In attendance were parents and guardians of children with special needs, siblings, the individual child, politicians, and advocates. The parents who spoke out made it clear on how important it is to be an advocate for your child. The stories shared took great courage and as a community we need to do something about how our children are being educated in the Public School system. The concerns that were shared included, but not limited to: schools not having related services in place at the beginning of the school year, behavior issues that are not handled properly (6 year old being arrested and put in a psychiatric hospital), paraprofessionals making fun of the child they should be helping, busing issues, taking away related services without any reasoning behind it, students feeling that they are "bad," a student being placed in a different school every school year because they don't know how to educate him, lack of communication with parents from the school district, parents not being informed of their rights, and educators not raising the bar academically. As a parent advocate I was outraged of what I heard and I felt the parents pain as they told their stories AGAIN, key word is again, a parent spoke about how she is so tired of retelling her story.
All I can say to all of those brave parents is, keep moving forward, get informed, keep speaking out, and as frustrating as it may be, know that your words are being heard and reform is getting closer. We all need to work together as team and as a community in order to reform our public school system. Parents/guardians spoke out in all 5 boroughs and the information shared was documented by the ARISE Coalition. You can still share your story by sending an e-mail to arise.coalition@yahoo.com.
NOW IT'S YOUR TURN...SPEAK OUT & SHARE YOU STORY BY LEAVING A POST BELOW!
