You might say something about how everyone needs to feel safe to learn and create art.  Julia needs to know that if she does not behave, you will ask her to leave the classroom until she can behave.  She likes the class.  She is showing me what she is learning almost every day.  She will not want to leave.” Continue reading →

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follow up & rugelach

CCCD0247-5F0D-4278-B8F6-9758819B1B5AAfter two reminder emails to my list of PTB (“Powers That Be”), Julia was picked up this morning in time to get to school on time. Her case manager texted me that her bus was on time and  she was not marked late during first period. I’m holding out for a week before I ‘get off my high horse,’ as my grandma used to say.

However, just because nothing is ever sweet and easy—This morning we went to the door three minutes before her ride has been scheduled to find the bus waiting.  I don’t quite know when it got there and I hadn’t received any word that she would be picked up sooner than her scheduled time.  I really don’t mean to look a gift horse in the mouth (Barb, lots of horse idiots today!), but it felt that it was just a wee bit passive aggressive to reschedule the pick up without any word to me.  Because the bus has been coming late, we have been going to the door just on time.  If we had this morning, the bus would have probably left.  I’ll swallow this complaint right here, because I know what response I would get.  I’m not even going to add to my thank you that a schedule getting Julia to school on time should have been worked out before school started.   Continue reading →

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to the PTB

This morning I send this email to everyone who I could think of–teachers, school administrators, district administrators and the bus company (I will modify this email slightly and send it every day to my list of PTB until the issue is resolved.  At last, for Julia that is.):

Good morning,

My daughter, Julia Schanker, is a sophomore at West High School and has been late to school everyday since school began.  

Julia is on the autism spectrum and has an IEP.  This year her IEP specifically states the she be on time to school.  Badger Bus is responsible for getting Julia to school in the morning.  Badger Bus has been late every morning since school has started.  To date, Julia has accrued six (6) tardy reports for first period during the first eight (8) days of school.  (There was no tardy report on the first day of school and I drove her to school one day.)

Last year, Julia was late for school every day until November 13, because Badger Bus was figuring out how to get her to school on time.  In order to get her to school on time last year, I wrote to many of you asking for help.  I am not willing to wait until November this year.

On the first day of school this year, I asked the driver why she was late. Her answer was, “there was traffic on Park Street.” For anyone using Park Street on weekday mornings, traffic is not an unusual occurrence.  This Monday, when I called Badger Bus, Bob the dispatcher, told me, “[t]his is only the fourth day of school.” Today is Friday, the eighth day of school and the bus was late again today. 

Julia’s untimely arrival at school is disturbing on a number of levels.

1. On the personal level, students on the autism spectrum, like Julia, need extra time to prepare for and reach their classrooms.  They need time to settle down in a classroom and they need regularity in their days to have successful days.  Worrying about getting to school, rushing to leave lunch and coat at a locker and racing to a classroom is a recipe for an unproductive day and eventually inappropriate behavior.

2. Legally, transportation is in Julia’s IEP and thus West High School is not in compliance with Julia’s IEP which is protected by the IDEA.  The IEP team also agreed that being on time to school is important for Julia’s education, thus, the district is contractually obligated to get her to school on time.  Finally, Julia is being denied FAPE.

3. School wide, Principal Karen Boran sent a strong letter to the West community last week about  excessive student tardiness.  She has initiated appropriate consequences for excessive and repeated tardiness to classes.  Badger Bus is not in compliance with West High School Policy.

4. Finally, on Tuesday, when I dropped Julia off at West at 8:20 (ten minutes after first period began) there were three Badger Bus vehicles dropping off special ed students.  I saw another vehicle driving up as I pulled away.  At the time, I wondered if tardiness was not a Julia issue but an issue shared by many, many students at West High School who receive Special Education Services and are transported to school by Badger Bus.  Indeed, this idea was confirmed by Bob the dispatcher when I spoke with him later this week.  He told me that he had a pile of complaints from parents and a large number of those complaints were regarding West High School.  

I look forward to hearing back from many of you over the next few days and to addressing this challenge for Julia and for all students receiving special education services quickly and effectively.  

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” . . . only the fourth day of school.”

“This is only the fourth day of school,” said the Badger Bus Dispatcher when I called I this morning long after Julia was supposed to be picked up for school.  Bob, the Dispatcher, who seems like a nice enough guy, called the driver who told Bob that he had been outside our house and waited for minutes before taking off at 7:51; however, we were outside sitting on our steps at 7:48 and no one stopped from the time until just after 8:00.  Give or take a few minutes and the possibility that clocks differ, the upshot was that I drove Julia to school and she got there at 8:20.  First period begin at 8:10. Continue reading →

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