Photo courtesy of morgueFile/Seemann.

A decision by the school board to combine a regular education school with a special education school has sparked controversy.

Recently the Luxmanor Citizens Association (LCA) has been faced with a dilemma. Herbert Hoover Middle school, the holding school on Tilden Lane may be torn down and rebuilt within the next five years to be the new Tilden Middle School. In the new school, 100 students from Rock Terrace School would also be added to Tilden’s 1200 student community. This is called the co-location proposal. Rock Terrace school is a school for kids with special needs that serves students ages 12 through 21 who may have specific learning disabilities, autism spectrum disorders, speech and language disorders, emotional impairment or other health impairments.

Some local parents think the co-location proposal threatens the harmony of the neighborhood and will negatively change its character. Some smaller issues that may result from co-locating the schools are the parking, bus turn-arounds, additional parking spaces for teachers and aides of special needs students. One of eight proposed designs for the school includes building a 10-foot fence to keep the students with special needs on the property inside the neighborhood.

Most of the time the solution to the smaller issues is to envision separate parking lots, separate bus turn arounds, and time release doors to prevent special needs students from wandering into the middle school facilities. it seems to me that the vision of this school sounds more like it is focused on segregating the students then actually educating them.

One thing parents need to consider is the fact that the current Tilden Middle School already has a number of special needs students and the building itself faces Old Georgetown Road, a major road that is always busy. Any student could just walk off the property because it doesn’t have a fence, but no one does.

Another thing for parents to remember is that if they don’t want their kids to go to a school with special needs kids, then they don’t have to send their kids to that school. Besides voicing their opinion, that they want to keep special needs kids out of the school with their kids, parents can drive their kids out of the district to another school, or they can stick their kids in a private school that is a good fit for them.

By separating the two groups of students, the parents are putting their kids at a disadvantage when they graduate. They won’t have the option of deciding whether or not to have special needs people in their lives, and they won’t know how to work with them in a professional environment either. I believe that high school wouldn’t be half as great as it is now without special needs kids as a part of the student body, who can make each day better with just one smile or casual greeting. Some of the students who will go to the new Tilden Middle School may eventually go to WJ, although their middle school career may take a few extra years.

WJ already has some special needs students who are exactly like mainstream students; smart, friendly, and respectful. They have friends like everyone else and stop in the halls each day to talk to them. They study, they rush to class, and they try their hardest in school just like mainstream students. They help make WJ what it is.

Google defines community as a feeling of fellowship with others, as a result of sharing common attitudes, interests, and goals. Special needs kids are part of our community and contribute something no other students can; they bring a new point of view to the table and I know middle school wouldn’t have been the same without them.