Category: Let's talk
Hay, I'm interested to see what people think about this. Should all blind schools be designated for those with multiple disabilities and mental problems, or should they be open to all students. Personally, I am completely aposed to blind people being in sighted schools. I can speak from personal experience, and the blind are avoided, persicuted and generally treated badly. This is compounded by about 10 others I've spoken to online who've had the same problems. This results in social problems and a general lack of knowledge about getting on with others. However at a blind school, at least most of the time people can learn social skills by interacting with others, even if they are blind. This makes the long run of interacting at university easier. Furthermore, there are those who teach living skills and mobility at such places, which there are not in the sighted world. I recognise that there is something to be said for the blind learning to interact with the sighted, as, well, they're everywhere and we are not, however, if this can't be done at a school age in a sighted school, and we see all the problems of above, then, what, I ask, is the point.
well, i've had a very different experience. i went to mainstream school first when i was younger and got treated really well by everyone. I went to a blind school next and there were blind and partially sighted people there. i got bullied by the partials, it's a sad world, we're just the same as them. after that i went to college and there were a mixture of blind and people with learning disabilities too, yet next door, there was the sighted college, where we had some of our classes and that's how we got to mix. some of the sighted people were nice, yet others used me, which hurt, so i've had several different experiences.
I sorta have the best of both worlds. I would go to a blind school for what we claled placelents. These would last sometimes a week or a few months depending on what you were there for, but other than that I went to a mainstreem school. I had a bit of a hard time there, but I wouldn't trade those experiences for anything. I feel that being in a mainstream school sorta made me see the world for what it can truely be, and that I wasn't shelltered. The reality of the situation is that we can't all e in one little group all of the time, and we're going to get persicuted when we get out of school anyway, so we might as well learn early.
This is a very debateable topic, and I am glad someone has brought it up. Well, yes, it is true that blind and visually impaired people are often mocked and ridiculed by sighted students, attending a mainstreem school prepares them for the real world. A world for the sighted. Also, I have been to a school for the blind, and I frankly felt that I didn't belong there, because a lot of the students had multible disabilities so it was really hard to relate to them sometimes. Even though I did learn a lot of valuable and vital skills that I will need for the future, I just would rather go to a mainstreem school. I don't feel that we should be isolated from society, because of our vision. I myself, have been "persicuted," because of my vision, but at the same time I have made several friends, and the majority of the students at my school treat me the same as they treat everyone else.
I went to a mainstream school for my entire school career. I feel I learned much more there than I could have at a blind school. Also, as Chelsea said, when I did go for a short placement at a blind school, I fit in very poorly because most of the people had multiple handicaps. I benefited greatly from the itinerant teachers who travelled to our public school to spend time with us, as far as learning how to do mobility, dls etc.
Well, I think blind temporary schools are necessary. When e.g. you are 6 or 7 you should attend part time or full time school for some time, just to learn things like tying shoe laces, basica cooking and ADL sort of stuff, using the white cane, pouring and all these little things and of course braille and may be computer usage (nowadays). But I really don't think isolating blind people in their own little protected world is going to benefit them. May be those who have other disabilities or some major issues with communication (or have very bad luck with e.g. class mates). Our society is comprised of all sorts of people, not just blind people and I think separating us from that multitude of people and cultures and views and experiences will just harm us in the long run. How long can you stay protected, you got to go out get educatin in university or college, if you are smart enough you would be very stupid not to try it, you have to get a job and most likely with non-disabled people, ideally so in fact. I know being in school is difficult and you take a lot of stuff (well some people do, I was lucky, I never did, made some decent friends early on and excellent friends later and enjoyed it massively) and you have your good and your bad days. I also think you ned the assistance of teachers or specialized after school programs whilst your learning to cope with both being a student and being blind (I lost my sight at age 5 though so I may have had more adjustment issues than most kids). No pain no gain, this is just very true and you got to face the world and stick to your guns, be polit e but determined. My best decission (or my parents) was to send me to a swim club when I was 7, getting into the sport and becoming good enough to train with sighted kids made all the difference to me. I got a lot closer with my team mates than with friends from school, we have to work together, swim together, time each other and we hang out afterwards and at th the swim meets we are a team. I think if you can part take (or have kids make them part tae) in a sport or something outside of school that teaches them more about the real world in a better setting. Once you have your self confidence nothing can stop you.
