New Brunswick Autism Education: Everyone in the Mainstream Classroom Inclusion Model Continues to Hold Back Progress

I have been a frequent promoter of the progress made in New Brunswick in the education of autistic students. Recent developments though show the extent to which that progress has been uneven with ultimate implementation of changes being left to the School District level. A bilingual and bifurcated Education department in New Brunswick has resulted in some francophone districts preferring to go it alone or to follow models from outside New Brunswick.

Two developments have spurred the  progress that has been made. One is  the training of 4-500 teacher assistants at the excellent UNB-CEL Autism Intervention Training program. The program has received high marks on external review by Dr. Eric Larsson and has included knowledgeable guest speakers like David Celiberti of the Association for Science in Autism Treatment.  The UNB-CEL AIT program has emphasized both quality and integrity with course entry requirements, substantial practicum and examination requirements. Unfortunately the program has been opposed by some in the Department of Education who felt that the program, which resulted from political-parent consultation, represented a loss of departmental influence. The Department is now moving back to what it has wanted all along ...  an in house training program with all the inherent conflicts of interest, quality and integrity issues that in house training brings with it. Some school districts have also refused to enroll teacher assistants in the program particularly in New Brunswick's francophone school districts which have tended to go their own direction in New Brunswick's bilingual and bifurcated education system.

Progress has also been made in modernizing inclusion in New Brunswick schools.  For years the dominant "everybody in the mainstream classroom" approach pushed hard by  the New Brunswick Association for Community Living and by Gordon Porter,  the former chair of the New Brunswick Human Rights Commission,  has held total sway in New Brunswick.  This approach does not reflect the research literature, or the experience of families like ours, which says that not ALL students with autism belong in the mainstream classroom.  I have presented legal reviews and research literature reviews to the MacKay Inclusion Review, (Professor MacKay is one of the worst offenders, and I use the term "offender" intentionally, when it comes to promoting the "everybody in the mainstream classroom" model of inclusion).

My son used to come home with bite marks on his hands and wrists from his days in a mainstream classroom where he was overstimulated, and learning a different subject matter, using different methods than the other children in his class. Once removed from the class for most of his  academic learning his self injury ceased and his school career has been a true joy as I have indicated many, many times on this blog.  Conor has not been sent to a prison like isolation room.  He has been educated in a small side room with an autism trained teacher assistant. The room is decorated with the usual learning tools and is not in the least restrictive. Conor visists the school gym, pool, kitchen and library.  He is around other children there and in the halls.  I have seen children greet him at school many, many times.  Conor's classroom is the school and he is not alone in such accommodations which have been made for other students in District 18.

The concept of the whole school as a classroom or learning environment is not mine. I am not a professional educator and I did not come up with it. The person who did relay that concept to me was Alex Dingwall the Superintendent of School District 18.  The use of the whole school environment. to provide alternative learning locations and accommodation for autistic children who can not function in the mainstream classroom is not mine. It may or may not be Superintendent Dingwall's but it was he who relayed it to me during a settlement conference for a Human Rights complaint I had filed on behalf of my son and which I ultimately withdrew because he has been accommodated in our neighborhood schools here in Fredericton.

I caught some of the CBC coverage of the Moncton child placed in a jail like time out room. I heard Krista Carr of the NBACL offering her commentary without acknowledging that the system in place in that school district is the total inclusion, everybody in the mainstream classroom, model which does not recognize that the classroom is not right for all children and does not put any emphasis on providing alternate learning locations outside the mainstream classroom. The total inclusion model pushed by the NBACL, by the former chair of the NB Human Rights Commission and by Professor Wayne Mackay has failed and harmed some New Brunswick autistic students, including, for a brief period of time, my own son. Thankfully Conor has,  long since his failed mainstream classroom experience, had access to an alternate learning location in our neighborhood schools. The credit for that accommodation does not belong to me, or to Professor Wayne MacKay,  former Human Rights Commissioner Gordon Porter or NBACL official Krista Carr. The credit belongs to educators at School District 18 who have accommodated my son's disability.

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New Brunswick Autistic Students Need Flexible, Alternative Learning Options

I am shocked and disappointed to read the CBC report that a Moncton, New Brunswick grandmother, who is also a government social worker and exectuive director of the Greater Moncton Family Resource Center has pulled her grandson, who has Aspergers, out of school to home school him  after finding that he had been sent repeatedly to an isolation room.  After visiting the isolation room herself, the grandmother  described what she saw:

"So I had to take care of him one night and he was having nightmare … I thought something was wrong," LaBelle said. "That night he threw up and he was very anxious the next morning."   ...

