I had a pretty good public school experience, and my O&M teacher actually was big on that I should NOT go to a school for the blind and my VI teacher was extremely good too. The two were somewhat controlling, but not in the ways that are being discussed here.

One tried to undermine my parents' authority where my parents' legitimately should've had some and also tried to convince me that everyone besides her was trying to control me, where in reality my teachers and family were pretty much "you wanna do it, do it." and even had rehearsed conversations she would have with her husband, the only other blind person I knew well and later a blind friend that obviously were trying to manipulate me. But in terms of equipment and stuff, they were pretty open, just people other than me should not use my cane. but she was so insistant on me being utterly independent (can't was a word she never used) I actually have trouble asking for help when I legitimately need it now.

The VI teacher was pretty conservative but she also opened up a lot working with me and even after she retired she came back from retirement to work with me alone as she was the only person qualified in the state to teach calculus-level Nemeth Braille stuff and advanced scientific Nemeth as I was in very advanced classes. But she largely fought for me rather than fighting against me, arguing that I should do gym, allaying suspicions that I would hurt myself in the lab in Chemistry, and stuff like that as you largely needed an adult advocate in my school system, and raising Hell when in sixth grade my new Middle School hired someone specifically to follow me around and make sure I didn't get hurt. The person did that for half a day and then had her job descriptions dramatically and suddenly changed as my Mom and that VI teacher tore the school a new one.

I was yelled at just once for letting someone use a Braille and speak as I had taught a friend the rudiments of braille and in a class we would pass the thing back and forth and have it say stupid shit that kids think is super-funny but we were indeed being inappropriate and disruptive.

Maybe there aren't as many protective laws in the UK Dark as my public school experience was really good and my college life was heavenly. If someone in my middle school fudged with me the school would've come down on them like a ton of bricks. In high school that was even more true and in college the thought would never even cross someone's mind. I don't understand how college life in England could be so much worse, or at least "secondary school" means college in the U.s.  than England. I didn't even go to college in a particularly enlightened part of the Country, living and going to college in Kentucky but that sort of cruelty was unthinkable.

At one point in High school my laptop was stolen overnight that I kept at school and was given by the state. The person was never caught but many of the students were practically wielding pitchforks and burning torches for whoever did it once it became public knowledge.

one last thing though. "rubber Monsters?" sounds like Monster in my pocket, they were one of my favorite toys when I was little. As a lot of D&d players actually used them as figurines for their games and the fact that  they were actually of really good quality. They sell them in England and the rest of Europe from what I know but they haven't been sold in the US for going on 25 years now I think. The last I remember was they had Monster in my pocket wrestlers you could get in some cereal boxes as prizes, and I was like 10 when that happened.

The Nintendo game Monster in My pocket was also a pretty good game too, and I was so proud of myself when I was able to beat it consistently.

sorry, the mention of what sounds like Monster in my pocket took me down memory lane, but again, I don't understand how your educational experience was so much worse than mine. I get it for the School for the Blind, but beyond that?

I really don't understand it because I'm really ugly and weird-looking. with eyes 1/3 the normal size with blue whites and perpetual pink-eye, a v-shaped jaw with a mouth I can block with one knuckle of my pinky finger, a face that is unusually bird-like, a tracheotomy and really mess-ed-up frog-like shoulders. I also drool because of some permanent jaw numbness and difficulty shutting my mouth. By all logic, I should've been a target. I was picked on a bit in middle school, but it was just the occasional bit of pencil, paper wadd, or holding fingers an inch from my eyes and asking how many there were. my response was to flip them off and respond (how many fingers am I holding up?"

That's why the trust between the kid and the parent is so important, and if you break that, as the kid, you can't easily get it back. I was a pretty good kid, but in 5th grade, the second time through, when everyone thought it would be a good idea to hold me back for entry into mainstream classes in middle school, which at that point, I was not attending, I had a bad year. The teacher running that side of the VI department, I didn't really like her all that much, she made us brush our teeth after lunch, and had this gum tasting tooth paste that I hated, I always used normal tooth paste. Also, all my friends ere moving on to middle school, while I was not. That really bothered me, because then I knew practically no one. I started doing things, acting out I guess. I would take a pocket knife into school and scratch up the bathroom stall walls with it. I then started stealing matches and taking them into school. I'd go in the bathroom, light one, let it burn a while and then chuck it in the toilet and flush it. I'd then go and tell a teacher it smelled like something burning in the bathroom. I did this every other day or so for a week, then I went in one day, lit a match, and chucked it in the trash can. I waited for a fire to catch, and then left. I was so proud of it, I couldn't keep it quiet. I would tell people not to use that bathroom, to use the one on the other end, and when they would ask why, I'd just laugh and smirk. At recess, I took the book of matches with me, it had 2 left, and chucked it in the storm grate. I did tell someone though, someone who I thought was a friend, and that person snitched on me.

