YOU HELPED!
Working with students is one of the most challenging yet rewarding experiences. Support like yours allows us to acquire vital tools and assistive technologies that help us work with students with disabilities. The work is nowhere close to easy, but the visible change in lives such as Karina’s makes it completely worth it.
Click here to learn more about Gompers Private School for children with disabilities.
Once a student who disliked school, Karina is finding a home in Luz Rodriquez’s classroom at Gompers Private School.
Karina is a student attending Gompers Private School. She enjoys watching Harry Potter and listening to Justin Bieber. She lives with her father and new step-mother. She is incredibly smart, funny, sometimes stubborn, but always sweet. Karina came to Gompers Private School in an effort to find an environment that she could feel comfortable attending regularly.
Karina is non-verbal and struggles to appropriately express herself. Her inability to communicate along with poor socialization skills have had a profoundly negative effect on Karina’s life, both at home and in school. Before attending Gompers, Karina was not in school, missing over six months of classes. During that six months, Karina rarely left her house. We weren’t going to let Karina struggle any longer.
We met with her family and her support team to develop a plan to help Karina succeed. Our school staff would work closely with assistive technology department to support Karina’s communication in the classroom. We are able to provide Karina with picture schedules that help her better understand the routines and procedures of her class. Each day, we send familiar staff to pick up Karina from home in a van, not a school bus, which helps her feel less overwhelmed. Our smaller class size makes Karina feel more comfortable with her teachers, paras, and peers. Karina is provided with opportunities to make choices for preferred activities both on the van and while at school. We’ve learned that Karina is creative! When she’s presented with a choice of activities, she almost always chooses to listen to music or to color and draw.
Since coming to Gompers Private School, Karina attends school daily. She has not had absences due to non-compliance with her parents. In class, Karina sits calmly at her desk and works on her academic tasks. In addition, she willingly attends community-based outings with her peers. We couldn’t be more excited about the progress she has made!
The next step in supporting Karina’s academic success is increasing her time staying on tasks. Karina’s teacher, Luz Rodriguez, is working with Karina on asking for breaks when she is becoming overwhelmed.
We are so grateful to have Karina in our programs and we are honored to be able to support students like her in becoming more successful!