Interesting yet long story contained herewith. For kicks and giggles.
First thing the story has: I'm autistic. Not "I-can't-talk-to-people" (although that was once the case), not a "savant", but very noticeably autistic. The school has done a re-evaluation (which was very expertly written, as it said that I talk to myself while maintaining good eye contact. Try and wrap your head around that one.) and determined that I was no longer Autistic. Or at least, autistic enough. Because it somehow wore off. I don't get their thinking, but whatever.
So, the school sends out the student information this year. This packet of information lists a lot of things, including health problems. Guess what they still say I have even though they refuse to acknowledge it? Autism. Twice (I'm again being dead serious. I think our district has some REALLY big issues with people not paying attention. xD)
This is one of the many stupid things the administrative staff does. On a regular basis. Not even getting into the school's abysmal scheduling program, which has scheduled at least a third of the students with empty holes.
Add to this the WONDERFUL story about my school's Principal, who was caught halfway through the year driving on a suspended license (he'd had that since way earlier, but "forgot" to tell the district about it) with Marijuana in the car. So, as you might have guessed, he got fired.
Anything else? How about the math department? Heaven help us all, the math department. Because of 9/11's resulting budget cuts, our math department didn't get the update it was expecting (we update the curriculum on a rotating schedule, and it takes 7 or 8 years to get back around). So my math classes go somewhat like this Pre-Algebra -> First half of Algebra 1 (Middle School taught Algebra 1 over two years) -> IMP 1 -> IMP 2. IMP is a different math program that I happened to like better than traditional math, and you could take either regular or IMP. Now, at the very end of IMP 2, we find out that they're going to be using CIM, a math program that allegedly is the offspring of the union of these two different styles. As a result, both IMP and Algebra would cease to be for our school, and we'd have one math program. Because IMP teaches things at different times than regular math, we did a unit of it at the end of the year to get adjusted (which, wonderful foreshadowing that it is, was very confusing for us). So, the school buys the new books, and gets ready for a new year with one math program.
Well... then they decide to go back and edit their plans. Those kids in IMP 2? They instead will be the last students to use the old Algebra stuff. I'm glad that
my school cares that my education is up to date
. So, fun part ahoy! They switch the math programs for everyone under Algebra 2. The program fails miserably (largely because the teachers seem to teach the subject as "read the book for information", a tactic that doesn't work for these books). Parents complained about it to the point that the district - and I suggest that you wear a helmet, because headdesk doesn't quite cover this one - switches back to the old math program! That's right, in the middle of economic crisis and so on and so forth, when the school was already planning on firing teachers, our school district switches math programs--twice. And we, being the wise district we are, got rid of the old books already. So, we buy the same books again (no, not the exact same, but you get the idea). So, we are now using a traditional math program supplemented by the CIM books. Heaven help us if this doesn't work.
I'm in a town where these people are not only respected citizens, but are the teachers of the next generation. Who probably will end up going insane. I feel great about life.
tl;dr version: Be grateful you don't go to school here.