This article originally appeared on theSeed
blog.
INSERTION VS. INCLUSION
Inclusion is a murky word. Proponents of inclusion want to have classrooms, social activities and workplaces where there are disabled and non-disabled individuals getting together, commiserating, cooperating…It scares the crap out of me. Why? Because too many people believe that insertion = inclusion and frankly my friends, it does not.
Let us ask ourselves: have the disabled been integrated into society since the “purging” of the state hospitals (de-institutionalization) began in the 1970’s? By definition, inclusion is “the addition of somebody or something to a group or mixture” (Encarta dictionary). However, inclusion can be nothing more than a simple insertion of an individual into a setting where they are not truly accepted but are merely tolerated. A person can be tolerated without being recognized. Think of that kid that sits alone at the lunch table, not being picked on but not being played with, either. Tolerated but not recognized.
They can be admitted without being incorporated. A student with Down syndrome has a right to be integrated into a non-specialized public school but doesn’t his lack of friends or any after-school programs geared towards his socialization needs and interests prove that inclusion does not equal acceptance? In this case, we are not just talking about his acceptance by his peers; the teachers, administrators, coaches, mentors and the school system as a whole is in question.
Now, “federal officials are telling school districts that they must offer students with disabilities equal access to school sports.” Schools will be required to make reasonable accommodations to include students with disabilities. If doing so changes the nature of the game drastically then new programs that have “comparable standing as mainstream programs” must be created.
FORCED INSERTION
This worries me some. There are some unintended consequences I can foresee here. Forcing teachers and coaches to make a spot for a kid with a disability in their “normal” routine they’ve been accustomed to can be traumatic for all involved: the teacher/coach, their current students, and the kid being inserted into the team.
Once, when I was working as a hair designer in my previous life, before inclusion went from being a notion to an action that is actively pursued, a client who was a middle school teacher was venting to her colorist how she was being forced to have special needs kids in her classroom. She commented on how difficult it made her life now that she had to develop a lesson plan for a kid “like that” and still have to be able to teach the “normal” kids. The venting went on for a while and I eavesdropped the whole time. This clearly shows that inclusion must be done in a thoughtful, meaningful way. We can’t just tell a school, “You have four kids with physical disabilities and none of them are on sports teams. Stick them in somewhere by next week.” Can you imagine the resentment towards those four kids felt by the coaches and the other students because of a forced insertion? How will that resentment play out? Ignoring them? Dirty looks? Hurtful words? Physical harm? I know that not all teachers, coaches & students will feel this way but is this a risk you’re willing to take with yourkid? Not I! And yes, I know, nobody is saying that schools will have a week’s time to make the necessary changes. In fact, there’s no deadline for schools to comply which seems like a built-in loophole to me. But there is ALWAYS resistance when institutions that have not complied with ADA regulations for the entire time they’ve been in existence is told that they must make changes. Just take a look at the whole pool-lift debacle.
Another very real concern I foresee is: how can instructors & teachers who have never had any experience with special needs students be expected to include these students without any formal training?? Not everybody can be a special needs instructor. Just because someone is “good with kids” and gets good results in their classroom or on the field does not automatically ensure that they will know what to do when they’re presented with a whole new set of….problems, shall we say? A kid with autism who self-stims, for example, can be hard to deal with when you’re used to things like Tommy taking Sandy’s pencil. Forcing a teacher to take on special needs kids because of an “inclusion doctrine” with little or no training is detrimental to the students and teacher. I have not read anything, anywhere, which talks about appropriate training for these instructors who now have to figure out ways to truly include new athletes.
And of course we will have those ridiculous comments about how enforcing these regulations will only serve to raise taxes and school districts will become even tighter with their budgets. Oh, and now, regular programs will suffer because they will have to be cut in order to funnel cash to creating new programs for those other kids. Do you know what Title IX is? It made huge positive changes for women in sports. It demanded equal sports programs for women as for men and it led to a large increase of female participation in sports. But of course, there were those idiots who found a way to make it a negative by saying men’s sports had to be cut because of Title IX. AND??? Does that mean that women shouldn’t have the same opportunities because now the men have slightly less? Why should it be any different for people who have disabilities?
MAKING CHANGES
I started off by saying that inclusion scares the crap out of me but I do believe it is necessary and vital to a healthy society, not only for those who are disabled but also for the walkers, talkers & others who are not disabled. Access to school athletics, whether at the elementary, high school or collegiate level is A RIGHT, not a privilege! Too many times people with disabilities are seen as pity-cases. But guess what, people? There are actually people with disabilities who can do things society believes they cannot. Have you heard of Mitch Ryan? Yeah.
