Episode 6 - Kim

Episode 6 - Kim: Audio automatically transcribed by Sonix

Episode 6 - Kim: this mp3 audio file was automatically transcribed by Sonix with the best speech-to-text algorithms. This transcript may contain errors.

Malia:
You're listening to The Autistic Tea Party podcast, I'm Malia.

Cat:
And I'm Cat. And together, we will be your hosts as we explore some of the hottest topics in the autistic and neurodivergent communities at large.

Malia:
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Malia:
Hello, everyone. Today we have Kimberly Kizito, known as the IEP strategist on Tiktok to talk with us today all about IEPs. We're so excited for this episode. Everybody always has questions about IEPs every single day with kids of varying ages. So, Kim, can you tell us a little bit about yourself?

Kim :
Sure. Well, the IEP strategist is just the title I came up with because advocate just sounded boring. But I have been a parent advocate for over 13 years. I have two kids and my 15 year old is autistic and also has ADHD. Generalized Anxiety Disorder probably would have a few other letters, but we decided to stop there. And then I have an eight year old that has ADHD and I became an advocate after working in insurance for ironically for so many years and having an autistic daughter and kind of not feeling like I understood the process and really wasn't feeling like I was an equal part of the IEP team. And so I would ask questions and they would say, well, we don't have this or have that and you get that motherly instinct. So I became I started working for a I kind of was doing it on my own. And then I actually had to use an advocate with my daughter from kindergarten to first grade. And I thought it was a nonprofit. And so I didn't ask for it. And I thought she was a volunteer. And I was like, this seems really cool. I want to do this, can I be a volunteer? And she just laughed at me just like, well, first of all, I get paid. Second of all, you know, this is this job kind of requires a lot of research of training, like, OK, but she kind of stayed around and, you know, hiring me later. And then this was in South Carolina and we moved and I wasn't sure if I was going to continue to do it. And I continued and ironically, covid kind of helped me branch out. So I was doing local IEPs where I would sit in the meetings in person and then it happened and all of a sudden can do everything online.

Kim :
And so I have been handling IEPs and I need one of those maps where you scratch off the stage. I couldn't tell you how many states that I've done now, but I'm in North Carolina and I've actually only done like three in North Carolina this year. The majority of them are actually West Coast or California, Texas and Texas, and that was West Coast. But I handle them all over the United States. And so using Tiktok as this old lady here that decided I was going to make some videos on Tiktok has really branched out and really provided me a platform to do as much as I can to help others. And Robin was the one who started it with her. I thought Tiktok was animals talking to each other and little things that I would watch it with my kids. My six year old family put it was like, you know, you can you could there's like slides to Tiktok. And I'm I'm a 52 year old woman. I'm looking at these things like like Snapchat and all those things where I was like, OK, that's for the kids. And so I'd watch it with my six year old waiting for the bus and we'd watch little dances, little dogs talking to each other and stuff like that. And then somebody posted one of our teachers, Tiktok. And that's why I said all this adult on here. Oh, maybe I should start talking about. And that was January and twenty something thousand followers later. I've got lots of people that I've been able to help, so.

Cat:
That's amazing. And so, so, so, so, so, so necessary, because, I mean, as you know, especially being an advocate and being in the trenches of this stuff, the IEPs are just so incredibly difficult to navigate, especially for parents who just, you know, like you just find out that your child has a disability and they're going into kindergarten. And you've never heard any of this stuff before. And at the risk of sounding a little pessimistic or negative about the schools, well, schools love to play down what you can and cannot have access to

Kim :
Not pessimistic at all!

Cat:
I mean, it's realistic because at the end of the day, the less money they can spend per student, they're going to. And so a lot of parents end up getting railroaded and steamrolled in these meetings where the power dynamics are nuts because you've got the school like the S&P, the OTTI, the, you know,

Kim :
Have 20 people in the room, and you

Cat:
Have 20 people in the room and you and then they're all talking at you and it's incredibly overwhelming. So, like, this is such like this is going to be and it's such an important topic to talk about to help empower parents. And I think that your account is just incredible for that. And it's such a light and so necessary in the community because so many people would feel so alone without people like you out there letting them know that they actually do have power in these situations.

Kim :
It's very frustrating to and I mean the process, and it's all it's not unlike anything else. I don't know if I have a- I am an adult with ADHD. And so I have a unique ability, which is not really all that unique to hyperfocus and have special interests. And I just happened to be a special interest. And so I've kind of made a career out of it. But it it it comes very easy to me. And so because it comes so when we have certain things that we consider a gift or superpower is not the thing. The word of the day, I can't stand anyway, that's all. But it's not just something I like doing, like intricate rules of a rule follower and stuff like that, but. You don't recognize that what comes easy for you doesn't always come easy for someone else, and so there's times where I find myself,"Malia, you are you know, you're so good at writing these articles and so on so forth", just like anybody can do this and then you realize, no, everybody can. You know, I was like, honey, that's your gift.

Kim :
So be thankful for it and then go out and do good in the world. And so when people say that they're hard to navigate and everything, I I had to step back and not say they're not hard to navigate because they really are. If you think about it as a parent and I think back to when my daughter was diagnosed and going into the school system and what I thought of the school system is like all schools would be great and everybody is there to help. And I'm torn. And my mother is a retired teacher and things are different a little bit nowadays and. Then you realize that maybe you're not. You don't necessarily trust everybody all of a sudden and maybe not what it's supposed to be, and you already have a child that is struggling in any one of these areas or all of the areas, academic, social, emotional and behavioral. And you're dealing with that. And then on top of that, you feel like you've got to take on the school, too. It's it's overwhelming, right?

Malia:
Definitely, I am still absorbing all of your content, which I love.

Kim :
Your homework where you have to sit there and...

Malia:
I've been following you for a while. So I was absorb4 be ready ng a lot of your new content as opposed to when I first started following you. But often, like the conversation is heavily from what I see for like the younger kids, like especially like four to maybe eight year old, it seems like. And maybe that's because parents are so new. It's still very new those first couple of years of elementary school. Does it change? Does a process change as the kids go grow into junior high and high school and and then even in college, when kids are not kids anymore and they're usually on their own more than they were before? Like, how does it does the process change or or does the IEP is it a little bit easier? Because they already have a plan in place and it just needs tweaking as the years go by.

