High school? Ugh....

Barring any unforeseen circumstances, Jake should graduate 8th grade this year. That means next year we start all over again. New building, new teachers and new unknowns. Thankfully Jake will know the freshman principal since it's the same principal he has now. That is small comfort though for the uncertainty we will face until school starts next year. They don't choose case workers until after school is out so Jake won't know who his is until school starts. I put in a request to have his chosen early but they told me it wasn't possible. It just wasn't a fight I wanted to engage in at that particular time. He doesn't really know many teachers at the high school but he does know some of the upperclassmen so I'm hoping that between them and his friends he will be able to make it through the first month relatively unscathed. We had his IEP a couple months ago to go over his issues and pick his elective classes. It went much differently than I thought that it would. Thankfully his current caseworker is well aware of his issues and made a point to emphasize them multiple times. She invited one of the nurses since that is usually a point of contact with Jake and told them he would be in to visit and they needed to expect the word vomit. There is nothing required on their part. Just let him vomit what he needs to say and send him back to class. I'm hoping they will be receptive to this. I think that once he gets to know some of the teachers, especially the science teachers, he will have a place to go when he needs to unload in case the nurse's office doesn't work. He's already eyeing some of the science clubs and I know two of the teachers and the head of the department so that might help. We also decided to have him take gym during the summer. He was not happy at first until we explained our reasoning. Gym class is high school is huge. Like 50-60 kids huge. If Jake took a gym class during the year there's a good chance there will be some students in there he doesn't mesh with. That is a recipe for disaster because Jake lets people push his buttons. But if he takes it during the summer, it's only for four weeks, Monday - Thursday, and he's done. Four weeks, half credit. Then he can take more classes during the school year too that he's interested in and get extra credits so he doesn't have to break his neck during senior year. Win win as far as I'm concerned. I'm worried about some of the teachers he might get as well. Jake has a standing order on his IEP to be able to leave class if he feels like he's going to explode. We've never had a problem with this item since Jake usually goes where he needs to (nurse), gets done what he needs done and goes back to class. I have heard that in high school, some of the teachers aren't as receptive to this need. Momma bear is probably going to rear her ugly head at some point during next year because I know Jake's rights. It's on the IEP, they have to do it. His case worker might also be an issue. I don't know any of them down in the high school but I'm really hoping he gets a good one. I try not to worry too much because I tend to borrow worry and it's not good for me. My goal is to make sure I do everything I can for Jake before school starts and make sure he knows where he can go if there's a problem. We have four years to tune his self-advocacy skills so that he's prepared to go to college. I'm confident that we will accomplish it and not let any of the bumps along the way derail us.