I used to work for a company that made educational software for kids with disabilities and I didn't believe that most of the kids were even disabled

I worked for this company as a software testing engineer for 8 months and Iloit stopped working there 8 months ago. The company was about 15 people so it was pretty small, but their software was used in tens of thousands of different schools with millions of kids using their software every day. I didn't have much sympathy for kids with disabilities growing up and never liked the concept of them getting extra attention or extra credit or having things easier. I always thought that kids with disabilities was mostly a bunch of bullshit and that parents were faking it just so their kids could get extra attention. I was an edgy kid with an attitude problem but I grew out of it as an adult but still didn't have much sympathy for kids with disabilities.<br><br>&#x200B;<br><br>I remember when I was in elementary school, there was this kid in my class named Charlie and he had autism. He would always make these weird noises when he breathed through his nose and when he would eat his lunch, you could hear him breathing through his nose super loud. One time when we were on the bus, him and I got into this stupid fight over some pointless bullshit and he called me a "dickwad" and the bus driver heard him and he got in trouble. I told the bus driver that I said it first to him and got in trouble too but it still didn't change the fact that he was a dick. I wasn't a bully or anything and would always get along with him fine whenever we were in class together. Whenever we would do group projects, I would ask to be in the same group as him because I knew that he was dumb and wouldn't do any of the work and would still get the same score as the rest of us.<br><br>&#x200B;<br><br>It was the same thing in high school. I never liked working in groups because I knew that there was always at least one dumb person in the group. In my advanced computer science class, we had to work in groups of three for our final project to make a full software program from scratch. My teacher assigned me to a group with two other kids and one of them had a developmental disability. He was allowed to get extra time to finish assignments and exams and was allowed to have a note taker. I have no proof of this, but I'm sure that he didn't actually have a disability but rather his parents paid for him to get a disability so he could get extra attention. The other kid in my group was pretty smart and we made it very clear to the kid with the disability that he wasn't going to contribute anything to the project and it didn't matter if he didn't even show up to our group meetings. He didn't show up to our first two meetings but then showed up to the last two and helped us brainstorm ideas and write up the report for the project. He didn't actually write any of the code but he contributed a little bit. The three of us got A's on the project.<br><br>&#x200B;<br><br>So yea. I wasn't a bully to kids with disabilities but I never liked them and never believed that they actually had a disability. I treaded them exactly how I treated everyone else but didn't like getting paired up with them in group projects and never liked how the teachers would give them extra attention.<br><br>&#x200B;<br><br>When I got my software testing engineer job, I was excited to get my first project and get started testing their software. I told my manager that I didn't actually know what their software did or how to use it but he said it was fine and that it didn't matter if I knew how to use it or not. I asked him "well what the fuck am I supposed to test then" and he told me that I only had to look for bugs in the software and didn't need to know what any of the features did. The software was for kids with disabilities. They had different versions for kids with different disabilities and for kids of different ages. The main product that we offered was for kids with autism. The software had different settings you could change and you could pick what features you wanted turned on or off depending on how severe the kids autism was. There was also different gamification themes you could change depending on the age of the kid. The software was whatever the opposite of a犯game is. Instead of the game being as engaging as possible, this software was as boring as possible and was only there to be as useful as possible. It taught reading and math skills and social skills and a few other things. All of the features for teaching the skills were the exact same across all of the different versions. The only thing that changed across the differently versions were the settings that you could change and the different gamification themes you could change. I didn't use the software much at work but from what I could tell, it did seem kind of useful. I didn't see the point in kids having their own PC at school but I guess it's better than nothing.<br><br>&#x200B;<br><br>I didn't believe that most of the kids using our software actually had disabilities. I'm sure some of them did but I'm positive that the majority of them were just kids who were considered "special needs" because parents thought their kids were "gifted" in a certain way. I'm sure some of them didn't even have disabilities but rather had skilled parents who could manipulate the school into thinking that their kids needed special treatment. I think that the vast majority of parents subscribe to the modern day trend of thinking that every kid is "gifted" in a certain way. I'm sure that the vast majority of kids using our software didn't actually need it and didn't actually have a disability. I'm sure parents just used it as another way to get their kids extra attention and make it look like they cared about them.<br><br>&#x200B;<br><br>The company that I worked for made hundreds of millions of dollars in profit every year and the CEO was a multi billionaire. I'm sure a lot of the parents who's kids used our software didn't actually think that their kids had a disability, but rather just knew that they were getting a free product that they could use that was made and maintained by a multi billionaire CEO who made hundreds of millions a year in profit. I'm sure a lot of parents thought that since the product was free, they might as well use it. I'm sure a lot of parents thought that since the product was made and maintained by a multi billionaire CEO, it must be a good product that is actually useful. I wasn't wrong. A lot of teachers that I talked to at conferences told me that they knew that most of the kids who were using the software didn't actually need it, they just didn't want to miss out on a free product. I'm sure parents didn't care that the CEO made hundreds of millions of dollars in profit every year from their tax money. I'm sure parents didn't care that the CEO was a multi billionaire who charged hundreds of millions of dollars for his free product every year. I'm sure parents just cared about getting a free product that was made and maintained by a multi billionaire CEO. The product was actually kind of useful so it didn't even matter if parents were only using it because it was free or not.<br><br>&#x200B;<br><br>I went to a few conferences for teachers to show them our products and teach them how to use it and the features that it has. I saw a few teachers who had kids with actual disabilities who were interested in the products and learning how to use it but I remember this one teacher who didn't seem to care about learning how to use it and didn't seem to care that most kids who were using it didn't actually have disabilities. I asked her if the kids in her class actually had disabilities or if the school district was just paying for the subscription so that all the kids in the school could use it or not. She told me that she didn't care if the kids had disabilities or not or if the school district was just paying for the subscription so all the kids could use it or not. She told me that the software was free and she would always use it.<br><br>&#x200B;<br><br>Whenever I stopped by the conference room to see how the conference was going, I didn't really see the teachers paying any attention to what was going on. I saw a few teachers who were paying attention but it seemed like the majority of them weren't paying any attention or didn't care about learning how to use it or didn't care about if the kids had disabilities or not or if the school district was paying for the subscription so all the kids could use it or not. It seemed like the majority of teachers didn't care about anything except getting a free product that was made and maintained by a multi billionaire CEO.