Jake's story: Navigating the Educational System

As mentioned before, I am the father of three amazing children living with FASD. Back in 2019, CBC introduced Skylar and Cassie https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/ottawa/sisters-living-with-fasd-point-of-view-1.4970670 to the world but not Jake. At that time, Jake was still learning how to navigate life. Today, he represents a growing population of people living with FASD being accommodated in our educational system and finding success now. His story begins at age three when he first received language training. After two years of training, Language Express told us he was the first child they had ever had who did not progress at all. They raised questions if he would ever be able to read at that time. He went to kindergarten and primary school where he continued to make no gains in reading. However, he did learn work ethic and never giving up. In grade four, frustration reached a tipping point and he became violent. Eventually, it was discovered that the classroom environment was too noisy and stimulating for him. Accommodations were made by St. Francis School in Smiths Falls and he was able to cope throughout his day. At home, he discovered he understood ATV's and how they work and started teaching himself how to repair them at age 10. Grades 5-8 were spent in the learning commons, quiet corners and wearing headphones and hoodies to just manage the noise and stimulation. In Grade 9, things changed. CDSBEO decided to retest his langauge development and we did a private psy-ed. It was discovered even though he was still reading at a kindergarten level, he had a path on how he could learn how to read. While it is really unique, his SLP made foundational gains and got him to a grade 3 reading level. This uniqueness was seen in his driving test. He failed the driver's test seven times before they agreed to read the questions to him after which he got 100%. At the same time, he started seeing success in school through the support of his former elementary principal who serves as his personal tutor now and his FASD System Navigator from MCCSS and got all eight credits pushing through all the environmental challenges. He then got into OYAP in grade 10 as a truck and coach technician and is now flourishing. His placement boss put in all the accommodations he requires, he graduated from high school last year receiving four awards in leadership, mentoring, character and volunteering, got accepted into the apprenticeship program and is now preparing for his Red Seal Level 1 exam as a truck and coach technician at the age of 18. His boss recently shared his evaluation with us stated here: Have I ever told you what a remarkable young man your son is becoming…. He’s a treasure to carry on with. Thank you for all you and Shelley have done for him, and for society as well. He’s going to serve his maker well! All love Mike However, Jake's story is not unique in that when students are asked to do things they can't do, they fail and when asked to do things they can do, they succeed. While Jake's strengths do not include public speaking, Shannon Butt's strengths do. On Oct 21 at 3:15pm, Shannon will be sharing at the Canadian International FASD Conference at the Downtown Hilton Toronto her story of how she experienced life success once she was able to navigate our educational system and again Oct 23 at 12:15pm at Queen's Park. It is also why 870 students from both school boards in MPP Jordan's riding came together on June 2 to bring awareness to the type of successes children living with FASD can succeed when provided with the necessary but unique accommodations they require to succeed. In this final blog before Rural FASD's presentation at Queen's Park on Oct 23, we thank MPP Jordan of the PC Party, MPP Clancy of the Green Party and MPP Fairclough of the Liberal Party for coming as well and addressing our delegation. We look forward to seeing all of you through the day.