Seminar tries to clear up confusion about inclusion

Paul Sloth:

Julie Maurer hopes to see a day when parents of children with special needs, parents like her, don’t have to advocate for their children in public school

Maurer hopes the system changes and schools accept children, like her daughter, Jenny, as easily as children who will never carry a label like “learning disabled” or “emotionally disabled.”

Maurer’s daughter, now 20, attends the University of Wisconsin-Parkside after graduating from Racine Unified.

A small group of parents, educators and disability advocates spent a few hours Saturday at the United Way of Racine County, 2000 Domanik Drive, with University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee education professor Elise Frattura, clearing up the confusion of including special education students in regular education classrooms.

Those years, from elementary school through high school, were marked by Maurer’s struggles to get her daughter into regular classrooms instead of being isolated from the rest of the children her age.

A preschool teacher encouraged Maurer to read the federal special education law, so as to understand what she should expect her daughter to receive in school.

Posted by Jim Zellmer at April 21, 2008 5:33 PM
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