5states1year

The extra testing is basic speech and language and occupational. Not looking for ED but for more info to choose from. It's still independent party doing the testing and reports.

The Cohen Institute Psychologist, who is on our side, sounded like the extra testing will actually help confirm the autism. I kind of agree considering it will show he is emotionally together?

Hoping someone can help answer a question to help this sweet child of mine out. Background: We have been fighting with the school district for 2 years now. First full evaluation was end of 2nd grade where they determined his autism score was too low to determine eligibility and because his grades were fine he didn't need services, not even a 504 plan. Fast forward to December 2022, middle of 4th grade. Something happened at school that he witnessed and his school refusal behaviors (that have existed since preschool) escalated like crazy and then behaviors at home escalated in sync. I requested a new IEP evaluation process or an IEE based off the denial in 2021. They granted the IEE, saying they would probably come to the same conclusion with their own testing and I would ask for the IEE again at that point. We had a company called the Cohen Institute do all of the academic and autism testing. The results came back with an A-DOS 2 score of 7 for ASD which is right at the bottom cutoff. They did other tests and their conclusion is still ASD. The school district psychologist got the report and called the Cohen Institute to ask more about the autism diagnosis and request speech and language evaluations. Cohen Institute doesn't do those so we are back working with another agency for them plus occupational evaluation to ensure no more delays. Concern is this: the district psychologist said they wanted more testing to determine if eligibility category should be Emotional Disturbance or ASD due to ASD results being on the bottom end of the testing. Most of his autism tendencies show at home or when in new situations or uncomfortable and he "holds it together" really well at school. He has autism. We are 100% sure of this. He's 10 and still acts like a cat regularly for one thing, and so many other signs, plus psychiatrist diagnosis in 2021. But the district sounds like they might determine Emotional Disturbance as the eligibility category. So here's the QUESTION: How do we ensure ASD as the primary eligibility category? This is particularly critical in our case because we anticipate that no public school will be able to meet his twice exceptional needs (unless there's a self-contained classroom that will let him excel at his fast pace) and we can qualify him for ESA funding to pay for private school where he can learn at his own pace. But the category must be ASD for full funding to actually cover tuition. Not only that, but I can see that the emotional stuff (shut down and extreme school refusal) is a result of him not getting services for ASD. (He has missed 40 full days and over 27 partial days of school this year and many other days that were a huge hassle to get him there.) I'm also concerned that he will be treated differently for ED than ASD. Please help. I honestly wish someone could attend the meeting with me if they go this route that can advocate for autism but I have 7 kids and one income and can't afford any fees for an advocate so I'm pleading here to at least get some guidance. Post Note: This school has called CPS on us and the cops twice for "signs" of abuse or neglect like physically helping him into the building and him having his hair uncombed and smelling like urine one day. And when he refuses to go to a class but is on campus and not causing a disturbance, they call and make us come pick him up. His primary complaint for school refusal is that he's bored and learns faster than the other kids. However, we are noticing that he is starting to struggle with completion of problems when they are a challenge, so that is probably adding to the frustration of school.