Monday, September 17, 2007

The need for the iBOT on Thursday

Hopefully things will go as planned and I will get my iBOT tomorrow. This is just in time for an "open house" in my daughter's classroom on Thursday. My daughter attends an old elementary school that does not have an elevator. Her classrooms have been on the main level up until this year, and so up until now, getting to her classroom hasn't been an issue. This year she is upstairs. Parents are invited to see the classroom, meet the teacher, hear about the curriculum, etc. sometime near the beginning of the school year... this year it will be on Thursday of this week. I'm so happy that I'll be able to go! Without the iBOT, I wouldn't. My daughter is really happy about it too. I just hope I get the stair climbing technique down by then because right now it still takes quite a bit of effort for me to do it. There is a technique and once I figure that out, it will require little effort on my part. I was
hoping my daughter's dad would be able to come and he could assist me if needed, but he has the flu! Isn't September early for the flu?

BTW, in case anyone who is reading this is thinking, "Why not just ask to have an elevator installed in the building?" The answer is, I tried that years ago. There's simply no money for that. Period. "Reasonable accomodation" does need to be made though. I could have asked that they move my daughter's classroom to the main level, but both the 5th grade teachers have been in their classrooms for years and I wasn't about to ask them to do that for me.

Which reminds me of something else I wanted to mention. Most people assume that every public place is wheelchair accessible. NOT TRUE at all! If I had a nickle for everytime someone has said to me when I question accessibilty, "Of course they're accessible! They have to be, it's the law!", I'd have enough money to buy two iBOTs. Or, at least dinner. For one. At Taco Bell.

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