Thursday, 20 January 2011
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Should There Be Separate Schools For Autistic Children?
Brett Singer, of Parent Dish, asks readers if separate schools for autistic children is “just a way for society to further marginalize children with autism” or if “autistic children should go to separate schools.” This questions comes about because New Jersey Governor Chris Christie believes that autistic children would do better in separate schools. This opinion is not shared by everyone, and is coming under heated debate.
My son attends a school for special needs students. It is a public school, and the staff is well trained in working with all disabilities. I have had my son in public schools that have dedicated autism classrooms. Some were good, some were not so good. None of them were even close to matching my son’s current school in services provided. None of them had the staff with the expertise that this one has. None of them provided a safe, secure environment for my son.
When I say “safe, secure environment,” I am referring to the bullying that can go on between neurotypical children and children with a disability. My son’s self-esteem is nurtured at his school. He is normal there. He is free to learn and socialize without worry.
I’m not saying that all autistic children, or all children with a disability, should attend a special needs school. I believe regular public schools can be an appropriate placement for high functioning children. It’s children, like my son, that are low functioning that can benefit from a specialized school.
Governor Christie believes that a separate school for autistic children would save the state money. I can’t speak to that point, without looking at the numbers. It would make sense, though. In a regular school, a child that may need a one on one assistant, may not need one in a specialized school.
In the end, it would have to be the implementation of what Governor Christie is proposing that will prove if this is a good idea or not. If the school is for ALL autistic children, that would be segregation, and could cause more harm than good for our children. If the school is to be like my son’s school, dedicated for low functioning children, the school should be a success. In the end, it will be in the implementation of Governor Christie’s proposal. The children that attend, the staff that will work there, and the learning devices and special equipment provided for the students.
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- From: autismlearningfelt
- About Me: I am a WAHM, with two children. My daughter is 5 and my son is 10. My 10 year old son is diagnosed with Autism. I have a home-based business, www.learningfelt.com . Great creative and fun activities with felt for children. This blog is for sharing my experiences raising my son, product reviews, giveaways and sharing whatever items I find and want to share with all my readers. Read more at my blog: http://www.autismlearningfelt.com/
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Comments (20)
Nice post. It would be nice if all kids could go to the same school. It would be nice if everyone would get along. It would be nice if the teachers were all the most qualified. But sadly, that's just not the case.
I'm inclined to think that autistic children would do better in their own separate schools. The only problem I see with this proposal is that the spectrum is so broad, I'm not sure one could design ANY educational institution that could work to "manufacture" students from ASD kids.
This is a complicated question.
There is no doubt that specialty schools for children with autism tend to be staffed with greater expertise, resources, and outcomes tracking abilities than their non-specialized counterparts. While the debate between "Pro-Inclusion" and "Pro-Specialty Schools" is actually not a debate at all (if it were, you wind find people Con-Inclusion or Con-Specialty Schools), but rather two groups arguing FOR different things, the issue of "segregation" in this case should take a back seat to the outcome - increasing functional independence, which is the same thing as reducing the burden of care. That having been said, there are a couple of things to consider.
We need both specialty schools and inclusion based opportunities for children with Autism.
First and foremost are the functional independence needs of the student. Given the spectrum of independence associated with Autism, there are "low functional independence" kids and "high functional independence kids", and everything in between. When a child has very low functional independence, skill acquisition is usually the top priority, and this is something that specialty schools do very well. Why? Because they can control the environment, the staffing, the interaction, the program elements and the repetition in minute detail. In focused 40 hour per week, Applied Behavioral Analysis programs, the "school" part of the work is actually secondary to the "behavior" part, which is more important at this stage for these kids. At this stage, we are more interested in teaching functionality, and creating a "learning routine" - teaching children "how" to learn. Once we have the learning structure in place, we can start pushing content through it. While all children with autism, regardless of where they fall on the spectrum, can benefit from such intervention, these kind of "early, intensive intervention" programs generate high outcome results when it comes to functional independence skills. Skill acquisition is best taught in closed, contained, controlled environments, where the opportunity for "errorless learning" can be manipulated, where behavioral rewards can be immediate and focused, and where interruptions are minimized. But acquisition is only the first step. The next step is generalization, which requires the student to generalize the learned skill in other environments where there may be greater challenges to completing the independence based task. Skill generalization requires access to different, less controlled contexts, often associated with "inclusion" environments. As functional independence increases, the need for opportunity to generalize in "inclusion" based contexts grows. So, as students become more independent, and the burden of care decreases, students tend to benefit from being exposed to more normative and practically occurring environments in the real world. The real word requires practice, meaning both the opportunity for failure and success must exist.
The answer to this question is clearly that all students CAN benefit from specialty environments, and that some students ALSO benefit from inclusion environments. The determining factor should be based on the level of functional independence reached by the student in their individualized program, not the fact that a Governor thinks it's cheaper. In the US according to the Individuals with Disabilities Act (IDEA), cost is not allowed to be considered when assessing a student's functional independence and education needs and when designing their program. What Governor Christie is suggesting flies in the face of federal law.
This is not an either/or debate, and members of the autism community should strive to make that clear to everyone, including our law makers.
