[janetrmi9443]

I saw this with my own eyes when I was a substitue teacher for a class of deaf students in a hearing school. One deaf student came up to me very upset, because she found out that she was not getting a real high school diploma. All she was getting was a certificate for attending this high school.Parents are failing to be their children's advocate. They mistakenly believe that the schools will take care of their disabled kids. The schools don't have the means and the staff to spend extra time with these kids. They need to develop an IEP and make sure the schools follow the IEP and also make sure themselves that their disabled child is on target with their education.I am a child of the 60's. As a deaf child, there were no such thing as special education classes etc. My parents were told to send me to a deaf school, which my mother refused to do. She helped form a group of parents that advocated for their deaf kids and petitioned the General Assembly to pass laws allowing disabled children to be put into the public school system. What everyone failed to realize was that not every disabled child can function or learn in a public school setting. As a result of these laws, a majority of schools that were geared to children with disabilities have closed down.As I said before, it is up to the parents to be their children's advocates. The public school system is ill equipped to educate disabled children.