S/o school based therapists

amother

Brunette

Tue, Apr 02 2024, 8:24 pm

octopus wrote:

And now you are saying something different than you said before. You said earlier that you can't get an IEP without a diagnosis. False. Now you are saying a private evaluator can't write the IEP. True. What has one to do with the other? Please don't spout untruths. That's all .

I am not contradicting myself in the slightest. I said, you can't get an IEP without a diagnosis. An IEP is the individualized plan for a student with a learning disability. The diagnosis of the learning disability can be done by a qualified special ed person or school psychologist within the school system or the parents can pay privately for an evaluation and bring the diagnosis to request an IEP meeting. The evaluation report is the diagnosis, test scores, and recommendations for accommodations and services. It is not the IEP itself.
Besides where do you think all the public school kids are getting IEPs from? Do you think their parents are paying privately? Of course not, they get it through the school system. I've even sat in IEP meetings for kids who were in private schools, but this was their neighborhood school, so that's where their IEP came from.
I don't know why you are getting so mad at what I wrote. It's just the basic facts. Do you think I am making it up? I worked in public school systems for over 15 years.
Maybe you are thinking of 504s which probably is more along the lines of speech, o.t., et al.

amother

Blushpink

Tue, Apr 02 2024, 8:34 pm

amother Brunette wrote:

I'm kind of surprised that posters who are service providers in schools are not familiar with the basics of IEPs and how they work as well as what it entitles the students to. Are most of the students being serviced without IEPs? Is the government paying the agencies or the parents? I am guessing these agencies are geared to filling jobs in frum schools, but where is the money coming from? Just curious how it works.

Where do you live? I’m in Lakewood. Individual therapists don’t normally sit in iep meetings. It’s whoever did the evaluation and a representative from the agency together with someone from the school and a parent. So you can service a kid with an iep without having any involvement in the iep’s creation.

I used to work for a local agency and I also have a kid with an iep. Unfortunately the iep is just considered paperwork that needs to get done and isn’t given the attention it should.

The money comes from the government.

amother

Blushpink

Tue, Apr 02 2024, 8:36 pm

amother Brunette wrote:

I am not contradicting myself in the slightest. I said, you can't get an IEP without a diagnosis. An IEP is the individualized plan for a student with a learning disability. The diagnosis of the learning disability can be done by a qualified special ed person within the school system or the parents can pay privately for an evaluation and bring the diagnosis to request an IEP meeting. The evaluation report is the diagnosis, test scores, and recommendations for accommodations and services. It is not the IEP itself.
Besides where do you think all the public school kids are getting IEPs from? Do you think their parents are paying privately? Of course not, they get it through the school system. I've even sat in IEP meetings for kids who were in private schools, but this was their neighborhood school, so that's where their IEP came from.
I don't know why you are getting so mad at what I wrote. It's just the basic facts. Do you think I am making it up? I worked in public school systems for over 15 years.
Maybe you are thinking of 504s which probably is more along the lines of speech, o.t., et al.

For a private school it’s not officially called an iep or a 504. Those are public school terms. I forget what it’s called in the private schools but everyone refers to it as iep. You are not guaranteed to be serviced if you send to a private school.

amother

Brunette

Tue, Apr 02 2024, 8:48 pm

amother Blushpink wrote:

I currently work in a private school. Sure, there are kids with a "learning plan" which lists accomodations that were requested. It's not an actual legal IEP. Yes, the parents provided a diagnosis from a private evaluator, so that they can request extra time or small group testing or an assistant in the classroom. The school informally provides extra support but they don't bother to go through the actual process of an IEP (and some of the kids would not actually qualify anyway most likely). Now, there is an actual special ed program that is housed in our school, but technically isn't part of our school. Those kids do have actual 504s and IEPs, they have qualified special ed teachers and are basically in self contained special ed classrooms, with occasional mainstreaming for gym or art etc. (I don't want to name my school because it's a well known orthodox Jewish day school that has been mentioned on this site a few times.) I just mean to say, that IEP and 504 are not "public school" terms, they are legal terms and legal contracts/paperwork, if you will. But, private schools can run things a bit differently and they may come up with their own learning plans they refer to as an IEP, but isn't actually a real one, the type that is covered under IDEA.

amother

Snowdrop

Tue, Apr 02 2024, 8:49 pm

amother Brunette wrote:

How do you get an IEP with no diagnosis? An IEP is a legal document covered under federal law. But a diagnosis is needed to qualify for an IEP and to therefore be entitled for services. Are you talking about an actual IEP with a special ed case manager who is qualified to write one, or an informal "learning plan" that a private school put together to support a child that isn't quite up to speed? Because if it's the latter, then no. And anyway, it wouldn't actually be the school itself, it would be the school system that is supposed to be providing the services.