cheers
-B
I've been to blind schools all the time, but in the school I am now, there are some courses with sighted students. This went quite well, at least I heard it, I didn't take these courses. I think it would be hard to get on at large schools, but I'm generally of the opinion that we sould at least take some classes with sighted people.
I really can't say absolutely one or the other are good overall. I'd say they both have good and bad points. I only went to a school for the blind for three years, and even then I attended public school part of the day. The rest of the time I went to public school and had visitting teachers to handle the blindness skills. Yeah, public schools can be not so great socially for people like me who are intraverted anyhow, but I did a fairly decent job academically. In the school for hte blind, there were times I felt I was treated like a child when I was high school age and that I was kind of shut away from the real world, plus I felt that people just expected me to stay in there and be buddies with blind people only when in fact I wanted to mix with sighted folks. We may ahve had a few events where they brought sighted kids our own age to help us, but that's how they saw themselves, as helpers only. I also didn't feel like I related to everybody there, although I had a few friends there.
Purely and simply, it should be a matter of choice for the individual that is to say, parent, child and consultation from the local authorities. You may like to have all blind people integrated, but I'm afraid that such is the stuff of eutopia. Many schools are so strapped for cash that they can barely support sighted students, let alone those with multiple disabilities who need special support. The upshot would be that disabled people would not get the best chance, and wouuld not achieve their full potential because of a misguided notion of inclusion, and that would be a damning indictment on the state who implemented this notion. Of course I recognise the social argument, and for some, Mainstream school will be right. For others it will not, either because they would benefit from smaller classes or specialist support, or because they simply couldn't do the subjects that they wanted to do in mainstream. If a person went to the average comprehensive and said he wanted to do chemistry, biology and physics A-levels, i daresay the school would try and do their best to accommodate them, but in many casess it would be a struggle. Contrast that with a special school who have all the facilities and specialist teaching in place already. i went to a special school, and it has done me no harm. I came away with four A-levels and promptly went to Oxford and got a first class M.A. and also a certificat de droit Francais from the University de Pantheon-Assas, Paris. I had no problems in the sighted world, and feel I benefitted enormously from the quality of teaching and support I could receive in special education. this not only enabled me to achieve what I wanted to, but gave me an excellent grounding for university, where such support was of course not the same as I was in integrated education.
There are of course two further arguments that might be advanced by the proponents of a blanket inclusion policy: one is that the resources are all consumed by special schools and were they to be freed up there would be more to go around for everyone. That economic analysis would be all well and good if it stood up to examination, but the more evenly you spread the sand, the larger the sheet will need to be to cover it. So everyone would get something, but it would be a good deal less. secondly, it might be said that specialist education actually discourages people from going on to university, both in a social and academic sense. I do not agree. specialist education teaches you how to manage your resources, how to cope on your own academically, and how to get what you need out of the institution you attend for your higher education. AS for social skills, it is obvious that school does not take up every hour of every day, and I believe that this is made into more of a problem than it is. Finally, I might add that in France, the blanket approach to inclusion is taken: only 2 percent of blind students go to university over there compared with about 25 percent over here. Enough said.
