Good idea!
I'm also thinking that getting a chance to talk to specific people sohuld also be made easier.
I know one thing--it needs a HUGE library! Not one of those dinky little rooms with fifty-year-old books in it.
Now that you mention it, Hogwarts is my idea of a dream school...
<hugs>
Athie
Yeah, I think Hogwart's would be the coolest school ever!
I guess some of you have imagined this Hogwart-like dream-castle that would become the school for many aspies. If it were to be a huge library, I guess it would be on the school's computer.
Hmph. Computer-based libraries aren't near as nice as real-book ones. The quiet rooms that smell of books... The feel of paper under your fingertips... the walking along a shelf, browsing for anything that looks interesting... even the figuring out how to carry fifty books in one armload. I love it!!
There is just NOTHING like a real library. Of course, to be truly the perfect library, it does have to have a good Interlibrary Loan system, and (in a separate room, please) Internet-access computers and access to online article databases. Also, big comfy chairs. Because you need something to read in.
Yeah
Except they should hire some of the Aspie kids to work at the library, so the library workers wouldn't be constantly putting the books on the wrong shelves and putting teen books with the adult books and putting sci-fi and fantasy in the wrong sections and separating series because they have different authors even when they have a series section for the purpose, and then not hiring somebody who obviously knows how libraries work because she's never had a job at one, and how else is she supposed to get the experience?!!
Now that you mention it, Hogwarts is my idea of a dream school...
<hugs>
Athie
A huge library.
A laptop with bluetooth for every pupil.
Teachers in booths around the library to be consulted by the students as and when they decide that they need help.
Absolutely no compulsory PE whatsoever but a well-equipped, modern, work-out style Gym.
A list on the wall suggesting skills that should be learned by the end of the compulsory school age.
Parents allowed to accompany students who request it.
All staff to be on the spectrum too.
Hmm, definitely have different options for PE... offer a nice range of sports, probably fewer team-based sports than you have in conventional PE lessons, and students sign up for whichever one interests them. They let 6th formers do that at my current school, and it works really well... I've done climbing, fencing, ice skating and trampoling as 6th form sports... which is a hugely welcome change from lacrosse and netball. And there's the opportunity to go to the gym for the fitness freak types, or do martial arts (although I think that metamorphosed into a self-defence class... come to think of it, self-defence would be a good use of a PE lesson).
Don't think internet-based would work too brilliantly, if you're stuck then going and talking to a teacher can be immensely useful, and that's harder with online. Plus you need to have a hell of a lot of self-motivation if you're doing the entire thing at home. My bf is aspie, and after he left mainstream school he joined an internet-based one... it really didn't work for him, so that turned out to be a wasted year, meaning he's now at a specialist school a year behind everyone else.
I'm not certain about the requirement that all the staff be on the spectrum. Although I can see the reasoning behind it, there's also the fact that some students may want support from the staff in other areas besides academic ones - if understanding NT behaviour is one of these areas, then it might help to have sensitive NT staff who can explain NT behaviour. Obviously you'd need to be careful and they'd need a lot of training in AS beforehand, but it could work - and would you really want to exclude someone who could be a brilliant teacher just because they don't have a diagnosis? (especially considering the fact that there are probably many undiagnosed aspies out there)
Hello,
I agree with many of the previous posters about being close to a big library -- I am within walking distance from Alaska's Largest library at the University of Alaska Fairbanks. They have plenty of maps, (I forked over a whopping 50 cents for a withdrawn US atlas written in Russian, (even though I don't know the language)) professional journals of all strife and subjects, et. al.
My idea for an aspie-centric school:
-->As above
-->Dispense with those punishing florescent lights
-->Include a sensory integration room (a la Snoezelen™ room)
-->Emphasize individual discovery through individual activites while simultaneously de-emphasizing examinations
-->Small class size (n < 10 students)
-->For older kids: a life-skills class or two (ie finances, balancing checkbook, shopping, et. al.)
-->Still for older kids: Vocational training if needed
--> For all: a solid base of caring support including parents, teachers, administrators.
Any further thoughts?
~CGK
If we're coming from an English perspective... don't make the sixth formers (age 16-18) do general studies. It's highly pointless. The life-skills classes that CGKings317 suggested would be a perfect alternative to the traditional general studies, so the school can still say "yes, we're making sure our sixth formers get a wider range of knowledge", but the knowledge is actually useful stuff.
Hm, lashire's suggestion about using all 5 senses in each lesson made me think... if you're mainly an auditory learner, then the part of the lesson that's for visual learners isn't going to be much use to you, and vice versa. Maybe it would help to have an accurate way of assessing how each child learns best, and then putting them into classes with others who learn in a similar way, so that lessons for that class are focused mainly on the main learning style of the individuals in the class - still including some other styles, but not giving equal time to each.
I go to a high school for the arts, where we go for the required academic classes, then an additional 12 hours per week in the arts conservatory classes. Everyone has an art major, and some double-major. It's a charter school, which means that we get enough money from the government to pay for the academics, but not enough to pay for the conservatories, and it costs about $4,000 dollars per year per student.
