Today was professional development day. So while many people had the day off, I went in for some training. Fortunately, it was a better, and more applicable, training than on some previous professional development days. Possibly because the child study team went out of district this time.
It has been my experience that when you are the minority in the district (and next to teachers, almost every one else is the minority), you often get shoe-horned into trainings that have little to nothing to do with your profession. While one training on differentiated instruction may be nice, when you go to the same thing several years in a row (I'm taking dramatic license here) it gets to be a bit much.
So what is a child study team/department of special education to do? Well your options include pushing the department agenda and getting the organizers of ProDep to get a special presentation just for the department; get someone from the department to do a training of some sort; or head out of town if you are lucky enough to find an applicable training on the same day as your district's day (and the district is willing to spring for it).
So today's out of district training was on interpreting special education law. I had been to similar a training last year and I was pleasantly surprised to see one of the same lawyers that did the presentation last year. The great thing about this lawyer, aside from some of the truly horrific and preposterous stories he had to tell, was his dry humor. I likened him to Bob Newhart back when he did stand-up.
I plan on recapping this training in a couple of posts or side posts. I'm doing this for a number of reasons: first, today and tomorrow are a bit busy for me personally; and second, I need a little time to organize my notes.
So not to leave you high and dry, I'll mention some of what you can expect in the next few days: email, PLAAFPs, parents, and bullying.
I'm sorry if this seems like a bit of a non-post but my private life calls.
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