Strollerderby

Autistic Kids Booted From Yearbook

Posted by Jen Chaney

First some kids voted an autistic boy out of their kindergarten class. Now a school in California has left autistic children out of its yearbook.

The parents of autistic twins have filed a complaint with the Placer County Board of Education because of the incident, in which the autistic/special needs students in multiple classrooms were omitted from the annual book. A county superintendent characterized it as an oversight. But it's hard to imagine how neglecting this many students could have been a complete accident. 

Darla Granger, the mother who filed the complaint, tells MomLogic that she doesn't believe the school was trying to be cruel, but that the principal and others are not mindful enough about integrating the autistic kids with the rest of the students. As she puts it, "Negligence can be a form of intent if you don't care enough to fix it."

That's a valid point. Too bad it won't make those kids feel better about not seeing pictures of themselves, or their classmates, in that yearbook. 

Image: MomLogic.com


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Comments

 

BBBGMOM said:

sad, thoughtless, idiotic.  I just don't get it.  Imagine how isolating it must already be to be labeled as "special needs" - it is very weird that the school overlooked an entire group of kids.

June 26, 2008 2:48 PM
 

Sheri said:

I've seen stupid and thoughtless things schools do.  This is way up there.  I'm wondering what they think they are accomplishing by doing this???  

June 26, 2008 5:35 PM
 

Victoria said:

I live in Placer County as well but I am in a different school district then Darla. My son is enrolled at rock creek elementary school in Rocklin CA. He too was left out of his yearbook and is a 9 year old child with autism.

The explanation that is posted on the Placer county education website, that it is believed to have been a parent/volunteer has me upset. I might have believed that explanation to be truthful however inexcusable, had my child not experienced exclusion from his yearbook in a different school in the same county.

I can assure you that a parent volunteer did not oversee pictures of special education children making it into the yearbook at my sons school.

Being my son is assigned to a general education class, his portrait should have been automatically included with the rest of his class. As if this exclusion was not bad enough, they did not even assign his portrait to go to a class picture of his special education class, missing two oppurtunities to include his school picture in the yearbook.

The idea that the superintendent would even attempt to pass off blame on a volunteer, or even announce they they suspected it was a parent/volunteer is appalling. Why not just take responsibility because ultimately isn't it up to the districts to make certain that all students are included? The fact that they would pass it off without really investigating it has me seriously questioning if my son or other Special education children may experience being overlooked again in the future.

I believe I paid 29 dollars for his yearbook. I did speak up immediately, before we had even arrived home that day. I had hoped to be given an explanation to help calm my son, but none were given. I was told recently by the district that I can re-address the issue in the fall because it is not as if we can all go back and reprint the yearbooks.

Personally, I don't see why not. I could respect a sincere effort being made to right this situation. Maybe even an offer to refund my money? Apologies and true responsibility for ones actions can go a long way with me.

I considered not sharing my story because I do not want to "embarrass" the district, but then I remind myself that the district is adults. What about the embarressment my young son faced?

Victoria

July 3, 2008 11:11 PM

About Jen Chaney

Jen Chaney is the movies editor and a DVD columnist for washingtonpost.com. Her byline has appeared in The Washington Post, People magazine, USA Today and the Utne Reader as well as various other newspapers around the country. She is the mother of a one-year-old boy, who has not yet learned the word Xanadu. But he will. Trust us, he will.

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