Well, having seen the school for the blind here in Michigan basically disolve into an outreach program with no students, and just a name, I don't think that schools for the blind should be if nothing else manditory for at least one year, so that a blind student can have the interaction with other blind people. This is because it allows them to find out things that they might not be able to find out in a main stream environment. I also know that it would give blind children the chance to participate in a number of activities that sighted people don't have a clue how to adapt, or aren't even aware of. In Florida, and some other schools for the blind, they have very good sports programs namely goalball. When I went to a mainstream school, I didn't know about goalball until I went to a sports camp. This being said, blind children need to interact with sighted people other then there family members. Look, society is cruel, people with disabilities are going to run into percecution at one point or another in there lives, whether they go to an all blind school or not. So give them the best of both worlds, allow them to go to a blind school so they can become friends with other blind people, but then let them have the choice to go to a sighted school so they can have that much needed interaction with the sighted world. It is the world we live in, and we need to adapt to it instead of expecting them to adapt to us. So why not give blind children a chance to learn how to adapt sooner then later.
I go to a main stream school and I love it. I didn't really grow up with many blind kids, but I know a few. I think I would have been kind of lonely at blind school. Like, a boarding one, I mean. i'm really attached to my parents and I am a really social person. I don't know. I think that I personally would have worse in a blind school. But who really knows? I'm just happy with the way things are going for me now, and am glad I went on this path. But for others, I think the path can be different. I tall dependso n the person, their abilities and what they want to do with their lives, I think. But that's just me.
Yeah, when i went to my irst blind school, i was so family orientated, that it was hard to pull away, so i felt home sick, therefor it was harder to concentrate. I tried to do my best though and going to special schools and being bullied has made me a stronger person, i'm more confident now than what i was before i went and i say what i think, so in a way, it's taught me a lot. i have had experiences of both and it's made me a stronger person definitely.
this is an age old debate, and ther's good reasons for an against both. My experience was to be educated in a mainstream primary school, with very minimal contact with other blind kids up untill I was around 10 when I started attending anual sport and recriation camps for blind and VI kids from all over New South wales. And then music camp. (not band camp. Not half as interesting I'm afraid heehheeh.) When I was 14. High school was a little different, I was the only totaly blind person at the school, but we had 8 other VI kids spread through out the various grades, and we all had the 1 support teacher over seeing all of us. We were fully intergraded into every class though, and I had in class Support for Maths, and science. I personally wouldn't have had it any other way. I got the best of both worlds. admitedly I did have to really work on beeing fully accepted by my sited peers, More so in high school. But having said that, I was never bullied, I was just sort of over looked, which quite offen was fine with me. I always made a concious efert to get involved with school activities, like musicals, plays, and even managed to get myself elected onto the student representative counsil for 5 of my 6 years. I'm not tooting my own horn here or anything, just making the point that it is up to you as an individual to make the most of your situations. If the kids in main stream school, or in a blind school for that matter, are picking on you, then just smile and nodd, and then go prove them wrong. I suspect, that it is the subconcious belief of a lot of Blind and VI people that we aren't as good as our sited friends. This was made evident to me, when a friend of mine who did attend a blind school, said he was riddiculed by his peers when he started dating a sited girl from the school down the road. That is just utterly rediculous to me. but unfortunately it seems to be what some blind and VI people feel. And I can't help but wondering if inspite all the benefits that Blind schools offer, they don't also enforce this mindset unintentionally. I visited a colege for the blind in the UK in 2003, and was very frustrated at the way the students were patrenised by the staff, and this same patrenising attitude was always evident to me at our music camps too. It frustrated me to no end, and so I can't comprehend how anyone can willingly subject themselves to it. But each to their own. I can apreciate that as far as general living skills go, a school for the blind would have better resources, and in the boarding school situation it is written into the coriculem for each student. But all these little things that B mentioned, Tying shoelaces, pooring things, Oriantation and mobility training, can be learnt outside of the school, Atleast I know this to be the case in Australia NZ the UK and The usa and canada, haven't looked into it anywehre else hast to be said. for me personally, I say mainstream all the way, or at least mainstream first, and then if the child doesn't cope, find an alternative. Here in australia though there aren't many alternatives to be found, the majority of the schools for the blind have been closed down now.
well, I am glad I braught this up. One thing I have noticed is that in America, schools for the blind cater more to those with multiple dsabilities, in my experience in england, with the school in worcester I attend, this is not the case. Yes, there are special-needs students here however these are outwayed by regular blind students. I do agree in a way that it depends on the individual. Some people have such personalities that they can fit in with anyone. Others, like myself, do not and have a more difficult time of it. However, for mobility and dfl skills, nothing beats a blind school, period.