This might be great for exceptionally low-functioning children, as you have pointed out yourself. I have a child who is in Grade 3 and since he is not yet diagnosed formally, or as such, labelled yet, I don't see the benefits to suddenly switching him to a specialized school once(if?) we get a diagnosis. Our school board used to run special ed programs, having special ed classrooms in certain schools, but funding cuts and the push to 'immerse' the children in the mainstream cut the program out completely. As the children got older, they certainly were marginalized and teased/bullied by the mainstream children. This went for the gifted program as well (that I was in). Different was definitely something to be ashamed of.
I don't think it's a bad idea. Not all teachers at public schools are able to treat autistic children the way they should. (Some can't even treat regular children the way they should.) An environment like this would be good for autistic students, particularly because of the training that teachers would have for them.
I wish the public education system were dissolved.
I'm not sure about separate schools, but better educational environments is certainly necessary. It's just weird for someone different to be in a school trapped in one room the entire day (like they are at the schools I attended).
It should be the parents' choice, and if they want a separate school, they should pay for it.
I don't really know. I know a few autistic kids that have done perfectly fine in normal high school, and others that don't. I think that the degree of autism really is a deciding factor on whether or not they should go to a different school, where their needs are met and the teachers are qualified to be teaching them. I know the teachers at my high school weren't exactly qualified for that position.
Some peoples motives, though, may be different for sending these children to a separate school. It's not that I would want to ostracize them, but do this only for their social and learning benefit. Kids in high school can be awful nowadays. It's horrible. And they don't need that kind of attention, even if they don't always realize that it's happening.
But all-in-all, I don't think it should be up to the parents. Because some may think it would helping their child not to send them away because they think it's like sending them off to a private island of diseased children or something crazy [honestly, I'm sure there are parents who think that], when in the long run, their decision is hurting them.
As I'm typing this, different scenarios are turning in my head, and it's so hard to keep up with them. This is an extremely complicated and delicate situation, really. I guess I wouldn't know where to begin.
I've worked with a couple autistic children and my brother is. I've seen the bullying, it's harsh! As far as if they should go to separate schools? Maybe. I mean who wants their child being bullied all the time? If I had an autistic child I think I would support this. Especially if that means the teachers were more qualified to teach these children. Because the truth is autistic children are very intelligent, just sometimes in different ways.
While it shouldn't be mandatory, it should be an option (and not one that costs the parents). I'm ASSUMING any parent, or I guess any good parent, would opt for the separate school if their autistic child is struggling in public school.
I don't think it's the students that are a problem so much as it is the teachers who don't understand how to work with autistic students. I've seen too many teachers say they were disability-trained but end up just treating autistic kids like idiots and 2 year-olds. Bullying, I admit, is a problem amongst students, but I think you would get that no matter who you worked with. Being autistic doesn't mean you're not going to bully another autistic kid, or be bullied by an autistic kid. I know first-hand a lot of the verbal abuse in particular kids with learning disabilities get, but that won't stop by isolating them from their peers. However, if the reasoning for separate schools was so that autistic students could work with teachers who actually know how to operate with autistic students, I could get behind that. Separating them just for the sake of separating, though, I cannot condone.
I think it would be an excellent idea! If I had a child with autism, I would definitely want to put him/her in a separate school. It seems to me that they would have a better chance at succeeding, and also avoiding the bullies in public school.
You have brought up so many relevant issues articulately. Why don't you get involved? Write a letter to Christie! You really covered The main issues that must be considered if the students' best interests are to guide the decision. These include considering where on the spectrum children with the disorder would have to be to be placed in a "segregated" school. As you point out from your own experience (which politicians really like to hear), the best care and the most number of qualified teachers would result in the best outcome for lower functioning children. There is no doubt in my mind, putting this group of children together would also provide economies of scale, while giving them more of the best teaching on one place. But where do you draw the line? Some children are so highly functioning, they need to see "hormal" behavior to model. You are in a great position (not me) to explain why that would be helpful for some, but not children like yours. How do you draw the line in a way that benefitis the children most? And that -- not money -- is what should guide well-considered complex decisions. Good luck & good post. I really encourage you to write a letter or email to Christie! It's so important to so many families.
i teach at dominion school for autism , preschoolers and we do one on one teaching however , we do go to "inclusion" classes , which are classes with "normal" children of the same age and i think its a great idea . why not be exposed to autism and why not have children with autism get the same experiences as "normal" people and children ? thats not fair ! so yes, i think so but if they need a teacher's aide in class to help them a little along the way , i think that's ok too :) .
I don't think there should be a separate school for Autistic children. They're just fine at a regular school. In fact, I know one who is really smart, he is so smart that he makes Steve Urkel look like a special ed student. He's a wiz with his computer, he excels in art, he has many talents. Hell, he even has a hot girlfriend. Schools underestimate the intelligence of an autistic child. He graduated high school before any of his brothers. I'm so proud of him.
No, not all autistic children should go to a different school because some are higher functioning. I think it should be up to the parent ultimately.
i think there should be separate schools for autistic children. i rather my child be in a school that specializes in autism and autism only.
I had "developmental disabilities" from a very-early age. I then went through (& graduated from) a school system that was not specially set-up for anyone.
My schools' staff members, for the most part, were very helpful when I needed assistance. However, it should be noted that people who are lacking in one area are not so in all areas; I was (& probably still am) beyond many of my classmates in several areas.
Nobody should attend public schools. They are designed to institutionalize, not educate.