Sorry all this has happened to you & your child! I just want to comment on this one thing you wrote:
Unless your 12 year old has specific learning disabilities, I don’t fully agree with this. For decades I have seen young immigrant kids with zero English go to public schools and learn English just fine. In fact, I would guess within 6-12 months your kid will be conversationally fluent. Many (most?) public schools have english-as-seconed-language (ESL) programs and my personal view is that the quality of ESL program isn’t super critical, because the vast majority of learning happens through routine interactions with other English speaking kids, not from ESL classroom lessons.
I would encourage you to consider keeping your kid at home, and have him attend a school locally (public or private), and encourage him to make friends and enjoy those friendships. You will be surprised by the innate ability of the human mind to learn a new language at that age!
And hopefully OP can have a reasonable conversation with the school about refunding half or a portion of this year’s tuition and room and board fees - it’s a lot of money.
I don’t think the school is obviously negligent on the medical issue - it sounds like they tried to support your son. However, the Zoom sounds strange (if the facts align with how you described it), so hopefully the school is open to a reasonable discussion about a partial refund, which could be applied to helping your son get extra language help as he transitions back to a day school (public or private).
The better thing to hope for is that OP invested in Tuition Refund Insurance, because the school will refund nothing, unless it’s outlined in the enrollment contract (which I highly doubt).
There’s virtually no chance the school will refund the tuition. @skieurope is right – that’s what tuition insurance is for. The school budgets for a certain amount of revenue, and someone voluntarily leaving (or even involuntarily!) is not a reason the school should run a deficit. Most schools are tuition-driven.
Even in an expensive assisted living with a 24/7 nurse, they would not care for a wound/infection like that. I would think it would be out of the scope of a school nurse and the parent would be expected to take care of it privately.
Unfortunately that issue was the start of a lot of bridges being burned.
I am the parent of a kid with chronic serious health issues and had to learn quickly what bridges to burn and what to leave standing. If your son is in a different school, I would pick your battles and not have such high expectations of a school nurse.
It sounds like urgent care did all they could do- cleaning, topical and oral antibiotics, bandaging.
I am not trying to be unkind. You are new to the country and there are laws and regulations that limit what a school nurse can do.
Bullying is a problem everywhere. Language challenges may exacerbate this. Public schools often support ESL students. Community Colleges may also be a resource at some point. I would not assume a private boarding school would be the best situation for someone learning the language and it could be quite stressful.
I would not hire a lawyer and would try to deal with your anger, some of which might not be merited. It is possible he could remain where he is, if you ask for a meeting and start in a conciliatory tone, but I would think at this point things have gone too far and a move would be good. Check out local public schools and services for English as a second language.
Again, not trying to be unkind. Your story was painful to read and I have been there. I learned the world is not perfect and the way to most benefit my ill child was to start a meeting with a smile and a joke, and figure out what to fight and what to let go.
The problem is your expectations are in line with your formal country that are very different from what happens in the US. In the US many nurses in schools do nothing. Most will refuse to treat your kid. In other countries nurses will give your kid medicine like Tylenol. Not in the US. Even with unafilactic shock. Even if they have medicine on hand (with someone’s else name. ) They would literally let your kid die. Everyone is afraid to be sued. They would rather do nothing… Sorry that this happened to your kid. It is responsibility of parents to get child to doctor. School will take your kid only to ER. It is your responsibility to have all possible and impossible prescriptions labeled with your kids name. I know it sounds very stupid to you. But this is reality here.
For nurse to be able to do something, he or she should be Nurse Practitioner. And even in that case they may need supervision of a doctor.
And sorry kids can be brutal. And yes some may feel they can do anything and not be punished. It is kind of silly but in some cases black kid can say something that will be absolutely unappropriate for other kids. Unfortunately it is almost a norm.
Chiming in with the medical concern (issues 1 and 2). I agree with the above posters. I believe this is just a misunderstanding in culture. I do not know what you would wish a lawyer to do for you. I am assuming that the nurses email about supposedly taking him home was more about the fact that you were not understanding they were limited in what they can do and that parents are still in fact medically responsible for their child’s non life threatening medical problems. Read the policy on this. Most boarding schools require parents to make the appointment and attend if a specialist was required. If you the parents knew about a medical problem and were not taking the steps yourself to treat it, the court would find you as parents more negligent than the school. The school took the child to urgent care and ensured he took the antibiotics. If the child was fine at home, what was the difference in care?
Bullying is a huge issue at all schools and is difficult to prove. In the future, know that your only real action will be to formally request a room change according to the procedure at whatever school the child attends.
You said that his English is poor. I am not excusing the teachers word choice but I can see a context in which children (your kid) was being loud and disruptive and not listening or not understanding initial instructions. Being held accountable for voice volume and personal behavior is embarrassing but it doesn’t mean the teacher was being rude or mean.
I would question what it is you expect out of school security. Many schools are not gated communities and do have roads that are accessible to the public 24/7. Focus more on whether the doors to rooms are locked down. Sadly, school shootings seem to be happening yearly in the US at all different types of school. None are 100% “safe.”
I feel your best options are to learn that this was not the correct environment for your son and transfer him to a school closer to home for spring semester and reassess in summer before the next school year. At home perhaps you could invest in private English language lessons to better help your son. This huge change is likely stressful for him as well.
I don’t know your nationality, but is there a community of folks from your former country who might have some input about a day school? If in your neighborhood, do their kids attend the local public school…and how is that going?
I think the most important thing to do now is make a plan for the spring term that is not this boarding school. It’s not working as you thought it would, and it sounds like your son is not happy, and neither are you.
Agree with the suggestions above…either local public school for the spring term, or home school. Start looking now at options for the fall. It seems like a day school might be the better choice.