Former education minister says inclusion in N.B. has become an 'absurd situation'
CBC
Nichole McCarthy worries about her 10-year-old son's future.
Tristen has a diagnosis of autism. He can't read or write — McCarthy fears he never will at this rate. She said he attends Grade 5 for only half days and is falling further and further behind.
"He can't just sit home half of the day, every day, while all the other kids are getting instructions and schooling. …This is just going to continue snowballing. I'm worried for him," the Grand Falls mother said.
"I'm not going to be here forever to take care of him. I'm trying to prepare him for the future."
McCarthy said her son doesn't have a full-time education assistant and is a "bolter." She said he runs away when he can't cope with a stressful situation. He's even run away from school and been intercepted by police.
She said he is entitled to an education and to the resources needed to make sure he gets one.
"He's put in a classroom with all the other children and expected to sit in a desk all day and do the same things all the other children are doing, which he cannot," said McCarthy.
For former education minister Dominic Cardy, Tristen's story is a familiar one.
"The problem we have right now is that you've got schools that are massively overstretched in terms of the resources they need to be able to look after kids with behavioural issues," said Cardy.
"We've got kids on the [autism] spectrum who are, through no fault of their own, acting out because they don't have the regulatory mechanisms to be able to control that behaviour."
Coupled with what Cardy calls "a serious decline in the respect that's shown to teachers and the ability that teachers have to control their classrooms," he said it means New Brunswick has "settled for rhetorical inclusion."
"And so you end up with this in-between, where we pretend that we have a fully inclusive classroom."
Cardy said the students may be together in the same classroom, but the teachers haven't been given the tools to address each child's needs.
"I hear from teachers all the time about how they can't focus on the kids who've got real issues because they're just trying to keep control in their classroom. That often means they can't even really teach."
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