Posted in Blitzen, Education, tagged Blitzen, Education, Family, Foster care, foster parenting, parenting, schools, support on June 11, 2013 | 2 Comments »
I got the following email today:
Lots of B tears today, I’m told, and lots of long teacher hugs. She really loved this school year.
Indeed she did. So glad that she gets to go back to such a wonderful, nurturing place next year. When I think about how anxious and unsure we were about school at this time last year, it seems millions of miles away. What a difference a year makes.
Posted in Blitzen, tagged Blitzen, Education, Foster care, foster parenting, parenting, schools, support, village on May 17, 2013 | 6 Comments »
This year make me smile. What a difference a stimulating, encouraging, nurturing, loving environment makes.
Our main goal for school this year was getting Blitzen to love school and to feel like a valued, successful member of a community of learners. All are agreed – A+ (except our school doesn’t give grades but the many pages of thoughtfully written narrative tell the story).
Posted in Blitzen, tagged Blitzen, Family, Foster care, foster parenting, schools on April 30, 2013 | 4 Comments »
Than dropping her hot pocket on the subway floor on the way to school. Just no way to 5 second rule that without contracting some horrid disease. Thank goodness for breakfast at school and teachers in tune enough to recognize a hungry grumpiness for what it is and suggest that a quick visit to the cafeteria might be in order!
Posted in Agency, Blitzen, Education, Equity, Uncategorized, tagged agency, bio mom, Blitzen, Education, Foster care, foster parenting, parenting, schools, support on April 26, 2013 | 6 Comments »
Andrew has written so thoughtfully and eloquently on this just now. But I really must add:
Suck much, New York City Department of Education?
I can’t recall how much I blogged about last year’s IEP experience. But it was ridiculous. And we are embarking on a different process this year and I guess I should say that I am glad that they didn’t break any laws this time. At least not yet. A year ago, it was like they read the handbook and reviewed the due process guidelines and then chuckled and said, ‘let’s do the exact opposite just to fuck with them’. It was theater of the absurd or candid camera or something. Every special education professional that we spoke to following that original IEP meeting in June of 2012 gaped at us in disbelief and said, “You’re kidding right?!?” to which we’d reply, “No, that really happened, just like that.” and the special ed person would say, “Um, wow, that is so totally against the law. They really can’t do that.” And we did in fact file a letter with the DoE explaining how they had violated due process and we requested mediation. In all their wisdom, the DoE chuckled again and said, “You are not this child’s parents. So, we don’t actually have to listen to you at all, foster parents, go away. Or have her mother file a grievance.” ** And we did maybe not the right thing but the most expedient thing – we said, “Never mind, we’re sending our kid to a place that values children and their parents (foster or otherwise).”
This year, they are simply allowing themselves to be guided by a very faulty evaluation. And because of the school we are in, a very expensive independent school that focuses on children and not tests of any kind, it doesn’t really matter much for Blitzen’s day to day existence / experience. We went to DOE for some support services, we need services and we got services. So, that is all good, right? As long as she stays with us, as long as we invest in her education at an independent school, it will be ok, probably. If she ever has to return to public school, this evaluation will be all that matters and I am not sure that I am exaggerating when I say that it would have a devastating impact on Blitzen’s education.
** Just an aside that if Blitzen’s mother, at this moment in her life, had the time, energy and where with all to take on a huge, intimidating, bureaucratic, death star of an organization like DoE, her children would likely be living with her and not in care. That is why foster parents exist, often times, to help parents do parenting when for whatever reason they cannot – be it for 6 months or forever. So the fact that a foster parent would be refused due process ON BEHALF OF a child in their care just goes to show that all of this has nothing to do with children and everything to do with power and oppression. And so I stand by my opening statement, so elegantly articulated – DOE sucks.
Posted in Blitzen, tagged Blitzen, Education, IQ, racism, schools, Team Blitzen on April 24, 2013 | 10 Comments »
People in relationship with Blitzen quickly recognize that she’s brilliant in many ways — curious, creative, quick to make connections, adept at learning new skills with her body, a divergent thinker, a problem solver. Carrie and I don’t spend much time talking about her intelligence; it’s taken for granted by all who know her, and we move on to the important stuff. Where do mermaids swim? When do you feel joyful? How do you make cartoon characters? How do you be a friend? What do you do when you feel really angry? How do you make Dolphin Cove into a real island? What makes a family? How do we change patterns of behavior? In the book Ingo, why does the sea call to Sapphire?
Blitzen and the wonderful folks in her life are wrestling with those questions every hour. That’s the work, that’s the joy. We’re Team Blitzen and this is what we do.
