100% Full Inclusion Is Not a Decision That Should Be Made Outside the IEP Team

Let's talk about school inclusion as a blanket policy.

In some places, it is now the law, I think especially in some parts of Canada, it is now the law that all students be placed in a full inclusion setting, regardless of what their IEP says, regardless of their disabilities.

And it's my understanding that under US law, under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, It's actually an IEP team decision what would be the best placement for a student.

Students are entitled to a free and appropriate public education in the least restrictive environment.

And what that exactly means, what specific placement would be the least restrictive environment for that student, as far as I understand, is an IEP team decision.

So I don't really understand, at least in the US, where this idea is coming from that all students should be placed in a completely full inclusion setting regardless of their needs regardless of the decision of the iep team that doesn't really seem legal to me and i think as a as a principal you know i don't have any training as a special ed teacher i don't have a background as a special ed teacher so all of my knowledge of special ed comes from being a principal and we had a very strong special education department that handled probably more than is the case in most districts so i probably have a little bit less first-hand special ed experience but thinking about our students who had you know some sort of disability that affected their behavior, especially students with autism, placement often was the thing that made the biggest difference.

You know, if you have a student who is overstimulated and often people will say in my comments, you know, does, does your, do your comments about behavior apply to students with autism?

Typically, I am not intending to address students with autism when I talk about behavior and consequences because for a student who is on the autism spectrum, a lot of the behaviors that you're going to see are going to result from overstimulation, from being in a setting, where there's just too much going on for them.

It's just not a good setting.

But it is not my place to say that as someone who is not on the IEP team.

That is a decision for the teachers and the parent and the district staff.

make together as part of the IEP team and what makes me really uncomfortable is this kind of blanket idea that we can decide in advance that all students need to be in a big general education class all the time because giving that student a one-on-one aid or giving the teacher additional training like that doesn't really solve or resolve the difficulties of that environment for the student so I certainly believe in inclusion I certainly believe that full inclusion is right for some students including some students with autism but i believe that it is and needs to be an iep team decision and not this kind of blanket thing that we can say well every every kid needs to be in a gen ed classroom all day long regardless of the cost regardless of what the the iep team or the parents think i just think we have to honor um you know not always parent wishes but we have to honor parents voice and their understanding of their child and we have to look at what works for the child and i can think of specific kids where trying to to make them successful in a gen ed class was just never going to work because it was too stimulating for them.

It was too loud and they would, they would just kind of get, get overstimulated, kick somebody, throw something.

And there's, there's just no stopping that.

And when we made a change to a smaller class, you know, a self-contained class that would have, you know, some, some opportunities to, you know, for mainstreaming, but it was mostly a self-contained class.

I saw multiple students flourish under that change and never have those same issues again.

So again, that's not to say I know the right placement for any given kid, But I'm really uncomfortable with this idea that no child should ever be in a self-contained class, a smaller class, a specialized program, because I've seen the power of those programs for some kids.

And again, I think it's an IEP team decision.

So let me know what you think about this issue.

Is full inclusion now a policy where you teach?

If so, where are you and what does that policy say?

And what do you think about kids who might need something other than that?

Leave a comment and let me know.