My family has very little money, and would be unable for me to attend if we had to pay for it all. Fortunately, families pay only what they are able to pay, and generous gifts from corporations and wealthy individuals enable the school to enroll people such as myself who would never be able to attend otherwise.
Oh, and my writing classes have several times taken place in a classroom where there are no desks and chairs, but beanbags for students to sit on, and the classroom is lined with shelves of books that are part of the library. The coolest classroom in the school (the runner-up would be the Harry Potter room, which is next to a ramp that connects two sections of classrooms. It also has beanbags.
In elementary and middle school, P.E. was a terrible experience, mainly because (a) the kids teased and abused me physically and emotionally and (b) often the games were pointless and offered little value to keeping fit. It got so bad that in 5th and 6th grade I went to PE only rarely, and by 7th and 8th grade never even went.
However, at my current high school, among the PE classes, I chose to take Taekwondo (I am currently a blue belt). We have no sports team (although I wish we had a field to run in at least), and the closest thing we've got is unofficially hackeysack, and no one I've encountered my three years there is remotely like a jock (the theater and visual arts conservatories make up the most). I have never witnessed a physical attack there, nor have I heard of anyone witnessing one (many of my friends have been there for five years), and I have not been verbally harrassed.
I have only been insulted once in 9th grade by someone in my French class who was upset because we were in a team for some group activity and everyone else in the team selected me to answer the next question for us (she was horrendously bad in French). That's absolutely it. The dance majors often seem more like "normal" high school students than the rest of us oddballs, but that's about it, and usually catty remarks stay within their own cliques rather than disparaging other students or groups of students.
So yes, PE should be shown to the students to have an enormous potential for positive experiences, and the school counselors in charge of discipline, aside from being extremely well-educated about autistics and possibly autistic him or herself, should undergo extensive training about adhering to law when a student becomes threatened. Hopefully at such a school this would not be a problem, but of course the counselors who ignore autistics getting bullied start out with that premise and, in order to avoid dealing with the problems, simply deny its existence or claim that he or she has already resolved it (or both simultaneously, as in my experience).
Let me dig this thread up even though it has been inactive for the past few weeks, because alot of what I have been reading on AFF lately suggests there is a real need for places like this. So, the question I will pose is, how exactly do you make it happen?
Keep in mind, great things often have humble beginnings. It would take money, lots of it, to fund such a place, so it would be years from its inception before it achieves the capabilities discussed above.
My guess is that alot of parents of Aspie kids (the parents being either NT or Aspie themselves) will be forced into homeschooling if they don't want to go along with what the school has in mind. When that happens, the people in these homeschooling situations should organize into a club and stay in constant contact, bring their kids together for shared activities, etc. (This being on the scale of one group per city, county, etc.)
That might go on for a few years, during which time there would have to be a way to raise funds to build an actual school. That won't be easy because you'd have to raise enough to buy land for a campus. With land, there is also the matter of taxes, zoning, engineering, etc. How much land (in acres or hectares) do you think it would take for each campus?
Even at that point, it's still not as grand as the ideas above, but on its way there. The first thing to appear on the campus would be temporary buildings (office trailers, etc.). (Even some universities started out with only temporary structures, so it's nothing unusual.) Then of course, there's the matter of hiring faculty and staff, and being able to maintain a payroll for them. (It would have to be a private school, so as not to be politicized.) Would anyone care to try calculating the tuition rates?
If it survives enough years like that, THEN those in charge of it can look into building permanent facilities with the specialized arcitectural features described in some of the posts.
I know everyone here likes to go all over the place with topics of discussion, but for the next few days at least, try to stick with what it would take to get it started. And, don't forget to include your opinions on the toughest part of it all, funding.
Garmonbozia,
One of many possible careers I've entertained the idea of is Special Ed. Teacher, with the intention of becoming head of an aspie school.
The two ways I thought of doing it- and I'm sure there are others, these were just my thoughts- were:
1. Go through college, studying AS and education related topics. Get a teaching certificate. Take a few years to gain teaching experience; then apply for a grant to start a charter school geared towards aspies. Take it from there.
2. Get rich and fund the school yourself. This one requires figuring out and executing a plan to get rich, of which I have many, all of which require a lot of hard work and luck.
Therefore I intend to attempt the first course of action and will only inact the second if the oportunity presents itself.
#1 is also my plan. Perhaps we should team up sometime in the future, at least by correspondences of ideas of how to approach getting such schools up and running. My high school is a charter school, and aside from corporate donations and some wealthy people who have donated to the school, parents are expected to pay for their child's conservatory.
This needn't be the barrier that it may seem: my family is poor and we cannot pay $4,000 per year for me to attend this school (though we would if we could, as it is the only time I've really been safe at school). So we are not required to pay since we're unable, and other people pay partially. Considering that there are people who spend thousands of dollars per year on ABA, then hopefully there will be enough people willing to pay to keep up such a school. Optimal would be if there was an endowment for the school (where a wealthy person leaves a lot of money, say, several million dollars, to the school, and the money sits in the bank, with the interest going to pay for the school).
