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For caregivers of kids with T1D, do you have any special accommodations available from your child’s school? For adults with T1D, did you have special accommodations when you were in school?
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I was allowed to go to the Bathroom, see the nurse or eat a snack. This was LONG before BG meters or any technology.
Not until my dad sued the LASD in 1967. I had a low bg event and the teacher and school nurse panicked and called an ambulance. All they had to due was give me the candy my mom sent to the teacher for me. They wanted to remove me from school and send me to a school where children were severely handicapped. Needless to say, my parents sued and sent me to a parochial school after that. No more problems.
The first six grades of grade school, my parents would sit down with the teacher and explain the administration of adrenaline, then hand her a small 2″x6″ black box with a syringe, adrenaline, and a small razor blade to cut open the bottle. This was a small town in central Illinois in the 1950’s. None ever had to use it. Whew!
NA. Neither of my two sons have diabetes, plus they’re in their late 30s and early 40s now. I didn’t develop T1D until I was 21. I’d left full-time education at that stage of my life.
Our son was diagnosed in Jr. High School. Parents were required to meet with the school nurse who was right on top of diabetes. However, after the first year, he went on the Medtronic pump and the older school nurse was freaked out by the technology. However, she learned how to carb count and the cafeteria had to provide those to her, and she then could help my son determine dosages. I worried about him all of the time, but this kid had a pandemic wedding in July and now has a wife to help him. He also is going to try a dexcom that reads onto his phone. Insulin is 99 years old this year, so next year is a big birthday for T1Ds to celebrate.
My brother had none the whole K thru 12 and then getting his AS degree. I did not from dx in 6th grade to graduating with both my BA in Healthcare Management and BSN. My niece has a had a plan, 504 (I think that’s the name) since preK to now a senior in high school. The 3 of us have gone to the same grade and high schools , two of us at the same time.
I was out of school by the time I was diagnosed so it was not applicable to me. Both of my youngest two children were school aged and while they did receive some special services at their schools, they were not offered 504 plans. I didn’t hear about the existence of those until my children had graduated from high school. My daughter is still a college student and now she does register with the office of students with disabilities each year. Those benefits are huge pluses to her. I wish I had known about the 504 plans when the kids were in 1st through 12th grades. There definitely would have been different outcomes in their educations if we had.
My daughter was dx this year in March. She is 9. Very nervous when school started back up in August. Her school nurse is amazing. We have so much support in her school, including teacher and majority of staff. We were able to have the 504 plan set up within a month of school start. She uses Dexcom with her phone and omnipod, school nurse and teacher are knowledgeable about both these devices.
My school and teacher had been informed, and knew that I might occasionally need to eat mid-day. Since I was a serious kid, no one ever felt the need to question me when I did. Even so, it seldom was necessary, since tight control was not possible with urine tests as your guide. (1960s)
I almost qualify for this question. Most of the responses relate to K-12 education scenes and properly so. I was diagnosed in the 1960’s in the middle of my junior year in college. Without much fuss, my professors supported my efforts to keep up while I spent about two weeks in hospital care as I learned how to self-administer insulin and get my BG under control. When I came back to campus, I was invited to join a special dining hall table where students with various diet needs (diabetes, food allergies, etc.) were allowed to order food from a menu instead of eating the standard one choice meal in the dining hall.
I was dx in 1955 when I was in the 3rd grade. My mother met with the school nurse and my teacher to explain what they would need to do if I experienced hypoglycemia. Their response, supported by school administration, was to have me sit on the bench during gym and recess. During other kids birthday parties in class I was sent to the library until the party food was gone. During the entire time I was a public school student, graduated high school in 1964, I received no assistance or special accommodations.
DX in 1956. School allowed me to have candy bar in desk desk, but no other special accommodations as far as I know. I took my own lunch.
5 years ago my daughter was in public school, they would not follow the Diabetes resource nurse suggested testing / dosing schedule, and then they would not allow us to come to the school to provide insulin when the nurse was not on campus (she had 2 other schools she also had to be at.) in addition they refused to call us for high BG they wanted to just annotate on a communications journal, which if she is at 400 we prefer to come get her and monitor at home since at that point she wasn’t learning anyways. It resulted in a lot of back and forth between the school and us (family & doctors) we ended up pulling her out and have been homeschooling her as a result.
I almost answered no but then I remember I was allowed to eat snacks in school and sew hidden pockets in my uniform to carry candy with me. Diagnosed at age 10 in 1984.
K-12 I was allowed to eat during standardized tests. Starting in 11th or 12th grade I was also allowed to make up any time lost while eating or going to the bathroom, but never actually needed to use that accommodation. In elementary school I was allowed to keep snacks in my desk and in middle school I was allowed to carry a small backpack with me so I would have snacks available (everyone else had to keep their bags in their lockers). I was also allowed to leave class 5 minutes before lunch so that I could get myself to the nurse’s office to check my blood sugar. If I was allowed to do that in high school I wasn’t aware of it. I just went the nurse’s office after class and went to lunch late. I never got in trouble for being in the hallway in between class, though (if I was stopped I just said I was on my way back from the nurse’s office) so I usually took the opportunity to stop at my locker and swap out my books. (We only had 3 minutes in between classes and 18 minutes for lunch, so that freedom to wander in the middle of the day was very helpful, but not for diabetes reasons.) I’m pretty sure I told my college that I was diabetic, and I remember visiting Health Services to pick up/return sharps containers, but I don’t think I requested any special accommodations. I definitely never visited Disability Services. Most of my exams were self proctored and/or take home exams. I could easily take a break or eat a snack without having to ask permission.
I wasn’t diagnosed until I was almost 24, at which point I’d been officially out of school for three years.
Dx in 1974 at age 8. I had a stash of juice, insulin and syringes at the nurse’s office, but no other type of accommodations. I was able to leave class if I felt low to head over to the office.
No – not when I went to grade school and HS school in the 1960s and 70s. I just took care of myself by keeping Karo or maple syrup in my locker and sugar cubes wrapped in aluminum foil in the pockets of my gym shorts and in my purse. In college I kept OJ in a mini-fridge in the dorm room. I didn’t start using glucagon until I was in my mid-20s. Wasn’t a question like this asked and answered fairly recently?
I was allowed more sick day from school but did my school work at home I was a pre diabetic when I went to school