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Thousands of special education students were left without placement in the frameworks: "Disregard for the needs of children" - Walla! news

2020-08-12T06:19:04.855Z


Less than a month before the start of school, and many who need adapted settings still do not know which school to attend.


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Thousands of special education students left without placement in frameworks: "Disregard for children's needs"

Less than a month before the start of school, and many who need adapted settings still do not know which school to attend.

Tags
  • Special Education
  • Ministry of Education
  • autism
  • Corona virus

Dana Yarkatzi

Wednesday, 12 August 2020, 09:14

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      In the video: Education Minister Galant in the Knesset Education Committee on the opening of the school year on September 1 (Photo: Knesset Channel)

      The Ministry of Education announced this week that the special education system will operate as normal in the coming school year for all age groups, and will not be affected by the corona crisis. In practice, however, thousands of special education students were left without placement in frameworks - less than three weeks before school began. If that was not enough, as part of the struggle in Corona, it was decided to ban assistants from reaching the homes of special education students to help them with distance learning. Parents whose children are currently without an educational framework describe difficult feelings following the uncertainty, and point the finger of blame at the Ministry of Education for not providing solutions.

      The head of the special education department at the Ministry of Education, Rachel Abramson, said yesterday (Tuesday) that about 2,000 special education students have not yet been placed in appropriate settings. Speaking at a hearing in the Knesset's Education Committee, Abramson stressed that "we work day in and day out to try and provide an answer." However, due to the unusual situation, in recent days the National Association for Children and Adults with Autism (ALU) has been flooded with inquiries from angry parents.

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      Thousands in special education were left without placement. Knesset Education Committee, Tuesday (Photo: Adina Wallman, Knesset Spokeswoman)

      The director of the Division for the Advancement of Rights at the United Nations, Adv. Michael Zetz, explained in a conversation with Walla! NEWS on the need for assistance during classes. "We are in trouble with the corona outline, according to which assistants are not allowed to reach the homes of the integrated students," Zetz said. "In order for online learning to be effective, we need someone to help them and mediate the lesson." He stressed that "integrated students study in regular classrooms like everyone else - and they are going to fall between the chairs. Learning alone from home, without being supervised, leaves the integrated students unanswered."

      Zetz also referred to the fact that the Ministry of Education is not yet ready to place students in classrooms, due to the congestion and shortage of space. "Some authorities have not yet placed the students in special education because they probably lack space and they do not know where to place them," he explained. "The Ministry of Education is not properly preparing for the increase in the number of students with special needs in the system. It is not developing enough frameworks." He added that it was stipulated that "in special education between five and eight students will study, and in each class there will be a teacher and an assistant. Because there are not enough places, the Ministry of Education is burdening these classes."

      "They are difficult students with special needs, and instead of being prepared with additional frameworks - the classrooms are blown up," the director of the Department for the Advancement of Human Rights continued. "We receive thousands of inquiries from parents whose children are not yet enrolled, and we are about two weeks before school. All regular education knows on July 10 in what framework his child will learn and who is going to be the teacher. It can not be that special education students are a stepchild of God. "

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      "Without anyone mediating the lesson for them, they will fall between the chairs." School in Givatayim (Photo: Reuven Castro)

      Yafit Kantor-Elkan from Holon, the mother of 12-year-old Itai and 10-year-old Liad, who are on the autism spectrum, described the opacity on the part of the Ministry of Education. "Itai was diagnosed a year ago when he was studying in a learning disability class," she said. "He was in sixth grade at the time, and we allowed him to stay there until the last year of elementary school. Towards the next school year, we asked him to be placed in a communication class. It was approved, but then we were told there was no place in Holon. .

      According to Yafit, she was told that there was no place for me even before the incorporations into the frameworks began. "They're trying to persuade me to take him out of a media class. They tell me, 'Let's give you another school, a regular division.' I don't agree with that," she described. "He has his disabilities, my child does not read, he is dyslexic at a very difficult level. Although he is very intelligent and gives good grades, but in a normal class he is lost, even in a learning disability class he does not get an answer to his problem."