The best way to approach getting an endowment or other major source of funding would probably to find some people who are very wealthy who are autistic or who have autistc family members, educate them about the goals of the school, and try to get funding this way. Even though the school would necessarily promote a positive view of autism, even curebies will (usually) not object to the idea of a school that helps autistics, even if the school is not employing ABA or promoting cure, since most are realistic enough to know that, even if they want a cure, that one is not here now, and not likely to be here within a couple years, and their kids have to find ways to navigate the world as they are, at least in the short term.
So I wouldn't overemphasize that the school is anti-cure, especially since many people misinterpret this to mean anti-intervention. Just saying that the school encourages kids to be positive and reach their full potential is good enough, since this doesn't imply pro-cure but doesn't (necessarily) imply anti-cure either, which is a good thing since many parents have been ill-informed, and education is a slow process (after all, "the Truth must dazzle gradually / Or every man be blind"). And the goal of pretty much ANY school is to be positive and reach full potential, although in this context of parents with autistic kids it seems to carry an extra significance.
I don't think I'm getting rich anytime soon, or in this life at all, but I will financially support such moves as much as I am able when I am able.
#1 is also my plan. Perhaps we should team up sometime in the future, at least by correspondences of ideas of how to approach getting such schools up and running. My high school is a charter school, and aside from corporate donations and some wealthy people who have donated to the school, parents are expected to pay for their child's conservatory.
This needn't be the barrier that it may seem: my family is poor and we cannot pay $4,000 per year for me to attend this school (though we would if we could, as it is the only time I've really been safe at school). So we are not required to pay since we're unable, and other people pay partially. Considering that there are people who spend thousands of dollars per year on ABA, then hopefully there will be enough people willing to pay to keep up such a school. Optimal would be if there was an endowment for the school (where a wealthy person leaves a lot of money, say, several million dollars, to the school, and the money sits in the bank, with the interest going to pay for the school).
The best way to approach getting an endowment or other major source of funding would probably to find some people who are very wealthy who are autistic or who have autistc family members, educate them about the goals of the school, and try to get funding this way. Even though the school would necessarily promote a positive view of autism, even curebies will (usually) not object to the idea of a school that helps autistics, even if the school is not employing ABA or promoting cure, since most are realistic enough to know that, even if they want a cure, that one is not here now, and not likely to be here within a couple years, and their kids have to find ways to navigate the world as they are, at least in the short term.
So I wouldn't overemphasize that the school is anti-cure, especially since many people misinterpret this to mean anti-intervention. Just saying that the school encourages kids to be positive and reach their full potential is good enough, since this doesn't imply pro-cure but doesn't (necessarily) imply anti-cure either, which is a good thing since many parents have been ill-informed, and education is a slow process (after all, "the Truth must dazzle gradually / Or every man be blind"). And the goal of pretty much ANY school is to be positive and reach full potential, although in this context of parents with autistic kids it seems to carry an extra significance.
I don't think I'm getting rich anytime soon, or in this life at all, but I will financially support such moves as much as I am able when I am able.
Teaming up would be great! What grade/year are you in now?
As far as pitching the school to curebies goes, I think we jsut wouldn't mention a cure at all- instead we would highlight all the features the school has that would teach aspies/auties how to navigate life better, like social skills and daily living skills classes. Then if they complain that their kids still won't make eye contact, we can politely explain to them that we are focusing on more important things with their kid at the moment.
There might be existing funds/pools of money we could try to tap into that exist for special needs schools or something, but I'd have to actually do research to find that out, and I'm too busy right now. 
Re: pitching to the curebies - that's pretty much what I meant. Try best to not alienate anybody.
Currently a high school senior. I'm considering a school called the Evergreen State College, in Olympia Washington. It's an unconventional school (despite the fact that it is a state school), and one of the graduate programs it offers is a master's in teaching. I'm thinking of going there as an undergraduate to study math and computer science.
Another thing good about Evergreen is that a very high percentage of applicants are accepted, which is good for me since, despite doing well on tests and understanding the materials, there are some bad spots on my transcript (some due to emotional problems I was having, other times because the teachers and school staff weren't understanding of my needs, and were sometimes hostile to me).
I find it rather interesting that in nine years of elementary and junior high school, I made few acquantainces, and yet when I got to my high school (which is much more accepting of difference), I met my current good friends on the first day, in the first block of the class. Despite my still being very much autistic (rocking, little or no eye contact, unable to do small talk, etc.), I found no difficulties socializing with my friends, even though there were situations that I could tell if I had been interacting with other people would have been painfully embarrassing or awkward socially. Just goes to show that being autistic in and of itself doesn't preclude one from having friends and socializing to the degree that is desired - how tolerant your peers are seems to be a MUCH bigger factor in how that goes. And most of the people I socialize with are NT.
I remember being young, even before I knew at all was autism was, and I would daydream, why couldn't there be a school where other misunderstood people like me weren't bullied constantly and given mixed messages from school staff who seemed to think I was both mentally *** and a genius simultaneously (and condemn me for the latter, even though I am neither)? I was lucky, though, in that my parents and most teachers have been very accepting of me, and very helpful to me.