Kim :
If things are going the way they're supposed to go and I'm not hired, the process would be that your child ideally would be receive their IEP earlier. I do like to kind of say to parents, but yes, early intervention is great, but that doesn't mean that we can't still help a kid, the kid maybe maybe suspicion of autism or something at three, but not get a diagnosis until 10. And it's like, oh, it's too late. It's not too late. OK, so that's one thing to dispel. But if things are going well, yes, your child will have an IEP. We will build in the structures and goals and the IEP simply being something that is designed to help plan out that child's education, individualized to that child's needs. And by the time they get older to middle school, then it should need some tweaking and then to high school, a few tweaks here and there to adjust. A lot of the big adjustment is middle, elementary to middle, typically. And because you're going from one teacher, one hour, a couple or a couple of teachers in elementary school that see you all day to like six, that only see you at the same time for like 60, 70 minutes a day. And there's some tweaking that takes place and then the puberty. So definitely, definitely the kids changing and sometimes puberty can wreak havoc or hormones can wreak havoc on any kid, much less the autistic kid that may be having some some awareness of who they are and how a process that's so.

Kim :
And then by the time they get to high school, depending on what it is that they want to do, it starts getting real. And you start realizing, OK, here is someone that is voice is already change. They're moving into adulthood. What what are they going to do after school? If this is a child that is going to go to college, if the child is going to go to work, we still have a responsibility as people who are local education agencies under the idea, which is the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, to provide a proper transition for those. And I'm still calling them kids for those high schoolers once they graduate, so that they will be able to move into college or into a career and hopefully have gotten as much intervention in the school year as they could. But the process for an IEP is pretty much the same once the ship is in place. So it's pretty much the same all the way through to the end of school. There's the biggest thing will be the transition age. And each state has their own age, what's typically around 13 or 14 where they have to switch from. Just talking about those academic, social, emotional, behavioral things to how are we what are we going to do to prepare this kid for after school? After high school?

Malia:
So it's more like as they get older, it's more of the focus shifts to like life skills like, wow, those big life skills.

Kim :
Yeah, and it also depends on the child, too, because we have some kids that have higher support needs that are life skills, needs that happen, that are needed immediately. So you may have, for instance, a five year old at ELOPES and there that's a life skill. We don't want that. We want that child to be able to we want to figure out what's going on with that child that's causing them to up so often and deal with that as an appropriate life skills so that they can make it to first grade, you know. So but when you think about you think, OK, well, I'll use my daughter as an example. My daughter. Life skills, she is going into 10th grade, and so when we think for her, I am looking at things like, how are you going to go? We were at Chipotle today and I said, you're going to go ten steps ahead of me and you're going to order your food. And I said to her in a car and I said, hey, one of these days I'm going to have you go and get your own food. And she's like, Oh, OK. And I'm like, that is today really mother that I am, which is looking at me like, you know, I can I can do that with my child. Not too many other people can do that. And so that would be but just watching her, it really made me think this might be something her ability to be able to do things without me is definitely something that I want to include as we move forward in these next couple of years. So she's she's pretty dependent on having me in the room. And those are she knows how to do it. She can probably write down everything she need to do. But the actual application of that is something that I'd want to make sure we include as some sort of goal or something. And I think.

Cat:
So if a parent, let's say we were talking about, you know, older children and transitional periods and things like that, if we do go back to like, let's say, a new parent who found out their child is autistic or has some sort of learning disability, what would your advice be for people to determine whether or not like. The services available to their child are being maximised and that they're able to get as much. Resources as possible for their child.

Kim :
The thing I would say is by the time it's time to sit down at that initial IEP meeting and that's what they call it in the law, the initial meeting, the parent, the child should have gone through a battery of tests, a full educational emotional evaluation, they call it kind of educational evaluation, determine the idea is assessment. So when I say evaluation and let's say. Those include observing the child child in the classroom environment and so hope by the time you, the parents, is pretty comprehensive. And so the first thing I would suggest for an initial IEP is that that parent make sure that they separate those two meetings. So I want one meeting for the school psychologist, speech therapist, everybody that provided the assessments and the assessments are based on the child's suspected disability. If we don't have an autism diagnosis or areas of need. And so there may not be a speech made or something like that, but everybody that that participated. I want a separate meeting just to review the report, because that's a lot. And it should be a good assessment is going to be a good anywhere from five pages to five to 15 pages, depending on the amount of testing that can be done. Some kids and there are some parents to know that if your child is non-verbal, preverbal, some verbal, there are tests that can be done. These psychologists go to school to learn this stuff so they can give tests to these children, they can give tests to the parents.

Kim :
They can provide things for the parents to fill out. And so the age and the level of ability of the child really should not matter. And so you're going to have that meeting, which I like to set about aside 90 minutes. I want the parent to request that report at least four to five days in advance. Call your friend whose kid has already been through it. Call your friendly neighborhood IEP strategist. That's me looking over the information. And the first thing you want to do is make sure that all of your child, all of your suspicions as a parent so that you do have an autism diagnosis, but there may be something else, or maybe you're thinking dyslexia or ADHD or something that the the doctor didn't pick up or something that they don't necessarily look at because it doesn't it's more of a school thing. And you brought all of these things up at the meeting. So there's a meeting that happens prior to this this eligibility assessment testing. And at that meeting, Kim is really, really distracted. Kim's got an autism diagnosis and but she's really distracted. And I've noticed that when she's writing her letters, they are she's she's shaking her hand out. And all of these things that that are that should be kind of triggers for a school psychologist, the shaking, the hand that is our hand hurting.

Kim :
This might take an occupational therapist to come in or this might have somebody look at dysgraphia, which is kind of a dyslexia, but kind of one of the things with writing. So I want that that I want that report in my hand or in my parents hand four or five days before the actual meeting. And then I want that meeting where we're going to sit down or we're going to go over this report. And I want those parents to be able to sit there until they have a full understanding of everything. And the law requires that. And what I see parents doing is they're afraid to ask questions or they feel like, I don't know, I don't understand this or whatever everybody does that. It's one of those after you leave the room things. I wish I should have asked us to bring my husband's IEP meetings and he would start asking me questions in the car. And I'm like, Really? Because you were quiet. Where was this? Now he can't come. He's not allowed to come unless I'm mad. And then he kind of centers me if I'm mad. But but for the most part, I want those two meetings separate. And then once the parent has had a chance to digest, this is what this test is, because all of these tests have different scoring for somewhere or by T scores.

