Dying disabled boy Ethan Rediske, 11, who is in morphine coma asked to prove he can't sit standardised test

News Limited Network
February 06


Florida boy Ethan Rediske, 11, is required to take a standardised education test every year, despite the fact that he was born with brain damage, cerebral palsy and is blind, reports The Washington Post.

Ethan's mother Andrea Rediske has been asked to prove her son cannot take this year's test, despite the fact that he is in hospice in a morphine coma and doctors believe he could die any day.

Ethan's devoted teacher Jennifer Rose visits him daily, and is required to document his progress. The school district, which is aware the boy is in hospice, has now asked for a letter from the hospice saying Ethan is dying in order to exempt him from the test.

"Seriously? Why is Ethan Rediske not meeting his 6th-grade hospital homebound curriculum requirements? BECAUSE HE IS IN A MORPHINE COMA," Ms Rediske wrote in a letter to The Washington Post.

"We expect him to go any day. He is tenaciously clinging to live. This madness has got to stop," she said.

It is not Ms Rediske's first fight with the state over subjecting her son to standardised tests.

Ms Rediske said the tests are an extreme strain on Ethan, who had to do breathing treatments to remove liquid from his lungs three times a day. Last year she was able to obtain a waiver.

"Each question can take up to 10 to 15 minutes to just do one question", Ms Rediske told Bay News 9 last year as her son faced another angonising test.

"So he's spending hours in his wheelchair and he has severely compromised lungs."

"They're asking him questions about the way a peach tastes, and he's fed through a tube in his stomach, and he will never taste a peach," she said.

"I honestly don't know what they're trying to measure with this test and at the end of the day it's damaging his health."

Another Florida boy, a nine-year-old named Michael, who is blind and severely disabled after being born with a brain stem instead of a brain, has also been forced to take a standardised education test. Michael lives in an Orlando care home after his parents abandoned him after birth.

"He's blind. And they're showing him pictures of a giraffe, a monkey and an elephant and asking him which one is the money," Orange County School Board member Rich Roach told The Orlando Sentinel of Michael's tests.

"I'm watching all this and just about to lose my mind."

A new Florida law allow parents to request a waiver for the tests for children with chronic conditions, but the process is long and involved and requires parents to get approval from the education commission each year.