New York City Is Placing Students With Disabilities in Mainstream Classes. But Do They Actually Feel Included?
December 14, 2017
By: Alex Zimmerman
Source: Chalkbeat
Terell Richards languished at the public middle school in Queens for students with severe disabilities that he attended a few years ago.
It wasn’t just that he found the work so easy he sometimes fell asleep in the back of the classroom, his sister, Kya, said. It was also that he felt so out of place he would sometimes dissolve into tears.
“Just crying and saying how much he just felt like he was in the wrong place and completely lost,” said Kya, who helped her brother, now 19 years old, switch to a private school for students with special needs.
Now, New York City — and districts across the country — have started sending more students like Terell into classrooms alongside their non-disabled peers. But while some research has shown students with disabilities can perform better in mixed-ability settings, a crucial concern has been whether the new environment makes students with disabilities actually feel less isolated and out-of-place…