Kim :
Some are scored by standardized scores. Some are raw scores. Knows what that means. The expectation sometimes because everybody is so overworked and everything is for the parent to understand that eighty on this test does not necessarily mean a good thing, whereas eighty on this test is a good thing. So I want all of that separate from the IEP. And by the time and usually at the end of the day, a psychosocial educational evaluation, there are recommendations. And that is where I want you sitting out there. I tell parents all the time, get your drink of choice for me at the Starbucks, or if that's an hour, it might be something something else. And sit down with your little highlighter. You've got water around and there, you know, what time is it out there? And in order, you know, you got that. You've got your highlighter and you're going through it and you are highlighting and you have. Questions and you're not worried about who is going to be irritated with your questions because No. One, this is your kid. Number two, this person, these four people that have done the assessment are probably not going to see your kid for another three years. The school psychologist is probably going to be in for another three years. This evaluation and these kids are not going to see you for they're not going these providers, they're not going to see you, your kid, once they become an adult.

Kim :
So I want a full understanding. And if they do not cover. If I talked about that my child has a reading issue, say they're not kindergarten through third grade or whatever, and they have a reading issue, and I've read the entire report, I'm like, you know, they didn't cover they didn't do any sort of reading test or there's nothing here that covers that. Then we need to go back when we have that meeting and we need to have a request for that. That's a whole nother thing, but an independent evaluation that says you didn't cover something. So that is what that is all before the IEP by the time. So by the time the IEP meeting comes. Well, we have gotten I have I have sat through that. I've cried through it sometimes because if you think about that and like it, it's like everything my kid can't do. And that that reading that evaluation is smart. It is very hard because it is a list of everything your kid can't do or that's what you feel like as a parent anyway. And I tell parents to push through that part because this is all about getting your child some help. And then when we get to the actual IEP meeting, there are the IEP is set up. So we have we are using the information that we have from the evaluation to determine the goals of the child.

Kim :
Right. So as a parent, I don't expect a parent to sit out and write out goals. You shouldn't have to, at least not for the first one. Now, sometimes I work with parents. I'm like, we're going to sit here, we're going to write goals. What time can I call you? But we are looking at goals in terms of measuring them as smart goals and excuse me, where it's an acronym for specific, measurable, attainable and relevant and time bound. And so if the report has shown that Kimberly is currently reading to grade levels below her grade and we've identified that the reason for that is a decoding issue. So reading is broken down into decoding and comprehension. She can understand everything that is read to her, but she can't form that. Look at the page and I'm looking at this like you guys can see me, but she's looking at the page. She can't read, she can't pronounce it. So we're going to I want a goal as a parent, I'm going to say, OK, I would like for her to be able to start working on that skill. She should be able to read at grade level, but also as a parent. And this is where I see sometimes I see things on the school and that's wrong. I know my kid, so I don't care who's got masters and doctorates and all in the room.

Kim :
They don't know my kid better than I know my kid and they don't know what my kid's autism better than I know my kid's autism. I don't care how many kids you say, oh, I know autism. You don't know my kids. You interrupt, I guess. But I want so I want to be able to as a mom. Can my child realistically attain grade level reading in the year, so an IEP year is 12 months, not a school year? OK, so it's 12 months from, say, my IEP is from April 1st of twenty twenty one, April 1st of twenty twenty two. So within this 12 months, will she be able to get to the the proper grade level as a parent. Maybe not. I don't know. We've got to work on some other issues. She's too distracted, all of those things. So these are and I want the parents to be able to prioritize based on what that evaluation has shown. And so, as an example, a lot of our kids are autistic, kids have ADHD. Sometimes we have to tackle the behavior and the attention before we can even look at getting the child to read on grade level. Now, I didn't say that we have to do one thing first and spend an entire year working on attention and all that. We can do it, but at the same time. But the expectation is going to be higher for me as an advocate for my my client's child to be taught the skills to be able to sit and attend.

Kim :
And however, they're going to be able to get those things without having the goal for reading the at the same level. So I may say. Kimberly needs has to have some sort of training and sitting. For short periods of time, so this is a kid that the baseline is that this kid doesn't want to sit down at all. So we're going to sit for short periods of time, short periods of time. I want to break that down. I want parents to say, how is this going to be achieved? Oh, OK. Well, Kimberly is going to sit for five minutes as Greg goes before I as measured by teacher observation. Seventy five percent of the time, blah, blah. So as a parent, I don't care if I look stupid. I don't care if I look stupid. But I want to ask I always ask, so how are you going to achieve that goal? Oh, well, we're going to based on how they answer it, if they're answering it with some level of expertise, then I feel comfortable. But if they're just pulling things out of the sky, then it's going to be a long meeting because I really want to know a lot of times we will write a beautiful city that has zero chance of being executed properly.

Malia:
Well, I was going to say that that sounds like the difference between, you know, if someone's pulling stuff out of the sky, if the people in the meeting are doing that, having someone there to advocate with you and be like, oh, no.

Kim :
Right. And that's a thing. If you like my services. And I think I believe I have a lot of West Coast folks because I would charge like three hundred bucks and the people charge like three times. So they're like, oh, she's cheap. We're going to have to. But but if you can't afford and advocate your girlfriend or whoever, you know, they can sit there and listen. I just need somebody to sit here next to me while I'm tearing up because I've just looked on a screen and they show that Tyler is 30 percent and everybody else is that eighty five percent or whatever, and I'm all stressed out about it. I need you to be sitting there paying attention. And if you have questions about stuff, it doesn't make sense, that kind of stuff. I need you friend to sit there. Just pretend that friend, somebody else that can be there with you. So to suss out all of the stuff and to be able to have a kind of an ear, a listening ear,

Cat:
A second set of yours is like super helpful in most cases anyways, medical appointments, things like that, but incredibly important and like IEP meetings and stuff where it's going to be really

Kim :
Just by themselves all the time. And it just no matter what your girlfriend bring, you're not

Cat:
The people that like. So that was the question that I did have. So for people who don't have support networks like that, let's say someone really just doesn't have a person that they can bring along with them. And let's say they go to this meeting and they leave, they're feeling really unheard and they leave there feeling like because of like we talked about in the beginning of the podcast, they've got 20 people then you sitting there and they're listing off pretty much all the deficits your child has. And you're just sort of like aghast because, you know, your child and you're like, well, yes, those things are true. But also there's this whole person, you know. What is the is their recourse for, let's say you finish that IEP meeting? You leave there feeling really awful and you say, I didn't get a chance to say X, Y, Z, I didn't necessarily agree with this goal, I don't think that this assessment of my child is true, given what I know about them at home. What is the path forward? If you feel like you've left an IEP meeting and you feel like you weren't heard and that your child is not being served and that you do still have questions and that you don't agree with some of the goals, what do they do? What does a parent do next?

