Not nice

I really don’t get it. Age 12 is typically 7th grade. And it is not unusual for many kids to start school a year late or repeat an early grade, so there should be many 12 year olds in 6th grade. I would agree if he was going to be two or three years older than the grade level peers, but we are talking about 1 year older? That is crazy. You do have input as a member of the IEP team. And I think it would be socially detrimental to suddenly change his grade level, too. From what you are saying, he’d turn 14 in eighth grade if left in the correcxt grade level. That makes zero sense that they wouldn’t allow him to be 14 and still in eighth grade. Are they retaining NO kids at all?

Janis

Actually if he would not skip a grade he would be 15 when he left 8th grade, his BD is in April. My son was retained in preschool in a different state, I have not heard of this school system retaining anyone. The problem has to do with funding, the school HS is suppose to take over for special ed kids at 14 and they will not reimberse the elementary school system. I do see why his being 15 for 2 months of the school year would be a big deal but they say it is. My son is not the only one being effected they are bumbing up a number of kids in the district who are not age matches. Luckily my DS is doing summer school and I do work with him. I have the 6th grade texts and we will review them over the summer so there is not such a big gap. Sorry about posting on both the teachers site and this one, but I remember way back when I use to come on that some people just looked at one or the other and I am looking for as much insight as possible. Thank you for responding.

Lisa

I am sure this does not really help but just wanted you to know that it is not even unusual for a 15 year old to be in eighth grade. My daughter had such a kid in her class—he was getting his driver’s permit as schol was ending. He must have been retained—but had no obvious issues.

I think it is a quirk there. Maybe you’d be better off planning to skip eighth grade and work like a dog to find a way to change things before that happens.

Beth

This varies from place to place. The system where I presently am has an age promotion law.

The reason for it is historical; back in the 1950’s and 60’s there were no services at all for special ed — they were lucky to have roofs over our heads, no libraries or gyms at all in elementary, and we *averaged* 35 in a class, a real money crunch. So some kids who would now be special ed were repeated and repeated in Grade 3 until they got big enough to refuse to go to school. Others including two of my classmates did learn and got to Grade 9 at age 17.
When the system was overhauled and modernized in the 1970’s, the pendulum swung a little far the other way, not only with regard to this law but to many other policies. Our system now has a law that kids must be in junior high (here, secondary goes Grades 7 to 11) by age 13, period. This means only one grade repetiton in elementary, ever. The unfortunate and unintended consequence is that essentially nobody ever repeats; when it would be useful in primary the administration won’t repeat the kid because what if he needs to be repeated later; and then by Grade 5 or 6 when they have saved up the repetition, it’s too late to do any good.
Originally when this law was implemented here there was supposed to be a transitional class for kids who were over 13 but not yet ready for Grade 7. This idea could have been worthwhile if it had been implemented as planned, but it was too idealistic for real-world pressures, overused in some schools and underused in others, and fell out of use.

Laws like this are in the basic education laws of the state and are pretty much impossible to get changed. In order to change the age law here, among all the other things, there was a five to ten year overhaul of the whole education code.

Your best bet is to continue the tutoring as planned. Spend extra time on math which is cu,umative so if you miss something you have real trouble getting back on track. Then in the fall he won;t be the only fish out of water in the next grade, and get him as much tutoring help and support as possible.

I still think federal law will prevail over such a stupid local law. I believe this can be challenged. It is contrary to everything an IEP is supposed to stand for. I agree with the idea of keeping him in 6th next year and fighting this like crazy before eighth grade. Contact Wright’s Law. I can’t believe they can get away with this.

Janis

Having his skip a grade sounds frankly rather crazy. Aren’t they afraid he would miss something? The other problem I see is though he would be old for his grade the big thing AS kids lack is social skills. There is the hidden curriculum (the stuff they don’t teach them) and this gets more complex the higher the grade. So, imo, he is going to miss out on some of these subtle little things that happen. I can’t see doing this on the basis of some silly local rule either.

—des

I don’t know your particular situation, but in our area the age regulation is NOT a “silly local rule” — it’s a provincial law, part of the basic education code. Since education in both the US and Canada is constitutionally a matter for the state or province, that’s the highest authority there is.

You could fight it up to the state supreme court, but is that really the point?

Depending on circumstances, sometimes you can get an official to find an exception or a loophole, but this would have to be done through the state/provincial government department of education.

There are other times where the local people just “forget” to notify the state offices, but your district has apparently passed this point — perhaps they were audited previously and told to shape up. Something like that could be the reason for the sudden change in plans for this student (obviously they’ve known his age for several years, so there must be a reason for this recent decision.)
It does no good at all to criticize the local people — their hands are tied by state laws and they may already be in trouble for having bent the rules so far. Your options are coping, private or homeschool, or state superintendent.

Students with more severe impairments get services until 22 years of age. If they are older in high school it lessens the time that they have to prepare the student for transitioning to the work force. Part of the remedial program in high school is to get the kids in the SDC’s into some kind of work program so that they can be taught functional skills to be able to support themselves in the future.

Is there a way to find somebody (local press? Probably not, but worth thinking about) that the school doesn’t want to look foolish to? (Unfortunately there might not be anybody). There should be a way to loophole this by citing the “individualized needs” of the student, though I can also imagine a school believing that they are meeting those needs.

Given a choice I’d skip eighth grade. It’s a disgusting year anyway. In sixth grade he can use his size to social advantage… though it could be a painful adjustment if he does that and then skips to ninth grade and is suddenly acting like the big guy… but isn’t.
I had a student in seventh grade who had been skipped from 3rd to fifth, then from fifth to seventh for similar non-reasons (no policy, they just thought “okay, he’ll never learn to read, why are we pretending?”). That kiddo had gotten used to dominating… being just regular size in a junior high was not a good transition. However, if your kiddo doesn’t consciously use his size, then if others are less likely to pick on him, that would be a good thing :)

The reason the decision was made it was best to skip the 6th grade and not the 8th is the set up of schools here. The schools are k-5, a 6th grade center, a 7th-8th grade center, and then hs. If he skipped 8th and not 6th he would go to a different school 3 years in a row. The 6th grade center does not change classes. The thought process is if he does 7th and 8th grade at the MS then he will get more use to the routine expected at HS. At the beginning of the year he will only go out for PE and Art but they hope to get him out more as the year goes on. They have several levels at the MS of special ed. His academic skills on group testing tested at the 3-5th grade level, when looked at individually through observation and school work his skills seem higher. He can read and understand the newspaper and was able to read his textbook on his own last year. The cross-cat class he will be in have students that function anywhere between the 4th and 6th grade, since his band of scores was 3-5th, they thought this the best placement. He will get speech/language therapy, ocial worker services, and the Autism teacher will consult with his teachers on an as needed basis.

Lisa

I work in the public schools and our schools are set up the same way some are K-8 others are k-6 6-8 middle school, 9-12 high school…

But what I mentioned…is a real senario for transitioning students with IEP’s their age works against them as there is still time needed to prepare the students for the future.

I know that this is an issue in High School with students in SDC’s to give them enough time to get the transitional training for work experience that they need before they turn 22. The Department of Vocational Rehabilitation is involved with this process as well in high school as the student services are transitioned from the local school district to the Department of Vocational Rehabilitation. and their remediation program selected for the student to be employed.

I still say this is a gross violation of least restrictive environment. If a kid is on an IEP because of educational delays, they can’t just skip him UP a grade! That will make him an extra year behind! You need to speak with an advocate or special ed. attorney. I am pretty sure they cannot legally do this.

Janis