sigh
chant mistress
- Joined
- Sep 19, 2001
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- 10,248
This thread is for Sillyman.
My son is autistic. This past fall he was suspended nine times in less than two months before I gave up and brought him home to teach him myself. The following article could be about my son as easily as any other special needs child.
http://www.ctnow.com/about/custom/thc/hc-archives.htmlstory?coll=hc-headlines-thc
(Please note, to download the article requires a sign-in, password and a small fee.)
When The Punishment Doesn't Fit
--------------------
Advocates Question School Suspension Policies
By CARA SOLOMON
Courant Staff Writer
April 21, 2002
Anthony Henry doesn't like it when people get too close to him.
He feels threatened. He gets agitated. He starts an argument.
This is textbook behavior for some children such as Anthony with autism. When it happens at home, Brenetta Henry talks with her 11-year-old son until he calms down.
When it happens at school, she said, they suspend him.
"They really are not equipped to handle this type of child," said Henry, whose son attends Hartford Transitional Learning Academy. "And the child is losing out."
In the zero-tolerance climate of today's schools, children with disabilities are being punished at a rate that far exceeds their numbers in the state. Though they make up only 13 percent of the population, special education students received 24 percent of the suspensions recorded in the 1998-1999 school year, the latest state data shows. That figure has surprised state officials who say they are now keeping close tabs on the trend and warning certain school districts when they show a high number of special education suspensions.
"It's clearly a concern that we're paying attention to," said George Dowaliby, bureau chief of special education and pupil services for the state Department of Education.
Suspensions have become a hot issue recently, with the release of a state report in February that described school disciplinary policies as excessive and not necessarily useful. The Governor's Prevention Partnership, which formed a task force to study alternatives to suspension and expulsions, said 141,434 students were suspended or expelled in 1999-2000, 13 percent more than the 125,185 suspensions and expulsions in 1998-99.
The task force pushed schools to focus more on early intervention for children with behavior problems, recommending more teacher training, a graduated system of discipline, and a closer connection among schools, parents and mental health providers, the report said.
Children with special needs - many of whom act first and think later - are particularly vulnerable to harsh school policies, advocates say. Some have problems with impulse control and resolving conflicts. Others struggle in group settings, and the agitation is made worse when other children target them for teasing.
"I do absolutely believe kids who are in special education are the obvious choice [for blame] if there's an incident," said Nancy Prescott, director of the Connecticut Parent Advocacy Center, a statewide advocacy group that works on disability issues. "They're the scapegoats a lot of the time."
This year for the first time, the state offered grants to school administrators who wanted to study the high rate of special education suspensions and develop alternatives to out-of-school suspensions for those students. At Keigwin Annex School in Middletown - where special education students account for 32 percent of the suspensions but only 15 percent of the overall population - the state grant will help establish an in-house suspension program with a full time social worker.
"They're going to have an opportunity to look at behavior that got them into the problem, and look at how to prevent it in the future," said Patricia Charles, Keigwin's principal.
Like any child who acts out, a special education student who disobeys orders in the classroom creates a problem for teachers, said Ann Lohrand, president of Middletown's teachers union. And while teachers try their best to work through problems with special education students, using suspension only as a last resort, that preferential treatment sometimes seems unfair to other children whose misbehavior may be sanctioned more severely.
"To be fair to the teachers, it's a sticky situation sometimes," said Lohrand. "Our teachers do the best they can with what they have."
But the high suspension rate is proof, advocates say, that ultimately teachers are too quick to punish a child they do not understand or know how to help. In the years since the federal Individuals with Disabilities Education Act was passed, thousands more special education students have been moved into regular classrooms. But schools have not necessarily kept pace with the change, advocates say. Few regular education teachers are trained to identify and handle the behavioral problems that come with some children's disabilities.
And the problem extends to special education teachers as well, said Merva Jackson, director of African Caribbean American Parents of Children with Disabilities, a Hartford advocacy group.
"The bottom line is, a lot of these teachers are not coming out prepared, knowing the law and understanding the disabilities," she said. "Over the years, it hasn't been a focus for a lot of higher institutions of learning."
The lack of teacher training means that special education students are often labeled troublemakers, advocates say. They are watched more closely and, as a consequence, they are caught acting out more frequently than the average student, said Linda Rammler, a special education consultant. And when children with disabilities act out, she said, teachers mistakenly believe that they can be disciplined like any other disobedient student.
"Teachers don't realize that when they give a certain look, or raise their voice, they've lost the kid," said Rammler, the parent of two children with disabilities. "The kid is not thinking."
The state education department is looking at the rate of suspension, whether some educators are punishing children for behavior related to their disabilities, which in some cases is illegal. The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, limits the number of days a special education student can be suspended before educators and parents meet to discuss a change of placement. A change of placement is essential for some special education students whose behavior depends on the environment.
Several parents of special education students said that the suspensions had frustrated their children, made them more aggressive and taken a serious toll on their self-esteem. In some cases, the children did not understand why they were being punished.
Such was the situation with Anthony Henry, who was suspended a number of times before being transferred. His behavior has worsened.
"He had a disability, not a behavior problem," said Henry, whose son was sent to a school for children with serious emotional problems. "Now he has a disability and a behavior problem."