Kim :
Well, this is something that I say at every IEP meetings in the schools, just by the whoever is in the works at the school roll their eyes. You can have an IEP meeting every week if you want to. A lot of other schools say, well, we do this once a year. And so the parent thinks they cannot they have to wait a whole year. Now, if you leave the IEP meeting is like, oh gosh, I don't know. Or I forgot something that that's going to bring up last week's meltdown. And they address that. You can call a meeting. Again, I'm not comfortable with this. And now I'm going to bring my friend and or I'm going to bring my advocate or whatever. And I want to really look at the list again, because, you know, I feel like that goal isn't specific enough or we completely missed the call of meeting again. And most not all states, but most states have specific guidelines for what happens when a parent requests an IEP meeting. So I'm a parent, I have one and I request an IEP meeting. I have 15 days to respond with an IEP meeting. And a lot of times the schools will try to get around that and say, OK, well, we can always adjust the IEP, we don't have to have a meeting. I think we do. Or if you don't think you do, I like to me, I like to I kind of like to set a precedent for that there as to how they're going to do it.

Kim :
If they you know, they told me that I only have an hour for a meeting and I was like, I talk. So we're either going to have to choose another date or block off two hours because I want especially with the first school or new school or something. And they don't want to do that, then that's fine. We'll take an hour and I will we will spend an entire hour talking about page one. Then we will have to we have to reschedule. I'm not going to sign off on anything until we're done. And so that's another recourse that you have as a parent. You can at the very end of the IEP, they have something called a signature page. And so what they're doing now on Zoome is they have some some people Zoome have I guess they have it set up so you can sign on the screen or they can accept your signature. And a lot of times the fine print on there sometimes says all the entire team agree you can sign it and then turn around and say, you know what, I disagree, let's open the back up. If it's not, there is never a oh sorry really. As to like how you signed your child away and now he's got to bring us pizza every day, you know, so they you can absolutely say look at this again. And I really want to revisit this issue and talk about and give.

Cat:
Conversely, there's like so I saw this growing up several times with my sister and children that were in her class with her where and the emergency IEP meeting was called without. The parents being able to be present.

Kim :
Well, that is not legal, and I

Cat:
Believe that the the president was that they had sent notice or something like that, and it was an eye, an emergency IEP that was called to address the specific need. And because the parent did not respond and X amount of time that they were able to proceed with the meeting because it was intervention based on this child, but it was actually used to remove services and to essentially say, like, this child no longer needs the support or whatever. Is that something that is legal under obviously dubious circumstances where it's like like, oh, you didn't respond because you missed the email and now your child doesn't get blah,

Kim :
Blah, blah. It's something the schools do and they know the school. The school has to provide a documentation that they have tried to contact the parent over. You just can't just be like we sent off one email and we took one letter. So we don't think they have to be able to have to show that they had a method of contacting you over several times before they have a meeting. And not only that, they can have the meeting all day long, but they still, by law, cannot just start removing services, changing placements. They can't do major things anyway without doing an evaluation. So if they said, well, we're gonna have this meeting and now we're going to take this child off of an IEP and it's not a legal thing like I was talking about, the developmental delay, for instance, is and then the idea is only a qualifiable diagnosis until age nine. And then they have to qualify under something else. But if it's just this kid's autistic and we no longer think he needs services and we try to contact mom five times, we're just going to get rid of the IEP. They cannot do that. They still need the consent of the parent to evaluate the child. So there's all these little intricacies now, schools that they will try it. And if the parent does not know the law, then sometimes the schools can get away with kind of messing around and doing those things. But it brings to mind a client that I had whose child was in this situation with a developmental disability and she didn't understand that she could. They took my child away. And I'm like, well, they can't do that.

Kim :
They can't just take it away. You have to sign off. And any major change in an IEP meeting moving from a least restrictive environment to a more restrictive environment or changing schools or taking away services or whatever requires a evaluation, an assessment, because they can't just you can't just go by the teacher's opinion. Oh, we think that Kim is great. And now we're going to or we hate Kim and we're going to send her off to such a school for people or whatever that happens tomorrow. And sorry, this is because you didn't come to the meeting, so we're just going to send her. She has to go tomorrow. Well, that's the opinion of the school. Now, we need a norm referenced testing that shows that Kim cannot learn in this environment and needs to go off to school or whatever. And in order to test Kim, Kim's mom has to sign a piece of paper to consent for that testing. So there's all of these things that happen that has to have to happen before they can make these major changes. So in your situation where they did, they only may have made a phone call or set off one email or something like that? That's right. And as the parent, the recourse would be to the schools have to hold these. They have to have these records. And the parents should show me all of the times where you tried to contact me, how it happened and what email they did use all of that. And if it's one time, then the parent can say, sorry, not happening. The parent has due process, which means they have an opportunity to respond if they disagree.

Cat:
Is this process a little does it get a little trickier to navigate provided let's say we have a child whose parents are not documented or there is some situation like that, a home does. Do you see problems come up with following through with things like the legalities of all of this stuff and does not lead to those communities being underserved because the recourse is harder to take, provided that a school says, well, we're doing this and then it's like this. Parents like, well, that's wrong. Like, I don't agree with that. And then they go, OK. Then then go find the resources, go find the lawyer and go find the do whatever, is that something that you see weaponized and cannot be? Is that something? Does it get into like a much more difficult place, a marginalized place for those? I mean, obviously it does, but,

Kim :
Yeah, I don't see it getting that far. Typically, the parent does not understand how to get to the point where the school's like, OK, fine, get an attorney. Typically the parent just feels stuck. And then they called me in and I'm like, I can't do this. They can't do that. And and we find out that the school is not being on the up and up. So but there is an absolute huge issue with black and brown communities where the referral to special education is at alarming numbers. And the it's interesting because the diagnostic procedures on the medical side are at lower numbers. So you see children that are not getting a proper autism or ADHD or other diagnosis. And these communities on the medical side and then on the school side, they are being referred to special education, education, because not necessarily because they have a disability, but because maybe their behaviors aren't acceptable to the people in the school. And it just may be a cultural thing.