A preschool child with an IEP would be under the category of preschool child with a disability, meaning they scored low enough in testing to get services. Are you a school based therapist?

amother

Brunette

Tue, Apr 02 2024, 8:51 pm

amother Snowdrop wrote:

A preschool child with an IEP would be under the category of preschool child with a disability, meaning they scored low enough in testing to get services. Are you a school based therapist?

Yes, well that's still a type of diagnosis and used data to diagnose. None of this contradicts anything that I've said. No, I'm not a therapist but I've sat in many an IEP meeting with the school psychologist or qualified special educator going over test scores used to give the diagnosis.

amother

Brunette

Tue, Apr 02 2024, 9:00 pm

amother Blushpink wrote:

This isn't that different from a public school IEP meeting. There's at the very least the case manager/special educator (who might be the same person, or not), parent, teacher representative (doesn't necessarily need to be the child's teacher, I sat in meetings for students I didn't know at all), and a therapist if a specific service was on the table (doesn't need to be the child's actual therapist).
It's what is mandated by federal law, not state law. (I assume the agency representative takes the place of the therapist in the meetings you describe.)

amother

Latte

Tue, Apr 02 2024, 9:08 pm

amother Offwhite wrote:

Yes they’re within your scope of practice. Do you SPECIALIZE in one of those areas, instead of being a jack of all trades? People pay good money for a specialty. But you do need to put in many hours of work and be willing to keep on learning and growing.

Im thinking to specialize in myo. But I really love literacy and language thats my passion. I do that in the school Im in but the pay is just so terrible. I got my cs last year Im relatively newish to the field.
How many years have you been working?
How much do you charge for evals?

octopus

Tue, Apr 02 2024, 10:00 pm

Again when the district does the psych eval they tell the parents it's not a diagnosis. Maybe public schools have a different process, but you can legally get an IEP without an official diagnosis as long as the test scores meet certain criteria.This is how it works for non-public school children. They treat it as just test scores. They give a classification. One of the 13 legal classification as listed by federal law. The district administrator assigned writes the IEP based on the test scores. It's a legal document and it's just as legal as public school. If you are classified as an OHI (other health impairment) it is NOT a diagnosis. For example, ADHD or a diabetes can call fall under this category. Of course it's easier to get services with a diagnosis but the district will test non public school children at the district (for ages 5 and up ) and it is not for diagnostic purposes. Special educators are NOT administering or diagnosing. Back in the olden days special educators administered the testing at the district. Not anymore it's psychologists. I don't know where you live but this is how it's done in NYC.

Last edited by octopus on Tue, Apr 02 2024, 10:23 pm; edited 3 times in total

amother

Puce

Tue, Apr 02 2024, 10:13 pm

amother Daisy wrote:

I am a school psychologist in the public school system. I work 8:00 to 3:20, 5 days a week, 10 months a year, and make $85,000.

I’m also a school psychologist, but in a yeshiva. I only make a little over 60k and that’s for full time (9-4 M-T and half day Friday), 10 years of experience, and about 100k spent on tuition (masters and doctorate). I don’t regret going into the field because I love my job, but I do not feel like I’m paid my worth.

amother

Snowdrop

Tue, Apr 02 2024, 10:29 pm

amother Brunette wrote:

Ok that explains it, because your information thoughout this thread hasn’t always been accurate. In what capacity have you been in many IEP meetings?
That’s a classification, not a diagnosis, that any preschool child with an IEP has. Starting at age 5, in kindergarten, there are new school aged IEPs that have a different classification system, but not all students with IEPs have a diagnosis.

amother

Brunette

Wed, Apr 03 2024, 8:08 am

octopus wrote:

Obviously different districts may run things a bit differently but you are splitting hairs when you use this to accuse me of "spouting falsehoods" ( what's with your anger and rude accusations? I was honestly a bit embarrassed on your behalf) because it's splitting hairs at this to claim that using "classification" is a completely different thing than a "diagnosis"-- either way, they are found to qualify as having a learning disability. I was responding to a post that gave the impression her child had an IEP with no learning disability which makes no sense. If she had said her child was "classified" as having a disability that would have sounded totally different.
Again I don't know where your anger towards me is coming from, but you might want to think about toning it down a bit before jumping on a poster, because you didn't do yourself credit at all, no matter how qualified of a therapist or how devoted to your students you are. Maybe you didn't realize how angry and vitriolic your posts came across, but you may want to tone them down in future.