It’s completely outrageous, but somehow, the school year is over. Today was Lina’s last day, and a half day tomorrow is Corin’s wrap-up. My oldest is only finishing first grade, and already I can tell you, every year seems to go faster than the one before. I am not prepared for what this means for the future.

As Lina’s end-of-year party wrapped up and we headed home, I found myself again reflecting on the remarkable people she has brought into our lives. I’d like you to meet a few of them.

That’s Ms. Meri. This was Lina’s second year in her early childhood preschool class. Ms. Meri has a graduate degree in early childhood special education from Vanderbilt, and she is certified in behavioral analysis. I’m not sure I can really convey the remarkable work she does and the tremendous difference she has made for Lina and our family. Her blend of warmth and no-nonsense high expectations was exactly what Lina needed as she began her school experience. Ms. Meri’s professionalism and expertise have been clearly demonstrated at every turn over the past two years.

That’s Ms. Courtney. She was Lina’s occupational therapist this year. As the year began, Lina was resistant to fine motor activities like cutting with scissors or working on pre-writing skills. This morning, Courtney told me that writing her name on the chalk board is now one of Lina’s most preferred activities. That is no accident. So much patience and persistence has gone into finding the right strategies to motivate our girl to practice the fine motor skills so essential to her future academic success. Ms. Courtney also happens to volunteer as a leader for the GiGi’s Playhouse EPIC program for young adults, so she is doing big things in our Down syndrome community.

I didn’t get pictures with several other key members of Lina’s educational team: Arianna and Elizabeth, the fantastic full-time aids who did so much of the work necessary for the kids to learn and navigate the school day; Jodie, Lina’s beloved speech therapist, who often got a full-body, wrap-around legs hug at drop-off in the mornings; and Amy, the lovely and patient physical therapist, who made sure the physical environment in the classroom was suited to Lina’s needs and worked with her on the gross motor skills needed to safely navigate the school environment.

No one could have prepared me for how important these people have been to us. They work together as a team, helping to lay the foundation for Lina’s future success and thereby lifting so much of the weight that settled on my shoulders with her diagnosis. But beyond what they do for Lina, they are beautiful people, and my life is richer for knowing them.

What I am really trying to say is that besides the blessings of her individual presence in our family, Lina has brought us the gift of a network of truly remarkable people. In fact, that network extends well beyond her school. The early intervention therapists and staff who were our introduction to special education in Lina’s infant years, GiGi’s Playhouse volunteers and families, the lovely people we’ve met through the Down Syndrome Association of Middle Tennessee, random strangers who have shared their personal connections to Down syndrome… I regularly find myself counting as blessings people I have met in our foray along this unexpected path.

There are also good-byes that come with the package. Next year is Lina’s last in preschool, and it will bring changes. She will switch to the afternoon schedule, and after two years in Ms. Meri’s classroom, she will be required to change teachers. It’s always a little sad for a kid to say good-bye to a beloved teacher, but it’s especially poignant after two years of working with Ms. Meri and developing a solid trust in her ability to provide exactly what Lina needs in the classroom. We will miss her greatly.

There have been good-byes before, including to Lina’s entire team of therapists when early intervention ended at age three. Because these relationships are by nature more involved than in the average educational setting, the good-byes are hard. That will undoubtedly continue to be true. But it will also continue to be true that our lives are so much better for the role these remarkable people have played in Lina’s life.

It turns out, the biggest gift of Down syndrome is something we all hope for: meaningful connections with the very best kind of people.

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I don’t want to let this post go without noting that our educational experience is unfortunately not the norm. We’re still early in our experience, and I am sure we will face challenges in the future. But in many school systems across the nation, families struggle to get even the most basic educational and support services for their children with special needs. Under funded and under resourced schools often see those needs as a burden and try to get away with as little as possible, requiring parents to gird themselves for constant battle and strain family budgets and schedules to fill the gaps with outside resources. Even school systems with good intentions often fall short due to a severe lack of resources and training and the push and pull of constantly changing regulations and competing priorities. I am incredibly grateful that our experience thus far has been exceptional, but I also hurt for families whose educational experience has added to rather than subtracted from their burden. Better is clearly possible, and it shouldn’t take a wealthy county to make that happen. We must do right by our public schools, where most children with special needs have to receive their education and therapy services.