Malia:
Do you have encounter like just having to, like, explain a child's diagnosis to the team and that like, they completely just like

Kim :
My aunt I the

Malia:
Things that like are completely do not make sense for their situation.

Kim :
I mean, this is I try to do an inventory at the end of each year, each school year. And I've got like one or two IEP meetings left and then I think I'm done. I don't know. This has been an interesting year for handling all these different states because there's like New York is go in this week and I've got an idea next week. But I have spent a great deal of time this year explaining executive functioning and ADHD and autism to teens where these my kids that that's 15. She is a straight-A student. She will get the highest grade in the class. This kid will also pick her nose in front of you. She's 15. The things that you know that are not necessarily socially acceptable and there are kids that are like that, that are not getting assessed or IEP and there are kids that may just have ADHD or or have an autism diagnosis that the parents didn't pursue ADHD because they're so similar or whatever. And so the kid's got massive executive functioning issues. They need to have everything in writing. They're not able to plan a project from start to finish those types of things. And so as a result, they end up getting the IEP is only addressing the academic side that the child may need remediation and math or something like that.

Kim :
And they're not addressing behavioral, social, emotional, or they may have goals. OK, well, my daughter is one of our goals is to raise our aid and allow you to generate a raise. Are you going to tell her to raise her animals? What do you want? There's a this is not she's not a neurotypical kid. So I can tell a girl, typical kid. Hey, raise your hand. I can probably tell about five or six times. And then at some point they're going to raise their hand. But for an autistic, get our kid with ADHD, you may have to actually do some actual teaching modeling, have a plan. And so when I'm sitting in these meetings and they want to either deny testing, assessing for a child for a for at IEP and a lot of times they're doing that because they don't know how to teach those executive skills. They don't recognize that these things are not inherent and actually do require a curriculum and actual teaching. And so there are I will go all the way into I've gone into kind of I go into a couple of different things with one of my favorites is when you see a baby and the baby is old enough to, I don't know, crawl along the floor until they see your phone and they pick up the phone and I put it to their ear.

Kim :
A lot of babies do that, right? You're autistic. Kids don't always do that. They may pick up the thing off the floor and then I'll throw it. And so or they do they're looking at or whatever. They don't necessarily recognize that that phone is something that they would put to their ear. Not not all autistic kids are going to do that. But there are your your baby that maybe doesn't have that. Gnosis is doing that. How did they learn that, that's all just silence I so I have a clue. How do you think they should learn that they didn't go to school for it six months or crawling on the floor. Did you show them here. Little Johnny. No. Good little Johnny's not going to pick up the phone. They watched you. You don't know when they watched you. You didn't watch them long enough to know that they they watched you. And so those are skills that that child picked up inherently, that maybe a kid with autism or ADHD is not able to pick up. And so how do you think those kids are going to learn the other inherent things that you think that every other kid, every kid that doesn't have a diagnosis is going to learn to stand in line after the first week of kindergarten, is going to learn to raise their hand if they have to learn to play and share is going to do all of these things.

Kim :
Whereas a kid that's autistic, a kid that has ADHD, these are things that need to be taught. And so that kid is going to sit up there and be punished or you're going to put them in a more restrictive environment because you don't recognize that these skills that aren't academic, these are skills that just come from observing, need to actually be taught to people that can't necessarily observe because they have other things going on. My kids observing the fact that the light is blinking and nobody else knows she's looking at the clock because she knows the bell's going to ring and she doesn't like the sound of the bell. All of these things are things that I will sit there and and talk to the people in the room and they're just like, oh, and you can create these things. What seems like common sense, what you can create this curriculum. You guys want school to do it, so let's get it done.

Malia:
So is that something when you when that is the case, where the team just really doesn't get it and you explain it to them, you know? How much of that do you do versus like is there resources that the school then seeks out? Because if that is lacking, there's obviously training that the staff needs to have and it's all in some of these underserved areas.

Kim :
Well, one of the one of the things I wish I had had the actual class, but one of the parts of idea requires by law that a teacher that is dealing with a special needs child be a highly qualified teacher, highly qualified means this teacher has been trained in helping this child and working with their disability. Now, the disability of executive dysfunction, for instance, that is not considered a disability, is not a diagnosis. It's not a there's certain categories of this. I'm assuming that your listeners on the list, but certain categories of disabilities under the idea, but some of them affect. So ADHD and autism have come out in areas of executive functioning because the prefrontal cortex, blah blocking can lots of fun brain explanations here. But when I see that, as I know before going into that meeting as an advocate, I don't go into an IEP meeting without knowing exactly what's going to happen. I can tell you from minute to minute what they're going to say, whether because I've dealt with the parent. So if this I if these people are saying, well, you know, Tim has straight A's and we don't think she needs it, she'd be fine on the final four. She just needs extra time to test kids over there at 10 years old, plugging her ears every time the bell rings and not able to write her homework down. But she'll be fine.

Kim :
No, that tells me that they don't have any idea how to teach executive functioning. So before that meeting, I have done the research I have. And I I'm I'm a digger. I this is one of the things that I like to do. I have gone on there are the school school board meetings to look at their budget, to see what contractors, what vendors are they using. Oh, you know that the school over here. So if the school is in the district, so if there's a charter school, for instance, that's in the district and the district has contracted with Ordon Gillingham and Executive Functioning Partners or whatever, and they are servicing ABC Charter School over here, the district has paid for that, but everybody in the district can use it. So I guess I guess what ABC Charter School District has it so you guys can get at it. And so a lot of times they will say, oh, OK, so I will find the resources. And I think what parents do a lot of the time is if everybody I mean, if you work in corporate America or you've worked under anybody in the last 20 years or whatever, they don't come to me with problems, come with solutions. It's like, don't just come in here complaining. That's what I do. I will go into a meeting and provide an answer for all of the they cannot tell me that they don't have the resources because they if they have any general knowledge of ideas, they know you can't say that.

Kim :
So you can't say we can't afford it. We don't have it. The law requires that you do. Mills versus DC was the lawsuit that that shaped that that said that schools can't just decide they're not going to educate because they don't have the resources they are provided with money to provide those resources. So they don't say that to me in the IEP meeting, but I will give them resources and say, hey, this kid needs this. And I noticed that your school district has these three or four programs and how can we get your teachers to get that training? So nine times out of ten, somebody clued in in the vastness of the district to all types of education that can be provided. And there are tons of free resources as well. So there's times where I just don't want to hear it when it comes down to it. We can't do this. We can't do that. There's due to there's all types of books, things that, you know, they went to school to become a teacher. And part of that is learning how to create a lesson plan. Guess what? I can provide you with a book on executive functioning for teenagers that you can read over the summer and create a lesson plan.