I guess everywhere is different. Goodness leaffan, I hated DLS when I was a little kid lol! That sucks that APSEA didn't treat you well. I do agree with some other's view points that we get treated like chilldren. a lot of the staff blame that on insurance, but what ever.
I have seen a patronizing aditude here in america as well, and I think that's sad. I distinctly remember going to a vocational rehab center in Arkansas, and being told that until I could demonstrate good mobility skills I couldn't go anywhere by myself. Now at this point in time, I had a dog from Leaderdogs. Not to say that this automatically makes me an mobility god, but it should say to people that I have decent enough skills to get around on my own. this is an aditude in an adult facility, so I can just imagine how bad it must be at some schools.
First, something blind students need to remember: It's not just you. I know a lot of sighted students in a lot of schools who take a lot of crap (either they're shy and quiet, not in the right croud, or whatever). Blind students tend to assume that they're the only ones taking crap from everybody and that nobody else gets it. That's blatently not true. Students generally suck, and the ones that don't take the crap from the ones that do, disabled or not. I'm in a sighted high school, and I get a lot less crap (stolen books/lunches/etc, beatings, what have you) than other students at the same school.
Secondly, it depends on the location of the student, and the type of schools available. Our local school for the blind, quite frankly, has many many issues and is made up of over three quarters multiple handicapt students. I would never go there; I wouldn't fit, and it would be bad for me. However, I would go to worcester in a minute. As that's not an option, attending a regular school is my best option, and it has worked extremely well for me.
Yeah, I agree with the majority of what people are saying, taht people can learn from both. The Blind School near me definitely caters to people with multiple disabilties some of the time, which is kinda sad in a way. But it's a great school, don't get me wrong... lol.
The school here caters to multiply disabled students too, but we have a summer camp here for the blind that's a lot of fun. I think they should have more of those. Mainstreaming greatly benefitted me, but so did the summer camp. It all depends on the various options. Some schools are better than others; my school happened to work with me pretty well, and itinerent services for the blind are helpful to many blind students here in the USA.
Yeah, our blind school had a summer camp to which i attended and thoroughly enjoyed. Why is it the summer camps are better than year round? Lol.
I went to a regular school but went to the state school for the blind for most of the summer times for their programs. but actually, my school district had tried out year-round school for one year, and I din't mind. *smiles* But the programs were cool to have something to do, although I still missed my family. My favorite part was that I could go to the library just about every day. I awould either check out books that were interesting to me, or when I had access to the computer or Internet, I would find an article in the encyclopedia or take my disk and ask the librarian to Braille-print it for me. She would call me "the mad scientist", because of that, and the fact that I mainly would check out nonfiction books, or read and sometimes copy from the brailled encyclopedias. Also, one of the dorms I stayed at had had a braille dictionary, and I would actually read from that. Yeah, I know I'm weird, but I've always been interested in learning. *smiles*
As for the question of what's best, I guess it would depend. I don't know how it would have been different if I'd went to a blind school instead of mainstream, but I know some friends who did go for at least 1 or 2 years. I think it would have to do with what resources are available and if their schools were providing that to them. Also, even though the resources were there, it might be good for subjects like math and independent living skills, since the teachers at the blind schools would be trained to know how to work with blind people in those areas.
i think that blind schol is the best.
i whent to mainsi think that blind school is the best.
i whent to main streem for a bit, then whent to a school for the blind, wich i injoyed more.
now, i go to a bording school in worcester, and i like it more than the last school.
but i see what some people say, you do need to mix, and in this envirament, there isn't much of that, because its bording.
there are some people here with other problems, but more blind people.