Copyright 2002, Hartford Courant
My son is autistic. This past fall he was suspended nine times in less than two months before I gave up and brought him home to teach him myself. The following article could be about my son as easily as any other special needs child.
http://www.ctnow.com/about/custom/thc/hc-archives.htmlstory?coll=hc-headlines-thc
(Please note, to download the article requires a sign-in, password and a small fee.)
When The Punishment Doesn't Fit
--------------------
Advocates Question School Suspension Policies
By CARA SOLOMON
Courant Staff Writer
April 21, 2002
Anthony Henry doesn't like it when people get too close to him.
He feels threatened. He gets agitated. He starts an argument.
This is textbook behavior for some children such as Anthony with autism. When it happens at home, Brenetta Henry talks with her 11-year-old son until he calms down.
When it happens at school, she said, they suspend him.
"They really are not equipped to handle this type of child," said Henry, whose son attends Hartford Transitional Learning Academy. "And the child is losing out."
In the zero-tolerance climate of today's schools, children with disabilities are being punished at a rate that far exceeds their numbers in the state. Though they make up only 13 percent of the population, special education students received 24 percent of the suspensions recorded in the 1998-1999 school year, the latest state data shows. That figure has surprised state officials who say they are now keeping close tabs on the trend and warning certain school districts when they show a high number of special education suspensions.
"It's clearly a concern that we're paying attention to," said George Dowaliby, bureau chief of special education and pupil services for the state Department of Education.
Suspensions have become a hot issue recently, with the release of a state report in February that described school disciplinary policies as excessive and not necessarily useful. The Governor's Prevention Partnership, which formed a task force to study alternatives to suspension and expulsions, said 141,434 students were suspended or expelled in 1999-2000, 13 percent more than the 125,185 suspensions and expulsions in 1998-99.
The task force pushed schools to focus more on early intervention for children with behavior problems, recommending more teacher training, a graduated system of discipline, and a closer connection among schools, parents and mental health providers, the report said.
Children with special needs - many of whom act first and think later - are particularly vulnerable to harsh school policies, advocates say. Some have problems with impulse control and resolving conflicts. Others struggle in group settings, and the agitation is made worse when other children target them for teasing.
"I do absolutely believe kids who are in special education are the obvious choice [for blame] if there's an incident," said Nancy Prescott, director of the Connecticut Parent Advocacy Center, a statewide advocacy group that works on disability issues. "They're the scapegoats a lot of the time."
This year for the first time, the state offered grants to school administrators who wanted to study the high rate of special education suspensions and develop alternatives to out-of-school suspensions for those students. At Keigwin Annex School in Middletown - where special education students account for 32 percent of the suspensions but only 15 percent of the overall population - the state grant will help establish an in-house suspension program with a full time social worker.
"They're going to have an opportunity to look at behavior that got them into the problem, and look at how to prevent it in the future," said Patricia Charles, Keigwin's principal.
Like any child who acts out, a special education student who disobeys orders in the classroom creates a problem for teachers, said Ann Lohrand, president of Middletown's teachers union. And while teachers try their best to work through problems with special education students, using suspension only as a last resort, that preferential treatment sometimes seems unfair to other children whose misbehavior may be sanctioned more severely.
"To be fair to the teachers, it's a sticky situation sometimes," said Lohrand. "Our teachers do the best they can with what they have."
But the high suspension rate is proof, advocates say, that ultimately teachers are too quick to punish a child they do not understand or know how to help. In the years since the federal Individuals with Disabilities Education Act was passed, thousands more special education students have been moved into regular classrooms. But schools have not necessarily kept pace with the change, advocates say. Few regular education teachers are trained to identify and handle the behavioral problems that come with some children's disabilities.
And the problem extends to special education teachers as well, said Merva Jackson, director of African Caribbean American Parents of Children with Disabilities, a Hartford advocacy group.
"The bottom line is, a lot of these teachers are not coming out prepared, knowing the law and understanding the disabilities," she said. "Over the years, it hasn't been a focus for a lot of higher institutions of learning."
The lack of teacher training means that special education students are often labeled troublemakers, advocates say. They are watched more closely and, as a consequence, they are caught acting out more frequently than the average student, said Linda Rammler, a special education consultant. And when children with disabilities act out, she said, teachers mistakenly believe that they can be disciplined like any other disobedient student.
"Teachers don't realize that when they give a certain look, or raise their voice, they've lost the kid," said Rammler, the parent of two children with disabilities. "The kid is not thinking."
The state education department is looking at the rate of suspension, whether some educators are punishing children for behavior related to their disabilities, which in some cases is illegal. The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, limits the number of days a special education student can be suspended before educators and parents meet to discuss a change of placement. A change of placement is essential for some special education students whose behavior depends on the environment.
Several parents of special education students said that the suspensions had frustrated their children, made them more aggressive and taken a serious toll on their self-esteem. In some cases, the children did not understand why they were being punished.
Such was the situation with Anthony Henry, who was suspended a number of times before being transferred. His behavior has worsened.
"He had a disability, not a behavior problem," said Henry, whose son was sent to a school for children with serious emotional problems. "Now he has a disability and a behavior problem."
Copyright 2002, Hartford Courant