Yesterday we received a Department of Education evaluation by email. It came in upside down, but it can be read if you print it out or stand on your head. It’s filled with numbers and clinical-sounding words designed to distance and intimidate. The word deficient is used a lot.
Reports like that shouldn’t matter. Blitzen’s brilliance is an ontological reality; her intelligence and glee exist whether or not they’re acknowledged. My instinct, as a privileged, educated white man who does well on my culture’s bubble tests, is to ignore the upside down email and channel ee cummings:
While you and i have lips and voices which
are for kissing and to sing with
who cares if some oneeyed son of a bitch
invents an instrument to measure Spring with?
The problem is that our measuring is not benevolent. The systems of dominance embedded in our education and child welfare institutions are have consequences in the lives of kids like Blitzen. Evaluations like that have the effect (and, I’d argue, the intent) of separating undesirable kids from their peers and offering them an education with less creativity, less critical thinking, less joy, less humanity and less possibility.
This disproportionally affects traumatized kids, kids of color and kids in foster care. (If you’re a footnote type, 40% of kids in care are in special education and 50% of kids in care don’t graduate from high school.)
Blitzen and those of us lucky enough to be on her team won’t have the privilege of kissing, singing and swimming in Dolphin Cove without spending time, energy and creativity in the soul-sucking battle against the measuring instruments that prop up systems of inequity.
Posted in Blitzen, tagged adventure, Blitzen, Education, Foster care, foster parenting, parenting, schools on April 17, 2013 | 5 Comments »
Blitzen went to a nature conservatory with her class yesterday and they explored the Hudson River. She was very excited – they all put on waders and got walk around in the river looking for fish and stuff. They found 2 crabs and named them Mr. Crabby Pants 1 and Mr. Crabby Pants 2. I am not actually sure if they were crabs and sadly, it sounds like Mr. Crabby Pants 1 may have had an untimely accidental demise at the hands of the 3rd grade.
I never met a kid that loved to explore and learn and check stuff out more than Blitzen. During breakfast this morning, she asked if she could tell my about the river, again. I had heard it all yesterday but clearly, material this good is worth retelling.
Posted in Blitzen, tagged Blitzen, creativity, Education, Family, Foster care, foster parenting, imaginative play, parenting, schools on March 7, 2013 | 2 Comments »
Blitzen loves to dress up for ‘special occasions’. This week, the occasions included student government where she had to dress for success (she was proposing pajama day but decided not to wear pjs during her presentation) and the last day of the teaching fellow that has been working with her class. Next week, she will present at assembly her ‘special course’ (a class that she will be co-teaching next quarter with one of her favorite teachers) on mermaid tails and she is already thinking hard about what to wear that day and we are already arguing about the appropriateness of ‘high heels’ and mermaid tails as school attire.
Today, she composed a stunning ensemble of leggings, a grey tank top, a silver sequined skirt which she hiked up under her armpits and was wearing like a tube top over the grey tank, a purple belt not around her waist but situated high up on her chest, a silvery sweater shawl thing, white fur-trimmed boots and her new little purse (hand sewn made out of ribbon and an old tie!) and of course, a glittery pink head band. I really should have taken a photo.
Posted in Blitzen, tagged Blitzen, Family, Foster care, foster parenting, imaginative play, parenting, schools on February 15, 2013 | 1 Comment »
First, she excitedly tells anyone who will listen that she is the Queen. Then she relays the plot and finally, she starts bouncing up and down and yells ‘AND there are costumes! Can you believe it? I get to wear a costume!!!’
Posted in Blitzen, tagged bio mom, Blitzen, Education, Family, Foster care, foster parenting, friends, parenting, schools on December 6, 2012 | 2 Comments »
Um, hell no. No offense, NJ people.
Apparently, the moms and dads at school have been asking Andrew when we are moving to NJ or when, specifically, is Blitzen moving to NJ (or occassionally to Arizona or North Carolina). We have heard that several times a day for a week or two now, Blitzen has burst into tears and confided in a classmate that she has to move to NJ and won’t be able to come to her school any more. All this stems from a recent family visit. Biomom announced that they would all be coming back to her soon and they would be moving to NJ.
Now, I know, I get it — if Biomom had sophisticated parenting skills, we all wouldn’t be here. But really?!? How about some context, some planning, some something.
Andrew and I don’t think this will come to pass – 1) the return to biomom soon 2) the move to NJ. We’ve reassured Blitzen that even if that happens, we’ll try to figure out a way to get her to school. And we will — we’re quite committed to doing whatever possible to be sure that she gets to stay at her current school for as long as she can, no matter what happens. But that doesn’t really alleviate her anxiety and stress.
