Trust, but verify

President Ronald Reagan had a Russian proverb he liked to use when discussing relations with the Soviet Union: “Trust but verify.” I would suggest this philosophy should also apply regarding anyone in a position of authority over vulnerable children with special needs -- particularly autism. We need systems of verification to ensure against malfeasance, rather than only trust that people will always do the right thing when charged with responsibility over an autistic child. The disgusting revelation regarding what recently happened to a child with autism in a segregated classroom is a case in point.

Here’s the update.

A ten year old child was bullied by his special needs teachers in a classroom that was designed to teach children with
autism! This behavior was uncovered by a smart father who wired his child with a recording device and thereby discovered the horrendous daily torment his child was experiencing. The father, Stuart Chaifetz, created a video and posted it on youtube to expose the disgusting practice which occurred in the Cherry Hill School District in New Jersey.

Chaifetz, is attempting to clean up the school district and rightly so! His goal is to pass legislation that requires teachers to be fired immediately upon discovery of bullying behavior. He has a
petition that he’d like people to sign.

I’d like to suggest that this does not go far enough. What is required in my view, is systemic change. The failure here is not about people, but rather, about a system where there are no checks and safeguards to protect disabled children.

There is one solution that is quite straightforward. Parents need to have a choice regarding whether they would like their child in a special needs classroom that has constant video surveillance. Those parents who choose this type of classroom for their children will never have to worry again. There are those who would argue that teachers’ rights are infringed upon due to this type of surveillance. In a contest of competing rights, it’s obvious the child’s rights must always trump the rights of the worker.

Until there is a 100% reliable way to verify that children with special needs are being treated properly, regrettably this type of abuse will continue. We need good systems, not good intentions!

If you’d like more detail about this horrendous incident, here is the video created by Stuart Chaifetz, the child’s father.





Persons with Disabilities Need Good Laws, Not Good Intentions

From time to time, news reports are full of horrible stories regarding the mistreatment of people with autism. Unfortunately, news from Canada suggests the abuse seems to be more entrenched than previously thought, as the blog Facing Autism in New Brunswick lays out. From the prairie province of Alberta to the maritime province of New Brunswick, in Canada, abuse is indeed evident from sea to shining sea. Read more...