Dear Johnson County Support Group Parents:

We can’t believe it is already January and the school year is in full swing. For some of us it has been a very hard year and others a very productive school year. This letter is to try to find out if there is still support for our monthly parent support group meetings held at Earlywood Education Center in Franklin.
Sometimes, of course, we meet parents who do not even know we offer a support group for families of children with special needs but many of you are aware of our group. Jeff Young, Assistant Director of Special Education, and I have very much enjoy holding the meetings and assisting families with information and education about their child’s disability, resource information and trainings. The concern is that the attendance of the support group has simply been going lower and lower.

This letter is to see if parents are still interested in attending our meetings and also what topics are of interest. We have offered a variety of different topics in the past years including: waiver information, Article 7 trainings, behavior support information and evenings to make visual support materials to take home to use.

Please email me to let me know if there is still interest in the community and what topics we could get speakers to discuss that would be of interest. We will do our best to find a qualified person to discuss the issues that you would like to hear more about.

We are also planning our April Super Saturday information fair  that we have done for the last 7 years. Please also send workshop ideas and thoughts for this learning opportunity! We all learn so much from each other when we meet.  I do hope that these opportunities can continue on, but we need interest to increase. I can personally say that I feel that Johnson County Special Services has been very supportive in providing assistance for our group and I truly appreciate it. These in-services, trainings and groups are a great way to meet others and assist with advocating for our children.

We as parents are often stretched thin but please consider if you can be part of the continued support  a parent group can offer both parents, other family members and professionals in the field that assist our children . We will NOT be having a January meeting this month but the rest of the school year we will be having our meetings on the fourth Monday of each month for February and March. Our next flyer will be sent out   soon to announce those speakers. Our meetings are held from 6:30-8:00pm at Earlywood Education Center in Franklin. In April we will have our Super Saturday information fair and May is our celebration cookout. Thank you for your input and continued support.

Lesa Paddack
Johnson County Parent Support Group Leader
lgpaddack@msn.com

Jeff Young
Assistant Director
Special Services, Johnson County Schools
jyoung@ssjcs.k12.in.us