Cat:
And I'm going to ask you about so as much and I deeply, deeply, deeply admire and love and identify with your because this was me in IEP meetings where I would go in there with my sister and people would say things and I actually, I think not know. And then I pull out my file and I be like, because X, Y, Z, here's on the stuff I printed out. I highlighted it for you like good Lord. Was this because I got

Kim :
Your pull up websites, no, no, no, I printed that stuff, I was like literally

Cat:
I have highlighted for you there's no excuses and I love that. But let's say a parent is not necessarily like doesn't live for this stuff like me. I would do this for fun anyways. Let's say there is a parent who is just sort of like I don't even know where to begin, to know what my rights are in this situation. Where would someone look? And I know this varies from state to state. So that's where would someone begin to say, let's say somebody lives in Texas or somebody lives in Rhode Island or California or whatever. Is there a kind of across the board like where the state government website or something like that? Can they find out what they are, what they are entitled to and what is

Kim :
Legally they're supposed to have? Yes, and it is called procedural safeguards. So for any state that you are in and I said this on my Tiktok all the time, Ohio, Tennessee, whatever type your state's name and then after type procedural safeguards. And what it what that does is that is the state's interpretation of the federal act, the individual's Education, Disabilities and Education Act, the idea. So it takes the idea and it kind of adds their own little spice to it or whatever. Now, they can't if you think about it like this is a federal law. So if the federal government says that I have to stop at a stoplight, then I can't all of a sudden in Tennessee decide what we're not. We're going to stop it and ask that bicycle to be blue. We can't decide where we're going to change that. But they the idea does allow for the state to modify slightly, which is why I can operate in all 50 states, because I know the federal law. And all I need to do if I get a client in Oregon, I'm going to pull up the procedural safeguards for Oregon and I'm going to say, oh, OK, here's I know which parts of the idea are different, but the parent does not need to know the federal part. They just need to know what is from the day that I suspect that my child may have a disability. And I send an email. How much time do they have to get that? To me, it's been 30 days and they may pull up California and realize, oh, OK, they got 30 more days because it's 60 days in California that they come to North Carolina.

Kim :
They got 60 more days because it's 90 days here. So little things like that where I tell parents, sit with your drink of choice, your highlighter and your pen this summer is your homework. Pull out your procedural safeguards. And at any point in time that a parent brings up an issue about special education, a disability that has not been brought up before, or the school brings it up to the parent, that school is required by law to provide the parent with those procedural safeguards and they either will tell them here is the link to it. Now, back when I was my kid was was younger. It was the documentation on paper and I could decline it. But they every single document that you will see or with an IEP or a four or the thought of. So this is pre the child getting it has a box or a section where the parent has to sign that they have received that and the school has to offer it. So the issue comes where if you are a parent and you're not in the know, for instance, I am a parent with ADHD, with autistic kid, I don't listen all the time. I'm looking out the window right now thinking is hot outside. You know, I may I may miss it, you know, or they told me it. What they used to tell me again, they were like it was like a big like fifty some states are twenty some pages, some states are one hundred and fifty pages.

Kim :
And so you're like you have this hundred fifty page document, you're like, I'm not going to sit and read all of this stuff. That's what I have to pay for because I said so. But they used to tell me, oh, if you want to have some reading to put to sleep here is, you know, and you have enough of these to wallpaper your bedroom and they kind of joke about it. But that is the most important document to read and you can skip through it. I don't expect parents to read every little thing, but there's parts of it that don't apply to you at all. So if your kid's never been suspended, there's a whole ten pages on that and you can skip over that part. But and if your kid's already been evaluated, you can skip over that part. But I want parents to pull that out, start skimming through it. Look at the table of contents. OK, IEP, let me read that. Get that highlighter any time it says number of days highlight if it's those forty five days. OK, now I know it's forty five days. Is it days, business days, calendar days, classroom days? Some states will, for instance, if I decide Malia has been flunking out of everything and I thought it was her boyfriend, but she really, really has ADHD. So I'm going to want to have her assessed. And it just happens to be in a state that does assessments in four or five days.

Kim :
And so I've sent a letter and now I know that the clock is ticking and they're telling me, well, everybody's going to be gone over the summer and know what we visited in the fall. Oh, I'm looking at your procedural safeguards and it says calendar days. Guess what that means? That means you have to do it now. Now, if it's days, then we do have to wait till the fall. So little things like that are where the idea kind of separates and gives us things to the states. But if every single person could type in their state, type in procedural safeguards, you want to look a couple of times if they all have the year on them. So you shouldn't see one more than. Five or six years old. So you know how the Internet is, if you scroll down like two or three pages, you'll see one from like nineteen eighty two or whatever. But they all should be fairly current. And typically, if you're going to pull one, you want to pull it from your school, your school district's website. So if you type in or the states State Department of Education, so California Dowi or whatever, and if that's the website, then you want to pull that up and either print it out or take a look at it. But you should have it. If you've got an IEP or if you have a kid that's autistic and the school knows it, then they should have offered it to you.

Cat:
Seems like particularly messed up, doesn't it, because I was just thinking about this as you were talking about that we're it's like let's say you do have a parent like I'm a parent. My child is like, I suspect autistic. And we have to do the assessment process. But it's like it seems particularly ablest and gross to expect disabled parents because I myself am autistic and have ADHD and OCD in any number of other things. And it's like you expect disabled people to be able to dig through a hundred and fifty pages of incredibly detailed, incredibly nuanced in that there are legal ramifications for these things. And then just to throw them, the disabled parent would be like a lot

Kim :
Like your cat. Go ahead with that. Yeah, well, as one thing, I want parents to know that the they are covered under the ADA in IEP meetings, completely unrelated. You can also go to an IEP meeting under your FMLA if you take it off work. But you guys got me at 4:00 because the violence is gonna so me a 9:00. But anyway but no they the IP invitation so that every every state is different, every district is different. Sometimes they all and there are I think there's only five but there are there's endless numbers of software companies out there that are selling IEP programs to schools. So I think there was five, but there are several that I've seen way more. And these IEP programs, they all have to have certain things. So every IEP has to have present levels and goals and things like that. The invitation has to have things by law. And so one of the things, in addition to a parent has received a copy of the procedural safeguards is do you need a translator? Do you need accommodations? And so if you have a parent, we've got a high Spanish speaking population in California. And so I have quite a few clients whose native language is Spanish and they don't necessarily recognize what you can have a translator at the meeting provided by the school. And but if you're autistic and ADHD and if you're just like me and I, looking at all these words, a whole bunch of stuff at at all I'm doing is looking at the data. I can make it as on June 24th, but it's asking, do I need accommodations? I don't necessarily know what that is.

