If Back-to-School Night Speeches Were More Like IEP Meetings

[The recent Supreme Court case involving what constitutes a free and appropriate public education has brought this old post to my mind again. Imagine the court cases that would ensue if every parent had to deal with what parents of kids with special education experience constantly!]

One of my favorite items on my list of reasons to go to back-to-school night is the opportunity to listen to an administrator give an ambitious, promise-heavy speech about what a productive year it’s going to be, how much the school believes in the kids, how much potential the students have, and how the school is going to do everything to help each student perform to the peak of his or her ability. Not something you hear around your average IEP table, where we’re programmed to expect “appropriate” instead of “best,” modest progress toward measurable goals instead of grand achievements, and outcomes weighted with a heavy dose of reality.

What if the principal got up and gave that kind of speech at back-to-school night? It might sound something like this:

Assembled parents.

This speech may be a little hard for you to understand, because I and the large team of professionals behind me on this stage know all about education and you know so little, but I’ll try to talk in terms you will understand.

This school year, the teachers and staff will be dedicating themselves to giving your children the absolutely most appropriate education for their particular abilities. We have assessed each of your children, and frankly, most of them are never going to amount to anything. They’re going to wind up living in your basement and working fast-food. We’ll give them the education they’ll need to work a cash register or a mop, and save you the money you’d throw away trying to get them through five or six years of college they’ll never use. We’re realists here. We’re not legally required to deal in dreams.

Since it is our strong and considered belief that kids do best when they are educated with kids exactly like them, without anyone who deviates from their perceived potential for achievement to weigh them down, we’ve placed your children on a number of educational tracks, from gifted to reasonably bright to average to below average to barely hanging on to here because the law requires it. Your child will be spending the majority of his or her school day, including lunch and recess, with children on his or her precisely and professionally selected track. Perhaps we’ll let them mingle at gym. If the state insists.

Our school has state-of-the-art technology and classrooms carefully designed to maximize learning, and those of you who have children who have been assessed as having the potential to grow up to become taxpayers and politicians will certainly enjoy seeing those tonight. For the rest of you, we’ve cobbled together a collection of dark corners, library tables, converted closets, and windowless rooms in which to educate your children. It’s not like you need a SmartBoard to learn how to say, “Do you want fries with that?” We’re all about what’s appropriate, and what could be a more appropriate classroom for a future food-service employee than a table in the cafeteria? You’re welcome.

We hope you will appreciate the tremendous effort we have put into determining just how much effort your child deserves, and that you will celebrate with us the stone-cold appropriateness of all the educational opportunities you witness tonight. Just to be sure, we have some legal paperwork for you to sign on the way out of the auditorium signifying your approval of whatever the heck we decide that appropriateness entails. Please note that attorneys for the school district will be stationed in the lobby by the bake-sale table to quash any complaints.

Thank you, and have a pleasant evening.