Now we get to the point of the story. My parents went to bat for me, but really, my dad fought them hard. They dropped everything down and gave me 5 days of in school suspension for possession, but really, I was the one who did it. The fire was very close to catching the paper towels hanging down from the dispenser, and from that point, who knows. The trash can was near full when I did that, so it could have got way out of hand. Back then, I understood it could have hurt people, maybe not so much before I did it, but certainly after. But the one thing I took for granted, and I didn't understand until I got older, was just how much I'd broken their trust, and what that meant to both of us. That's a big deal, yes, I'm glad no one was hurt, and I'm sorry I ever did it, it certainly didn't solve anything, but I'm most sorry I took advantage of my parents' trust in me and lied to their face about it. That's a type of wound that cuts deep I can tell you, and on both sides. I mean, we're all good now, that was near 21 years ago, but still. Anyone reading this who has lied to their parents, or thinks about doing it, just don't. At least, not for something that major. I mean, lying about small stuff, while not good, is kind of understandable at some level, like saying you did your homework, when you didn't. But still, its not a good habit to get into. And, unless you have shit parents, its really just for the best to admit what you've done. I know that I think about this stuff sometimes, if I ever had kids, which I fully do not intend to do, but if I did, well, lying to me really does nothing. If they told me straight up what they'd done, then I'd go easier on them. But once you've damaged that trust between you and your parents, they're always gonna doubt you, so if you got in trouble of a major sort, and needed them to fight for you, maybe thy don't take your word for it.

I know some of you probably do have shitty parents, and that really does suck. I'm grateful that mine were good. My dad was better out of the two of them in handling my visual stuff, my mom used to want me not to do stuff, while my dad made sure I got every opportunity. But yeah, if you do have good parents, and you know you do, just cherish that. And even though you butt heads with them, or they get on your nerves sometimes, trust me, some people have it way worse. Some people live in falling down houses with crack head neighbors and moms who shoot up in the afternoon, ya know? Some people don't have enough to eat, go hungry a lot of the time, etc. So if you have good parents, don't fuck it up by lying to them when you get in trouble. I'm not telling you to be goody two shoes, I mean, everyone does things, like smoking cigs or weed or something, trying things, experimenting and stuff, but if they catch you at it, just come clean, its really not worth lying to them.

@Orko,
Sadly, I believe it goes beyond the frivelous lawsuits  you and I, and others, no doubt,   detest!  the movie super size me comes to mind as the perfect example outside of the court system.  In case you're not Familiar with the thing, it's a documentary on this guy who eats nothing but Mcdonalds for 30 days straight and the SUPPOSED, drastic effect it has on his life.  what they don't tell you is that like, you know, you really probably, shouldn't be eating fastfood every day of your life?  Every day of the month?  Duh?
but, even if you did, just playing devil's advocate for a moment, another thing they don't tell you is that, no one has ever been able to duplicate the results.  the documentary swears up and down that he's had every item on the menu so as to not be discriminative, that he only ever had it supersized when he was asked, and that he ended up consuming an average of 5000 calories a day, according to his doctor.  According to people who have tested a large bigmac meal for the sake of argument, however, the thing only clocks in at just 1,450 calories, as one of the fattiest meals on the menu.  the question I have is, what the blazes else is he eating in between we don't know about!  the greatest problem I have is that people fall for this kind of thing left, right and center!  While I have no love for the fastfood industry and don't advocate for eating McDonalds every day of your life because greaseballs and gtreasemonkies and grease in general, I also think people have become too complacent when it comes to believing a conspiracy lies behind every single tale that is spun by another person against big corporations because because.  it's easier to jump on a bandwagon full of other twits than it is to take some time to do a bit of research and actually come up with something substancial.

@Orko,
Thumbs up!  if only more people had enough common sense to see it as such!

forgot, Mythbusters also often had confounding variables (things that should've been controlled in the experiment, and could affect the results) but weren't. For example, they were comparing whether it was more fuel-efficient on a hot day to drive a car with the AC on or with the windows down to stay cool. They had one car that was grey and another that was black. A black car would draw a lot more heat and absorb a lot more sunlight, and that extra heat ought to have affected milage in some way. A grey car, being lighter in color would absorb less sunlight and thus be cooler in temperature, perhaps making the AC not have to work as hard or otherwise affecting how the engine worked.

I know that they had two different colors to make it obvious what was going on to the viewers, but if it were good science the cars would be identical not only in model and year (which they were fortunately enough) but color as well because that very well might have mattered. Even if it wouldn't, if one car did better, they couldn't say definitively whether the color of the car or the mode of cooling the driver inside made the difference, whether it was one, the other, or both.