So what is the answer? How can we stamp out stigmas and eradicate discrimination? We can protest and march against the unfair and unequal treatment of those with disabilities. However, to date, research suggests that protests do not promote positive attitudes or increase knowledge about disabilities (Westerholm, et al., 1506).Education is the main conduit to a better understanding of the life of a person who happens to have a disability. The sharing of correct information will assist in the reduction of stigmas attached to individuals who are physically, mentally and developmentally disabled. In the case of mental illness, for example, after-care information is of particular importance because studies have shown that people who only receive information regarding psychological symptoms increased their negative attitudes about the illness (Westerholm, et al., 1506).
There needs to be an attitudinal shift when considering disability rights. Rather than charity it is imperative there be a focus on civil rights; rather than pity, a belief in a wide range of human possibilities is crucial. A disastrous consequence to the stigmatization of the disabled population is the tendency for the disabled to avoid contact with the able-bodied and, conversely, the able-bodied to ostracize the disabled. I have a firm belief that the best approach to reducing stigmatization and discrimination is to increase meaningful personal contact between folks who have disabilities and those who do not, i.e. full inclusion with appropriate training, not just insertion. For the disabled, this dynamic can help foster a sense of trust towards the non-disabled which may increase their willingness to involve themselves with social interactions they may have previously been resistant to. The development of this dynamic can provide for those who are not disabled important information regarding the positive and negative impacts of mainstream society on those who live with disabilities.
Imagine a world where people with disabilities aren’t fearful of the non-disabled and the non-disabled are not uncomfortable around people who are disabled. That’s the world that I want to live in.
THINK ABOUT THIS
Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr. was an American dedicated to the realization of the equal rights promised to all African-Americans in this country. In his famous speech he described the state of being of African-Americans a century after they were to have been emancipated:
“One hundred years later, the Negro lives on a lonely island of poverty in the midst of a vast ocean of material prosperity. One hundred years later, the Negro is still languished in the corners of American society and finds himself an exile in his own land.”
What he proclaimed was a concept that should have been obvious without being stated – that every person has the right to be treated equally and fairly. We can see very strong similarities between the tragedies that the African-Americans and the disabled citizens of this country have been forced to endure. Must we wait one hundred years after the beginning of deinstitutionalization before the civil rights of the disabled are truly recognized?
Citation: Westerholm, Robert, Laura Radak, Christopher Keys, and David Henry. “Stigma.” Encyclopedia of Disability. 4. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications, 2006. Print.
Photo Credit: blprnt_van
It’s an interesting angle to compare this to Title IX, but Melissa suggests that these new programs won’t “serve to raise taxes”, but she also says “how can instructors & teachers who have never had any experience with special needs students be expected to include these students without any formal training??”.
While I certainly agree that a Title IX-like system for people with disabilities would be a great thing, how can you hire all of these experienced instructors without a financial burden?
In that particular quote, what I’m arguing is that claiming that inclusion will only serve to raise taxes is not reason enough to NOT do it. With Title IX, there was an argument that now because of women, men’s programs had to be cut. Kinda like a guilt trip, “If those women wouldn’t be so needy then WE could still have XYZ!” Should Title IX have been done away with? Absolutely not! Have things evened out? Yes. Same principle applies here.
I don’t think I implied that there wouldn’t be a cost to it. Everything has a price, especially in the early stages of any change to a system. But really, there is a cost now. The people paying the price are those who have nowhere to go, no social activities, no friends, no after-school programs. We hear about how “typical” kids who run around in the streets after school have a higher rate of committing crimes than kids who have structured, safe places to go. We also know that positive social interaction fosters higher self-esteem and self-worth. Are children and people with disabilities worth less to our society and therefore don’t deserve the effort and money that people without disabilities? Of course not. That’s all I’m saying.
Melissa — Gotcha, that makes sense. Thanks for the clarification!
Wow. Great thoughts and I hear your heart on this. I experienced racial insertion as part of the original white class in Miami from Miami Springs that was “inserted” into a liberty city all black school by being bussed in during desegregation. To be honest, I understand the whole inclusion vs. insertion thing. The kids rightly so, felt this resentment to having all these “rich kids” bussed in and subsquently I was beat up almost every day. With that said, I firmly believe their intent was right but boy, that was stressful on us. The next year, the plan changed dramatically from what I remember and enjoyed the fruit of growing diverse friendships. This is great information and very thought provoking!
Thanks, Becky. You are a living testament to why it’s important to have plan in place and not just “stick” people in where it would look good if someone was to take a photo. There has to be actual cohesion!
At least in the public school setting…teachers (and coaches) more and more are required to have some training with exceptional children. If your district is worth their weight in salt…this training will continue to happen and should happen. This alone will not raise taxes…it does set a precedent that if a child with a disability wants to play a sport and is able to do so there is no longer discrimination simply because of their disability label. How each school, district, city, county and state will interpret this will determine if extra funds will be needed…but I believe this is a natural progression of the disability rights movement. There should be equality of opportunity not equality of ability. Like a building that has to put in access ramps for the disabled there will be access to sports teams as well. The issue of raising taxes for this particular program or ideal is a fear but no more than there is a general fear that school budgets will have to be replenished somehow. Realistically…we can expect to be paying more for education in some facet or another.
