interesting IEP meeting

Yesterday I had my oldest son’s IEP meeting and it proved to be very interesting. My son’s goal has been to “graduate” himself out of special ed, he has been working hard on this goal for almost 3 years now. His skills have improved dramatically. Yesterday he got his wish and “graduated” out of special ed. The
interesting thing is he was invited to join in another program that offers some of the same supports. Here is the plan, he will take summer school PE freeing up a space to take “SAI”. SAI is a study hall type class the difference is there are two regular education teachers in the class to assist the students. The class size is kept very small, about 5 students. The students are all in the same grade and taking regular sophmore classes. The goal of the program is to forster organization, study skills, ect. These students get the same accomodations my son had on his IEP, no points off for spelling, extended time, test read, ect. The goal is to help the students to slowly eliminate all the accomodations that they can. He is also being interviewed for
a special reading class. This class is filled by interview only, the student must be recommended by teachers or guiadance to even get the interview. Again the class size is small. The students in this class are not as far behind in reading as the ones in my sons current reading skills class. Both these classes are geared for students who need assistance but not neccissarily special ed. The reason for the recommendation, interview policies is the classes are geared for students who are highly motiviated, the student will not be accepted if they do not show strong motiviation. Neither of these classes are listed in the school handbook or student course catalog. I was curious if there were other schools out there with the same style program? My son is
doing very well this year he is currently maintaining a B in every class except language. I think moving him out of special ed which is what he wanted is going to prove a good move (I hope).