I was a Principal in a district that had its fair share of "Special Ed." students. We needed to meet with the parents of the students every year to discuss the progress of the child and have an agreement regarding the educational future of that child.
One year we had a grandmother in for the conference regarding her grandchild's IEP (required paperwork for all identified students - parents/guardians must sign off/agree to the Learning Support program for the following school year).
After the conference where the continuing educational program was explained (what we were going to do to help their child) we had both the Mom (who had been a graduate of the same school district and had also been identified as a "special needs" student) and Grandma (who came along to help the "Mom" understand what was going on) sign off (agree) to the program of Learning Support the next school year.
We worked hard at explaining that we were doing what we believed was the best for their child - we wanted to help the students be the best that they could be. Since Grandma's daughter had been through the program we felt that everybody would be understanding what was going on.
When we finished the meeting and everybody was ready to leave, Grandma floored me with this:
"I want to tell you, this Learning Support stuff you are doing is SO much better than that Special Ed. stuff that you used to do."
NOTHING had changed except the "wording." We just smiled and said "Thank you" and continued doing what we believed was best.
"They" don't want "Obama-care" but they WANT the benefits of the program.
HELLO!?!?!?!?
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