Kim :
Right. So it's it really is a learning curve because sometimes they're not telling you because they don't want to. Sometimes they're not telling you because this is their fifth year of IEP that day and they didn't think about it. But the onus is on the parent to recognize, oh, this piece of paper says, do you need accommodations? That's not do I need a wheelchair ramp? That might mean do I need somebody to represent me at the meeting at your school's expense? That's going to take and write this things. I had a lady in Colorado who had brain injury and her kid kept getting suspended and repeating grades on and so forth, and she would go to these IEP meetings and not understand what they're talking about. This lady in California, born in Nicaragua and her daughter is again, that's the R word where they still have that in California. And they we want to do process and got her daughter removed and into a private school and got the district to pay for it. And she didn't go the entire year last year because she didn't understand the paperwork. The mother did not understand the paper of the daughter was at the regular school again for an entire year, the whole year of education, and calls me afterwards. And I listened to everybody because I was just like this mother has I think it's dyslexia. You know, she's she's she's moved here and she's like, we came here on the boat and she was like, we became citizens, you know, so and so forth, but. She didn't understand, and so I called the attorney and I called the school district attorney's paid for, I guess it was the one of those situations where he paid for, but it was just one of those where they just kind of dropped the ball.

Kim :
And there were people that knew that this child was not supposed to be at the school and they just let her because everything was covid. And then California. I don't think they ever opened up to the last couple of weeks. And so it's very frustrating because the idea also says if I know if I am a teacher and I am teaching in class and I notice the kid is not picking up anything and might have a disability or whatever, and I'm not a doctor as a teacher, but I can refer her to to be tested for special education as a teacher. If the principal notices, if the anybody that is a part of they call the lawyer, the local education agencies or anybody at the school, I like to joke with the janitor, but I don't think that that those people can refer that child for special education testing. And a lot of times that doesn't happen because they're waiting on the parent. But the law says that they can refer. Now, the law also says that my mother has to sign off. And so my mom. I know. No, there's nothing wrong with it. We have those kind of parents and there's nothing wrong with my child and everything's fine. She just needs whatever. That's a whole nother denial denial webinar that I'll podcast next week on stage. But for real,

Cat:
Let's do

Kim :
It. Yeah, but so the parent. So I will say that all the time because a lot of times I get all day and if I'm calling, dyslexia is a hard one. So dyslexia isn't always turning your letters around. And so sometimes it's not really klodt until around 3rd grade. And a lot of these states have you have to pass this reading test or pass third grade. And so that's when these kids are being found out and parents are frustrated because they knew something was going on. But and then the teacher knew something was going on. And they're like, well, I couldn't say, yes, you can't. You can't. You can't diagnose. So you don't want to go up to the parent. Exactly. Your child's dyslexic. You can say, look, let's go for a special testing. I'm seeing some signs that they may need some help. And then it's still up to the parent to say, OK, I'm going to sign this piece of paper and have them tested. But it's it's amazing the burden that the schools want to place on the parent. I don't allow it. The burden, the blame and no, the burden, really the burden of proof is on the school and a lot of cases. But they know the right wording, the right things to say so that the parent feels like they have to do everything. And this is not true

Malia:
In what you do for these parents and these families. I think that it is clear to everyone who's listening that to say that you're an advocate and this is not covering it all like you do so much. I mean, yes, like so much advocate

Kim :
Under the title, I should a contest.

Malia:
Yeah. Like advocating your teaching. You're providing resources, you're steering them to resources like you are this family's cheerleader and holding both of everyone's hands throughout the process and keeping the staff or the whoever is on this team on their toes, like, no, I yes, I'm calling you out on this and I'll call you every single day for the rest of the school year.

Kim :
Bring it on. I'm not going to come. Good. Bring the district because I don't want to deal with the people out of school. I mean, I'm afraid they're going to bring in the district. I want the district there because most of the district ends up agreeing with me because I know I know what the heck I'm talking about, whereas I'm not going to sit and argue with the you know, I'm not no disrespect to principals. Well, sometimes I don't know. You got a whole school to to cover and you not going to sit up there and argue with me and tell me I'm wrong. I'm not. I will sit there in an IEP meeting for a five hour, five hour meeting two weeks ago where I just sat there like this. Listen to everybody. Every time they came back to me and I'm like, the law says this, the law says this, the law says. And finally then it went around and voted. Well, do we think this child needs to be evaluated for an IEP? Everybody in the speech that we think that the we all vote that a final four would be good, then they get to me and I'm just like the law says, you can't vote. Sorry, we need to do an assessment. Nobody in it. Well, we don't think there's anything wrong with this speech.

Kim :
Is there a speech therapist in a room you'll learn more? I mean, I was just like a speech therapist. No. OK, good. So nobody in here is qualified. And so what I want parents to understand is the school as a. Whole. Is one measure of assessment, so I'm not taking away from the principle of the special ed teacher, the occupational therapist, all of those people that have that are sitting in the meeting and saying that my child, based on their opinions and based on what they see. So we got kids grades are great. We don't need to do an assessment. She's autistic, but she'll be fine. You know, nothing. We don't have a million autistic adults out here that are brilliant but can't get a job because I dealt with their other issues. And so that is one measure. That's all sit there and everything. I am so I don't want to take away from your professional opinion, but that is your professional opinion and yours and yours and yours and yours is one. And the idea calls for a variety. So do you think the job is because. Yes, school says no. You say yes. That cancels them out. Guess what? We got another get some other other information. Oh, we're going to bring your grades.