You’re talking about barriers to access. Usually these are thought of as physical obstructions (stairs with no ramp; narrow doorways; curb with no cutout) but social obstructions can be just as traumatizing!
My hope is that there will be even more training than the current requirement of X-number of hours in a special needs classroom in your 3rd semester of college. Honestly, I don’t know when a student is required to do it & for how long but I imagine the majority of them choose to NOT be a special needs teacher because it’s just not for them. But then putting those very kids in their class forcefully because of a new mandate is what I’m fearful of.
There needs to be a culture of change. Meaning, from the very start, their secondary education should be focused on inclusion so that new teachers coming into the system know that their classes will be mixed. Period. Then, all of their schooling, training, thinking, planning is centered on a UDL.
Don’t you think that’s the best way to have full inclusion?
You are absolutely right… A culture change needs to happen. And it will not be a fast process. Unfortunately…teacher training is changing and there are less resources to go around. Hopefully when people are more outspoken about inclusion (what it is and what it is not) the shift will come quickly. Thanks for your original thoughts…as you can see it has spurned some interesting discussion.
This is a very well written and thoughtful article. I am the parent of a son with special needs but his functioning level is very low for him had he been in school during the inclusion push I would have had him placed in a classroom with a sp.ed. teacher only. I don’t feel that this would have been unfair to him..I know my son and know that he is very anxious when he has no supports in any situation from someone who is trained in sign language and has a curriculum that is tailored to his abilities..However, I was a teacher forever before retirement. When all of this came about with inclusion it was very upsetting to many teachers and I understand their positions. I went to the principal and told him I was willing to accept these children as long as the mix was a fair ratio and another teacher was also willing to team with me for the remainder of students ..so we had a mulitlevel grade of children as well as a mix of those with disabilites and those without…each classroom had an aide .this was a long time ago..in the middle 70s…believe it or not it worked and turned out to be a very workable program.
Thanks, Pat. I don’t know if I would have wanted my daughter in an inclusion class either but who knows how they will be 10 years from now? By that time, they may be very well integrated and “inclusion” will not really be a word that is used anymore because instead of an anomaly, it will be the standard, just as “segregation” in the context of race is.
The class you describe is basically the principle of Universal Design Learning (UDL) where you will have one lesson plan with multiple means of representation/engagement allowing students of different levels to learn. You didn’t know it then but you were way ahead of your time!! Thanks for sharing that!
really interesting article. as a parent, i never want to “take away” from my child’s already over burdened teacher but as the sibling of ‘special needs’ child, I also don’t want them to be left out. its hard to find the middle ground but i agree with your point that just shoving them in, doesn’t seem to be it.
Thanks, Courtney. As parents, we need to make sure we advocate for our children as they move through the education process, just as the school district will always have their representatives doing the same.
Well-written article and interesting comments. Going forward, it appears that budget constraints and tight resources will be with us for some time, given the current economic picture. This will be another area where reasonable people will need come together to seek the fairest, most responsible solution for all the kids involved. Certainly hearing the experiences of parents and teachers should constitute an important part of the group of “reasonable people” I referred to above. Not sure who the others would/should be.
Parents & teachers are a great start, Gerald. Professionals in the field, such as therapists, doctors & the students themselves are others that could and should be involved. Just because we’re talking about special needs kids doesn’t mean they are unable to speak for themselves. Person-centered care is another burgeoning reality in the needs of an individual with disabilities. It’s about time we started focusing on the person rather than the disability!
It really is hard. Our daughter (16 with DS) is living with a foot in each world. She is in a “multi level contained class” for most of the day, enjoying friendships and feeling confident and doing well. She has an engaging teacher, independent instruction, moves at her pace. Yet her favorite classes are inclusion classes where there are more kids/challenge and integration/chaos. Here we also have contained “advance placement” classes, where parents fight and test to get their kids in to these closed classes, while we fight to get out kids out… Wouldn’t it be wonderful if all classes were “multi level classes”, where there was a small student teacher ratio, independent instruction and an engaging teacher… then the kids could still move from class to class interact, teachers could specialize in sciences, maths, language, history… But that would, of course, cost a lot and we would have to prioritize education.
She is also a cheerleader, fully included in this sport, inspiring the coaches, fans and team mates, yet not usually included in conversations or additional social stuff. They just started a unified soccer team. Maybe schools could add unified teams along side the competitive teams, offering additional credits for joining.
We will just keep swimming, working one day at a time to make it the best we can moving closer to the ideal society.