I went to a school for the blind from kindergarten through grade four. While I think the experiences I got at the blind school were...useful, I think I should have been mainstreamed much earlier in life. Adjusting at such a late age is very difficult, at least it was for me. Plus, I think I learned more from my itinerant teacher in grades five through twelve than I did at the school for the blind. True the school for the blind had teachers who knew mostly everything about blind people, but I felt like I was treated as a child. Yes, I was a child, but... I didn't feel like I was advancing much. I could be looking at this all wrong, because I kind of tried to forget all of those years. Especially the first two years of my mainstream life... those really, really sucked.
Anyway, going to a school for the blind is somewhat important, but not necessary. And like I tell parents of newly born blind children: send your child to blind school if you must, but mainstream them as early as possible.
No, you don't. That was one comma and one question mark. Go back to punctuation 101. Thank you.
Tricky one. I went to a "Special" school, but have taught in mainstream schools and those with special units. I think it's a case of horses for courses; however, in my teaching experience VI students in mainstream suffer from a lack provision regards sport and recreation, and whilst academically they may do OK, socially they are lacking because they always ahve a support worker with them. However, sighted youngsters who go to school with VI people lose a degree of ignorance and fear, so that is a good thing. I could bang on about this, but i will bore you senseless. I think the bottom line is,it depends on the individual, their needs, and their personality.
I think that it is best to go to mainstream schools. When you've finished in education you'll have to intigrate with the sighted people anyway so it's important that you understand them because they won't always understand your needs. I think all blind schools should be closed down. I'm not against blind colleges though because people have usually matured by the time they've left school anyway. I think people who're blind and have other problems which affect the way they behave should be kept out of mainstream because people like me usually find them irritating, and they just get in the way and obstruct normality. This should apply to both sighted and blind persons with this need though.
"I think people who're blind and have other problems which affect the way they behave should be kept out of mainstream because people like me usually find them irritating, and they just get in the way and obstruct normality"? Excuse me for a minute, but, WHAT! THE! FUCK! Since when should the world be constructed to please "The Waynderful Wangel" and his/her naziest tendancies? They make life hard for The Waynderful Wangel. I think we should just kill them. Excuse me! This sort of biggited bullshit coming from other disabled people really pisses me off to no end. That was completely and utterly tactless and wrong. Yes, there are many good reasons why multiple challenged people may need seperat schools, but "they make life harder for me and mine, oh and I find them upsetting and I don't really like them" isn't one of those reasons. We should all band together and demand an apology from this cretin.
Exactly what annoyed me. If they have behavioral problems, it's usually not their fault anyways to begin with. It might be from a neurological problem, or because they don't know any other way to communicate. But I think with support from others, just like we blind people have, they can certainly be in a regular school, whether it's mainstreamed or in a self-contained classroom. But to say they shouldn't be mainstreamed because they are irritating is just wrong. Maybe some students might need to go to a blind school at some point, but multiply challenged students deserve to be pert of the rest of society like the rest of us. If there's anything that should be closed, I think it's those state hospitals they still have here. I really don't see the point of those places to be honest, and I think multiply challenged people should be as integrated with everyone else as possible.
Leilani
Obstruct normality? WTF? Please enlighten this truly ignorant creature. That post sounds like those people who get all up in arms if somebody dares inconvenience them, as if people doing it on purpose and as if they're guaranteed some right not to be inconvenienced or irritated just for breathing. Yeah-yeah-yeah. Everybody's out to get you and everything actually is as bad as you think it is. So there, too! Hehehehehehehe!
Students who are visually impaired don't always have to have a support worker with them. Also, blind colleges might make blind people less marketable to those sighted people who don't get it yet. We have to do our best to show them we can hold down successful careers just like other people.