LaBelle said she went to the school with Jean-Michel and she saw the room, which she described as "the little jail." There are three walls bolted to the floor and a door, which is held shut when her grandson is inside.  There is also a small window so his teacher's assistant can make sure he doesn't hurt himself."

The article only mentions two options for the student at the Moncton school ... the regular classroom or the jail like isolation room.  It is not clear from the article whether other options were considered and discussed with the boy's parents or grandmother. As the article points out the New Brunswick Department of Education has long had a policy of regular classroom education for all students::

"For years, the Department of Education has had a policy of classroom integration, which means students of all abilities are placed in the same classroom."

I have long been a critic of New Brunswick's inclusive education policies as  an autism representative at Inclusive Education forums.  The absolute, everyone in the classroom approach does not work for all students with autism spectrum disabilities. Alternative, flexible arrangements are necessary which recognize the need for some students with autism to receive instruction from autism trained aides in quieter settings.  Common areas of the schools can be used to ensure socialization takes place.  To insist on an everybody in the mainstream classroom all the time fails to accommodate the needs of some with special learning challenges and behavioral challenges.  When the only alternatives are the regular classroom and jail like isolation rooms some children with autism disorders will suffer.

As a father of a severely autistic boy with intellectual disabilities I, with my wife, asked for my son to be removed from the mainstream classroom early in his grade school years. He was coming home with bite marks on his hands and wrists after spending the day in a classroom with students who were learning different material then him. They were learning at a much higher level and using different instruction methods.  Just the number of people in the classroom can be overwhelming for Conor.  

Conor has been educated since then in separate, quieter areas at school ... not in jail  cell like rooms.  He has received instruction from teacher assistants trained at the UNB-CEL Autism Training program and he engages in activities in common areas of the middle school he now attends. In the swimming pool, the gym, the kitchen and the library he encounters other students and staff.  I take him to and from school every day.  Other students regularly approach him and say hello with big smiles on their faces.  Staff are very friendly with him.

It is disheartening to see that schools in Moncton are offering autistic students a choice between the regular classroom and jail cell like isolation rooms.  Autistic students and their families should be offered alternative learning arrangements like those provided to my son and other students in the Fredericton area where they can learn in separate, decent areas with properly trained instructors and visit common areas of the school for specific activities including the mainstream classroom for specified periods if that is within their capabilities.

Whatever the full set of facts it seems clear from the article that no effort is being made to accommodate the student's need for accommodation of his disability.  School officials are simply reacting to specific situations instead of trying to figure out alternatives that will help the student have a positive learning experience. 

Students with autism disorders in Moncton deserve learning options like those  provided to my son here in Fredericton.

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Autistic Disorder and School Inclusion for Conor

In New Brunswick proponents of an extreme version of mainstream classroom inclusion have dominated our education system for the past 30 years. The mainstream classroom inclusion for all approach is based on an inflexible and erroneous belief that all children, regardless of their personal condition, regardless of whether they have serious learning disabilities or neurological disorders, benefit from total mainstream classroom inclusion. Change has happened over the last 5-6 years as some autistic children, including my son Conor, have been permitted to learn in an area more suitable for them personally but still be included in a neighborhood school.

On Friday I met with Conor's resource team at Nashwaaksis Middle School to review the past year and plan for next year. It has been a terrific year for Conor on many fronts. He does receive his primary instruction including ABA in a small room with an autism trained (UNB-CEL Autism Intervention Training Program) teacher assistant. But he also visits common areas of the school such as the library, the lunch room, the gym and the pool. He is recognized by other students some of whom have approached him on several occasions to say hello as he arrives at school with Mom or Dad.

On the side bar of this blog site are video clips from last year and this year showing Conor in the gym doing activities with the teacher assistant Brad Daniels. There are many other kids in the gym (I took care not to record the other children) but you can hear them in some of the videos. In these clips Conor is still not involved directly with the other students but he is around them.

Friday one of the resource team members who has been at the pool with Conor mentioned that he joins with the other kids in the pool on occasion. Conor will get up on one of the water rafts with the other kids pulling it around the shallow end, an activity we also do with him when we visit the pool. (She also gave me a snapshot she took of Conor preparing to leave the diving board, above)

Real school inclusion should be flexible as it has been for Conor the past few years. If an autistic child needs a quieter setting in which to learn, for ABA instruction, to avoid over stimulation, then they should be educated in a setting that accommodates that need. This does not mean that the child has to be isolated all day. The hallways and common areas can still be visited for identified purposes within the abilities of that child at that time. And the visits should be observed carefully to make sure the child is not overstressed.

For Conor a flexible approach to school inclusion, not mainstream classroom inclusion, has been very successful and beneficial for him.

autism

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