Tuesday, January 26, 2010

Nashville, Tenn. struggles to find surrogate advocates

A child's most active and loudest advocate is usually his or her parents.  Especially, when the child has special needs.  But what happens when you have a child in foster care?  That's the problem facing the Nashville, Tenn. school district.

To assist students who don't have parents, the district uses surrogate advocates -- individuals, who volunteer their time to represent a child's academic and educational needs during supervised school meetings.  The district has about 80 children on its list and only 30 volunteers from the community.  And, its struggling to find more.  Volunteers typically have full-times jobs and their own children to advocate on behalf of, which makes it difficult to retain.

What do you think?

Found by way of DisabilityScoop: Schools make plea for surrogate advocates
Also, see The Tennessean: Metro schools need surrogates for special needs children

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