Our son Cole is 16 years old and was born with Apraxia. He’s been at Access since he was 3 years old. The main issue with this learning disorder was his inability to speak as well as motor planning skills.
After looking into our options for help we decided to send Cole to Access because they offered the best option for our son. Honestly public school didnt have a program we felt could help him. Thanks to the succeed scholarship we could afford to continue to provide the best educational experience for our son.
We are a middle class family who struggles as most people do in these tough economic times. If we lose this scholarship there is a good chance our son would have to attend a public school, where quite frankly he would be bullied and picked on instead of being taught in a safe environment with other children with similar disabilities and educational needs. When looking into options for our son we discovered that the public school system’s special needs programs were designed more as a “CATCH ALL” program instead of being individualized for his specific needs.
We do not understand why a political groups are trying to defund this program. Even though our son doesn’t go to a public school we are still paying taxes that fund our public schools. If this scholarship program is taken away can we opt out of paying public school taxes for our child that does not attend?
Specialized schools like Access are needed and very much appreciated. It doesn’t mean they are any less deserving of economic help.
– Dominic and Stormy, parents