I personally believe that is is the choice of the person attending school. When I was in elementary, I was highly ignored, and basically felt the most comfortable with other blind students. However, ever since I've hit Junior High, I have fit in pretty well. Although some people make unnecessary generalizations about what I am able to do, I have a wonderful circle of sighted friends so it doesn't matter what they think. However, schools for the blind positively influence a lot of people, so it's a matter of opinion.
I attended a main stream school all of my life accept for summer camps and a couple of weeks my senior year when I needed to get some specialized training. Though I had difficulties with some of the people in my school you'd never hear me complain. My difficulties were more because I wasn't a prep like a lot of the girls in my school were. I learned what I needed to learn. I think it doesn't only depend on the individual, but on agencies available in the area and what the parents are willing to put into it. My Mom fought to make sure I had a braille teacher, independent living training and O&M training, but then again she was willing, able and had the knowledge to make the fight possible. Now as far as this crap about people with multiple disabilities being shut away? My school had a special education class for such children, and because they weren't shut away they were able to possibly go farther then they would have shut away from the "normal".
I'm thankfull I was spared the agony of going to a blind school, because I know a few people who've had the misfortune of going to jarico hill school for the blind here in Vancouver back in the 70's, and it's not pretty at all, because my significant other is one of those who went through hell at that school. Basically there was alot of abuse at that school back in the 70's, and that's how it got shut down. So as a result, my parents had me registered at public school, and I'm might glad because of it.
I've got to agree that most everyone has their troubles at school. I think that, in elementary, lots of these trouble probably stem from being blind, i.e., the generalizations and the questions and the occasional teasing, butonce in middle school these sort of went down the tubes.
If I had to do it all over again I'd go to a blind school. Both have their advantages and disadvantages. Being mainstreamed I did not learn the things I wanted such as how blind people take care of themselves, how to interact as a blind person with the world, etc. Being mainstreamed is why at the age of 20 I decided to go into rehab because no one else would teach me these things as if I were at a blind school I might of not had to go through independant living at rehab.
Troy
I didn't have a blind school to teach me, however, my Mother knows of, and works at, an organization that focuses part of their resources on helping people learn what they can. *smile* Besides, I learned to do things more like a sighted person, but while that may not be well for others it has worked great for me. It's partly in knowing what help is available in your area.
Well, I have been in a regular mainstreamed school all of my life. I had both good and bad experiences. When I was in eighth grade, I got discriminated by a math teacher cause of that. She yells at me all the time cause I took longer to write on the brailler. She also yelled at me cause I took longer to get the brailer. She didn't have the patience to explain clear the math problems as she wrote them on the board leading me to get f's on everything. She even wrote a discriminatory or racist letter saying that my mom is lazy and that she is not professional. anthe good experiences were the interactions with all students. after I graduated, everyone was not the same since I left
When I went to high school, everything went well untill I got to my senior year. during my senior year, everything went down low. my counselor would say negative things about me not being able to go to college. she also said negative things about my parents forgeting to pay the applications for college. she would make nasty remarks about me not doing well in geometry. I explained to her that I have inaccurate pictures in my mind about the diagrams. I immagine things different from reality because o of having no sight. I even told her that they are vissually more accurate than tactually but she was stubborn. and my computer teacher was nasty cause she had no patience to teach me like the other students. She thought that they were much mor important than me. she had no patience to give me extended time or read the worksheets to me or anything rather than teach the sighted students. that has impacted me cause I somtimes feel angry and upset and sick often. I mean get sick often. oh good, this year is nuts.
oh, I forgot, please feel tfree to express your thoughts about that message. hahahshahahahaha!
I must admit, most of my experiences with teachers was wonderful. I only had one, um, witch, but that was only for one semester. Other wise things went great. As a matter of fact, I got the top score in my Geometry class my sophomore year, LOL. Talk about pissing off the other students. *grin*
I had a math teacher in fifth grade that did the same thing. She also through me out of her class to a different teacher.
Troy