Kim :
His grades are great. Those grades are doing well. His grades are appropriate because we require faith free, appropriate public education. And I joke, if you want free, wonderful education, you better come up out of your wallet and pay a million dollars to school. Because we don't because the government only requires that there should be appropriate money. So you may have a kid that's dyslexic that is getting C's. Well, that's appropriate. But, you know, the kid sits up there and answers all Jeffrey questions every night and you're just like that. But that is his dyslexia is affecting that. He's he's he's a visual or auditory learner because he's not reading the question. Was he hearing Alex Trebek recipes, read the questions and he's getting. So I know this kid is brilliant at the Jeopardy, like the arbiter for brilliance or anything. But but you know that the kids well, we don't have to provide testing unless the the the child's disability is affecting their their education. Well, I'm saying that it is well, we're saying that it isn't because he's getting C's and that's appropriate. Well, I know the beginning is OK, let's go back and forth. Guess what? We have to so we have to just cancel each other out. We need more. We need a variety. OK, well, we pulled out his grades and his grades are fine.

Kim :
Are OK. Well, that's what we've got. Cancel each other out then we have one that says maybe he's OK. That's still not a variety assess. So we're going to do an assessment and the assessment may come back and say, OK, he really does not. But we're assessing everything. I don't want you to just do it. And this is another thing. I'll sit in these meetings and I can tell I just week don't want I can tell you right now that school psychologist is not going to find your child eligible for an IEP. She would not allow anyone else to do any of that. Well, if I see that he needs occupational therapists will break occupational therapist therapy. And if the mother ended up calling and getting someone else on the case, I was just adamant. I was like, I will be right back in or two weeks with her, with fighting for an independent educational evaluation. But they need to provide an assessment. And there's this big wave going on right now where school is and we don't need to assess. And the parents are sitting in those meetings saying they won't test the law state, that a school can not delay or deny an assessment for a child with a suspected put that in quotes and underlined in an italicized suspected disability in favor of a response to intervention, a multi any sort of intervention program.

Kim :
The term that you'll hear a lot of times is let's gather some more data. We don't have enough data. Mallea broke up with that boyfriend and we just don't have enough data. And so we need to. We need to put her in this tutoring program and we'll see that's six weeks away and so the parents, they call me, they're just like, well, they want to put them in this. You can't. You can't. So you can say as a parent, that's awesome. I would love family to be in this response intervention program or there's nothing officially recognized. So there's one called S.O.S in Virginia, but RTI and PBIS are the nationally recognized kind of intervention programs. You can do that, but you can also test the right same time. And the law says you have to. And when I am dealing with parents that have called me, I'm like, does the child have a diagnosis that he suspected the child has, that we're not suspicious of anything. We have a diagnosis and they're failing to assess the child, because in this meeting, we have this meeting of the minds that technically count as one mind saying that this child doesn't need to be tested.

Cat:
And we have anyone who is wondering how passionate if ADHD was a superpower. I think you all just witnessed it while listening to all of this, because I'm totally kidding. I hate that narrative. But at the same time, I'm like, honestly, I think

Malia:
When hyperfocus works in your face.

Cat:
Exactly. Exactly. That was beautiful. And so many parents are going to feel so much safer after hearing this, because as we know on Tiktok, it's kind of hard with the 60 seconds, 15 seconds, you know, that kind of stuff. But that's why I'm so glad we were able to have you on this, to expand on this, because so many parents are so scared that, like, once they sign that paper, it's done. But like, as far as people were able to learn today that it's like you can you can do this all day, every day and you should wait. Exactly. And I think that's so empowering. And I just want to say that I deeply appreciate what you do, because as somebody who has sat through many, many, many IEP meetings and had many meetings with the district where I did the same stuff, it's like it's one nice to see a kindred spirit and in the passion about this, but also to know that, like, it doesn't always have to escalate to that point. If you know your resources out the gate and you can at the pay as you go. And I think that you're providing parents with a lot of resources to do that. And what you're doing is really incredible. And you're such a gift to so many people, to our community. And I sincerely, from the bottom of my heart, appreciate what you do.

Kim :
Oh, thank you.

Malia:
Are incredible. How can people find you, book you and get you on their team?

Kim :
I have my website is and hopefully this will be written somewhere, but it's Let's Kizito and Associates dot com, which is just ridiculous. I don't know what made me decide that people could tell my name at some point I'm going to change it. But it's because you don't want associates, dotcom and their error. You can click on on a walk with me, book me, hire me. I don't know what it is. It's some tab that says something about me and then it pretty much pops my calendar up. And I have a couple of different options. And I always tell parents it's pick my brain that's like a Q&A or whatever, or if you just want to chat. And that's that's what I do charge for that, because I end up being talking to you for like five minutes. So it's like ten dollars and you just you have a question or whatever. And then and I'm pretty upfront with my prices too. So I will coach parents. And a lot of times I'll be talking to somebody like, you know, and I can see that, you know, what you're doing. You do not need me to sit in that meeting, that you just didn't understand how to do such and such. So I want all of your documentation and some of your paperwork.

Kim :
One hundred fifty bucks. Give me a week and I will have a game plan for you to take into the meeting. And sometimes I'll and then I'll say, OK, are you ready? I'm going to I'm going to fly it and or I'm not so sure. OK, I will block off that time and for one hundred bucks more I'll sit in there and I'll do it for you. I'll do it with you. So when I go to the meeting, I do everything from coaching, everything from that I get from the coaching. Plus I'm actually at the meeting. Right. And at that meeting is where I kind of I'm very animated here. But at the meeting I'm just probably as the quiet. It's like night and day. But I definitely will tell the parent, keep your phone open, because after I've talked with them, like, I'm going to tell you to stop talking at some point or do not do this or to say this, you know, and it's just a we have a comaraderie, you know, where I am. I feel like I do have something that I've kind of latched on to that I consider a gift that I can use to help other parents. So Kizito and Associates, Kim Dotcom is my email and I answer

Malia:
Thank you so much. And also everybody who's listening, Kim will be she is part of our webinar, the org webinar series. And I believe your day is August 4th. Is that correct?

Kim :
That's correct.

Malia:
So you can find her and she'll be talking even more about Ipis and everything that we talk about here on the fourth sort of sign up for that. You can find that on the website. Org dot com. Thank you again.

Kim :
Can you appreciate it.

Malia:
Thank you for tuning in this week, we hope you had as much fun listening to this episode as we had making it.

Cat:
For more information and resources, please visit our teach Dotcom. That's a new TV A.H. Dotcom and join our mailing list to stay in the loop about updates and events.

Malia:
We look forward to bringing you a new episode next week. Until then, this has been the artistic Tea Party.

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