      "The first answer was 'Do not expect'." Yafit Kantor-Elkan and her son Itai (Photo: Courtesy of those photographed)

      Yafit added that the number of diagnoses is increasing year by year, but the Ministry of Education has not prepared for this. "They know that more classrooms need to be opened, but the Ministry of Education just sleeps standing up. I even asked to open a standard for a ninth child in the classroom with me, and I got a silly answer that 'a standard for a child in a communication class was never approved.' "I saw the debate in the Knesset where Rachel Abmarzon explicitly said that she had opened standards in media classes because there was simply no room. I was just asking for a standard to be given to him in Holon. It does not make sense that I should move him as far as Netanya."

      "We are two weeks before the start of the school year, and I have never felt this way. I did not think I would get into this situation," Yafit described. "Itai sees all his friends embedded, and he is the only one who is not embedded. The Corona period did its thing anyway. It is difficult, he owes a framework and a society. If no framework is found for him - I will sue the Ministry of Education. He is obliged to find the best framework "And they underestimate me and the needs of the child."

      "Instead of getting excited about going up to first grade, we are anxious." Sharon and son Or (Photo: courtesy of the photographers)

      Sharon from Petah Tikva, a six-year-old mother on the autism spectrum, described the difficulty in the uncertainty. "It's a terrible feeling, like I'm hanging in the air. These kids need preparation, showing them what school they're going to be in and what their name is," she explained. "Especially when they are preparing for first grade, you have to go to school, show them what it looks like from the outside, buy the shirts with a school logo." She said that "these are children with difficulties, it is not easy for them to leave kindergarten and they do not know at all what first grade is. They were not in a transition program where the kindergarten children are exposed to the schools in the neighborhood, they do not get it."

      Sharon also described the conduct regarding the placement by the municipality. "What happens is that the municipality keeps all the children's files with it, and prevents us from accessing information. We are not allowed to know in which schools classrooms will be opened, where the children will be placed or with whom," she said. "We are not part of the discourse and decision regarding inlays."

      According to her, the committee regarding her son Or was in March, and she was told that in July there would already be inlays. "I'm hanging in the air, we do not know which school he is going to. They tell us 'wait patiently', it is really unlikely in my eyes," Sharon continued. "But they have another charming sentence: 'Last year we gave placements on August 29.' "They go, can prepare and the parents get excited with him. We, instead of getting excited, get into anxiety."

      "" We do not sleep at night. We do not know what will happen. "Alon Segev and Ben Idan (Photo: courtesy of those photographed)

      Alon Segev from Holon, the father of ten-year-old Idan who was diagnosed with autism, was also left without a placement. "In grades 1-3, he attended the special school 'Mesilot' in Bat Yam. Last year a placement committee was held for him, and we insisted on transferring him to a communication class, so that he could communicate with children and not just adults, because he was the only one who spoke," Alon said. "This year he was at Ben Gurion School in Holon. The teacher and the principal did not want him. They made committees for us and now they want to transfer him to a special school."

      According to Alon, "It is debatable whether they are right or not, but the thing is that we are two weeks before the start of the school year and we have no placement. The Holon municipality talks to us about distant places, and the teacher who did not want him to continue at school told me. ' Nothing will happen to him. " He added that "I want him to study in the Holon area, to continue in a combined class in a regular school. We did not give him a chance at all."

      Alon described the difficult feelings and need for a framework for Ben Idan. "We do not sleep at night. We do not know what will happen in two or three weeks," he said. "With our older children there is no problem, they are normal, but a child like Idan must have a framework. Even now in the great freedom special education has worked somehow, but at the moment we do not know what happens next."

      "The Ministry of Education is blowing up schools and eroding staffs." The Josephsberg family (Photo: courtesy of the photographers)

      Yael Yosefsberg, chairman of the board of directors at the Alut and the mother of 16-year-old Michael, who is on the autistic continuum, addressed a discussion in the Knesset's Education Committee on the subject. "It is unfortunate to see that in such an important discussion and in such a critical year, the Minister of Education and the Director General of his office do not find it appropriate to provide solutions. This is how the discussion looks, "she said." We have heard about 2,000 special education students who do not yet have a placement, hundreds of them probably on the autistic continuum. Was the Ministry of Education prepared to give these children placements? "

      She said, from information that reached the ALU," In many settings for students with autism, as with my son, the Ministry of Education breaks the standard of the number of students to a class it has set itself. "The educational staffs, who are unable to give proper care to the students. Where will all those new students be placed and when will they know where they are going on September 1st?"

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        Source: walla

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