My faith in the system here is naively touching. Some might say stupid. In the couple of days before we left for Peru, I chased around various departments on behalf of my mate kiddo in the village, and was reassured by the two relevant social workers that they had everything in order for him to start school with his peers for the new academic year on the 1st of March. We arrived back from Peru on the afternoon of Thursday the 4th of March. In the evening of the same day I receive a text from kiddo’s mother. Do I know what’s happening re school as no-one has said anything to her since I last saw her?
Friday I did the rounds with my home-made rocket launcher. One of the social workers would be next in the office on Monday, and the other one in a different office on Tuesday. So I went to see kiddo and mum to touch base and report my lack of success on their behalf and explain that I would be on to it on Monday morning.
Monday, I went to see social worker A, based in San Francisco. She hasn’t done anything because she thinks that social worker B has it under control. She has every faith in social worker B, because “they were taking him to the summer scheme all summer, so I expect it is just that someone is on holiday now”. No, I was taking him to the summer scheme all summer, in my time, in my car, using my petrol, with no help, participation or remote interest from B or anyone in B’s department. A is a bit shocked by this; which is progress at least, but now she wants to focus on how I must be reimbursed for my petrol. Yes that would be lovely, but actually the point I’m trying to make is that the only thing that has happened so far is that which I have actioned myself, and what I’d really like is for someone “in the system” to recognise the kid’s existence and act accordingly, particularly while you have a legal obligation to educate him. She agrees to talk to social worker B, and now to another social worker C who is based in a school that might take him. Come back on Wednesday and she’ll let me know.
Tuesday, I go to Quebracho Herrado on the trail of social worker B. Predictably, she hasn’t done anything at all because she was waiting for the heads up from social worker A. She thinks that there is a provincial scheme where the village can claim the money for transporting kiddo to school, so she is going to look into that, but it might take a while because government paperwork always takes a while (don’t we know it) so in the mean time the village might need to put up the money for fuel so that someone can start transporting him without being out of pocket. She is going to talk to the governor. I suspect her problem there will be that she appears to be about fifteen and a half (when did she ever qualify as a social worker?) while the governor is a morose old git going through the male menopause.
Wednesday, I go back to social worker A. She hasn’t spoken to social worker C yet, and isn’t planning on doing anything until she hears from social worker B that the transport is in order.
It rained the rest of the week so the road to kiddo’s house became inaccessible. Today we went to see them in the afternoon (it’s his eighth birthday, we took him a ball), so once again I was able to bring mum up to date on the lack of progress, and to promise again that I would keep at it until we have a result.
On Saturday on Sunday they do no work at all. So it was on a Monday morning that the social worker was called. I guess that’s my schedule for another week taken care of then.