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UPDATED: April 17, 2015 NO. 44 NOVEMBER 1, 2012
Difficult Integration
Autistic children rejected from schools reveal a dilemma in education
By Wang Hairong
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In May, Longlong's mother transferred him to Baocheng School, which is the regular school that is closest to their home. Yet she did not expect that the boy would be forced to leave again months later.

Solution

Like Longlong's mother, many parents with autistic children would like their kids to be educated in regular schools.

According to a study sponsored by One Foundation, which has funded more than 114 therapy centers primarily serving autistic children in China since 2011, 49.19 percent of such parents hoped their children could attend regular schools, yet only 10.43 percent of school-age autistic children had been accepted into one.

In 1994, the Ministry of Education issued a regulation, stating that disabled children, including children with minor mental disabilities, can be accepted into regular schools. It also stipulated that children with moderate mental disabilities can be accepted into regular schools that are capable of educating such children.

Nonetheless, the regulation said that children should be evaluated by competent agencies before being accepted into regular schools, except for in rural areas where such evaluation is unavailable. Additionally, no more than three disabled children can be placed in a class.

According to the regulation, local education authorities should provide pre-employment and on-the-job special education training to teachers, and normal universities should offer special education courses. If a class has disabled children, the teachers of the class should be evaluated on both their performance in regular education and special education, and their additional efforts should be rewarded.

Although the Ministry of Education requires autistic children to be appraised before being placed into regular schools, in many cases, they are not.

Before entering Baocheng School, Longlong did not undergo required evaluation either. Cheng Xuecai, an official with the Baoan District Education Bureau, said that the boy should have been evaluated before enrolling in a regular school.

However, when Longlong's mother took him to a designated evaluation agency, the Forensic Psychiatry Appraisal Institute under the Kangning Hospital in Shenzhen, the institute rejected her request.

The institute's director, Li Xuewu, said that they had never before received a request to evaluate an autistic child for school attendance, and the institute was not certified to conduct such an evaluation.

He said that if the school insists on such a screening, the institute can produce its opinion upon receiving a written application endorsed by a school and education authorities.

Actually, most parents with autistic children allegedly conceal the illness for fear that their children would be denied admission once the schools learn of their conditions.

When school management suspects a child to be autistic, and contacts his or her parents about it, parents may dodge the issue, arguing that their child is normal and does not need an autism evaluation, said Dai Yaohong, council member of the Shanghai Middle School Ethics Education Association.

"But above all, some schools and parents reject autistic children for fear that they will disrupt class order and affect other students' grades, said Xu Guangxing, a professor at the Psychology Department of Shanghai-based East China Normal University.

Parents sometimes object to autistic children out of safety concerns. On September 27, a group of parents protested outside of Shiji Primary School in Beijing's Chaoyang District, demanding the school to expel an autistic student from their children's class.

These parents told Beijing Times that the student in question, nicknamed Li Ming, hit classmates and teachers with chairs, pushed classmates around, and cried loudly in class. Li's classmates collectively boycotted class and were waiting for the school's decision.

Li's father insisted that his son be allowed to stay, saying that doctors said his son is probably high-functioning autistic, and could improve by staying in groups.

In regards to current problems in integrated education such as shortage of special education teachers in regular schools, and the conflict between parents with and without autistic children, Gao Yurong, Executive Deputy Director of the Children Welfare Research Center under the China Philanthropy Research Institute, suggested that schools should permit autistic children's caretakers to sit in class, so that when an autistic child loses control, the caretaker can take the child away from class.

Gao also called on the government to give financial incentives to regular schools accepting autistic children. He said that schools can use government subsidies to hire special education teachers and reward those who excel.

Email us at: wanghairong@bjreview.com

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