Witness to discrimination of my students with special needs in the most blatant ways, I grapple with how obvious common sense & basic decency to know the difference between right & wrong was so easily discarded--but through stigma from healthcare & current administration that relies on division (using our most primitive sides), fear of embarrassment (most people avoid "standing out") & unavoidable behind-the-scenes conversations that contradict the IMAGERY set forth, it is lack of knowledge to perform their job & no desire to help others that reveal tactics that allowed repeated violence to continue. After repeatedly assaulted, witnessed & understood by many adults, the physical scars are my past, the struggle to accept how easy it was to deny the MOST VULNERABLE & AT-RISK their right to an education under IDEA (Individuals with Disabilities Education Act) specifically FAPE (free and appropriate education) & LRE (least restrictive environment) when not given a classroom, the metaphor for equal education & A SAFE LEARNING ENVIRONMENT, during the 2014-2015 SY, the realization that what is happening today in politics with every action of the Trump Family is the same greedy, selfish, self-serving, disconnected to struggle or suffering & reveals NO compassion, empathy & IT IS DONE WITH FULL CONSCIOUSNESS. A school is a "mini" society with the headache of hierarchy & ineffective non-contributers but with control, power & dominion over 'lil lives, the moment administration walked out when violence erupted, my student self-harming & harming others, the smokescreen of bystander abuse revealed through the use of paperwork and evaluations. The ability to continue covering up discrimination & retaliation could only be done if it was allowed & no one spoke up, everyone who is complicit is just as guilty.

What is most devastating are the children who witnessed the treatment of students with disabilities who will take those memories with them & the denial of historical hardships of families who have suffetrd from stigma, denial of education, cruelty, bullying & why IDEA exists, to protect these kids from a public school system simply made up of people who made very amoral decisions. If we do not address children who self-harm & harm others by providing pragmatic skills, use the resources that exist today, model self-love & behaviors and structured environments while bringing families into the conversation without judgement, these children y will never learn to self-regulate & they'll become adults with no self-control nor boundaries. 

Witnessed those with no knowledge nor desire to help, but also the way they learned new strategies, devoting time & energy to deceive, the motivation to avoid consequence. Without consequence, they are definitely emboldened to do more, if a feeling of being protected by those around them then accountability measures have no place. PTS is a DISSorder of time. being in a school that elevates academic rigor & basic knowledge that a strong foundations in reading, writing & expression of self gives a child a great advantage in life.

A special educator must justify every decision with evidence, quantifying data is done habitually & also the driving force to know which interventions to maintain or abandon. Lessons must be from best-practices & state standards identified--the guidelines provided!  Progress monitoring notes & calculation of grades are a subjective thing & it's the job of any teacher or parent to help kids become stable & productive citizens, but also honest & that requires modeling those behaviors.  

A demand for transparency from any public official (local, state, and federal) since IT'S SO EASY TO LIE & after my privacy was dismantled when no one could be help accountable for actions done over & over, the truth is a pursuit IF YOU MAKE DECISIONS FOR OTHERS. The first step to ensure discriminatory practices that harmed my students, perhaps for life, their futures already on shaky ground, simply never happen again. There's protocol already in place for violent or "disturbing" behaviors exist to serve the student & not the need of the adults. Since this happened twice ib 2013 & 2015, violence ignored for 8-months & then 7-months, the FACT TACTICS ALTERED & THE REMOVAL OF A CLASSROOM FOR SPECIAL NEEDS WAS THE OPTION IS SIMPLY EVIL. I observed & documented the SAME BEHAVIORS NOTED IN TODAY'S POLITICAL ENVIRONMENT, the use of emotion is how greed & insanity succeed.

I promised myself 3 years ago that I'd give voice to every PTSD trigger not knowing what will happen, but trusted I'd be given only as much as I could handle. First, managing the physical injury, than SI (guilt concerning oneself), accepting I was part of a team that harmed kids, completed paperwork fully knowing RTI/BIP/FAB/IEPs were not being completed & the discovery how grades had no affiliation with performance/ability, working with the same caseload potentially for 5 years, when I attempted to use it as a motivation, it wasn't difficult to trace a way of thinking when simply told by teachers & administration that they "could not learn" & were "too low" when they needed their IEPs fulfilled.  

We owe it to future generations to learn from those that gave us a chance to live with less grief & suffering through the advancement of medicine, technology, industry, sport/entertainment & the laws we have will forever remind those of our values, not just what we hope to achieve. Since I do not right IEPs, but I can't ignore what I've learned, in creating the BETTER SYSTEM FOR EVERYTHING in direct relation to my experience both personal and professional when confronted with those that detached themselves from remorse & used a systematic way to abuse.