Whistleblower Ohio Teacher Comes Forward to AbleChild on School Recommending Drugs in IEP

I have been a middle school teacher for the last 24 years. I have watched young people, more often boys, be affected by the pushing of drugs for ADHD. I, myself have filled out the paperwork a thousand times sent by doctors that ask the most ridiculous questions to attempt to determine if a child should be medicated to change the chemical compounds of their brain. These children are already going through chemical changes in their bodies as they are typically of pre-pubescent/ pubescent age.

One big problem that I have noticed in the schools lately is that they have not only been adding more and more psychologists/psychiatrists to the districts but they are adding social workers to schools at all levels (elementaries to high schools). They are even giving degrees and incentivizing teachers to get added degrees in social work to bring more social workers into districts. This is such a mistake. They are trying to add an element of parental trust by using social workers because they believe these people will get parents to do what they want in terms of signing IEPs, listening to drs, starting them on meds, building trust, etc.

I sat in an IEP meeting just last week with a parent and five other school professionals (psychologist, occupational therapist, intervention specialist, speech therapist, behavioral health specialist) where the professionals were concerned that the student wasn’t able to sit in his seat and not disrupt classes. The other professionals wanted the parent to consider medications that would keep the student from fidgeting so much and would have him be less “hyper” throughout the day. The parent was very clear that they had tried medications before and that those medications had changed who their son was and that their son was happy and sweet and they did not want to make any changes to their son’s personality. He doesn’t cause problems, he doesn’t act out or get violent, all he does is take laps around the rooms or step out to get drinks of water or walk around. The parent was clear that he was not interested in medication. These professionals would not let up and continued to push the parent that high school would not be as accommodating as elementary and middle school has been.

They were trying to intimidate and scare him into considering the medication. He was very clear that he was not interested but if they keep it up over the next few years, it will be hard for him to continue to fight that kind of push. I have seen it time and time again over the years, these professionals will continue to push this parent. They will continue to send emails and progress reports detailing the distractions that this child causes in the classrooms. They will continue to tell the parents that their child is causing other students to miss out in their educational opportunities because of his behavior. This will become overwhelming and I fear the parents will give in because they trust the professionals.