Teacher bullies autistic child

 

Bullying is always unacceptable. For kids, for adults, at home, in the workplace, at school, in the playground, verbal, physical, mental, emotional – every form and in every instance, it’s never OK. For those of us who have experienced it personally, or through our children, it’s a crushing event.

 

Imagine your distress if you had an autistic child who was being bullied at school. And then you find out the bullying is being done by his teacher and teacher’s aid. This is what dad Stuart Chaifetz found out when he put a wire on his son when he went to his New Jersey school. Akian is a 10 year old  Autistic boy, who Stuart describes as a sweet and happy child. When he started school however, Stuart received calls and complaints from the school about his son’s behaviour, accusing the child of being violet and hitting his teacher and teacher’s aid. Stuart could not fathom this, they were describing a different child. After meetings with the school, and numerous meetings with a behaviouralist who was never able to recreate these violent outburst in Akian, Stuart decided to put the wire on his child. It was when Akian returned home with the tape, that Stuart listened to the recording and heard the hours of verbal and emotional abuse from his teacher and teacher’s aid.

 

Aikan's teacher and teacher’s aid have wholly inappropriate conversations in front of the class of children, all of whom have behavioural conditions and communication difficulties. And even worse, they then go on to humiliate and degrade Akian in a most cruel manner.

 

After bringing the recording to the school, the teacher’s aid was fired, however, the teacher remained on, but was placed in a different class.  The school have said that it is a “personnel mater that the district took seriously and handled appropriately”, however, Stuart disagrees and said: “That my son's teacher was not fired and still works in the school district is an outrage I am not willing to allow to pass in silence,”  and added “she betrayed my son and caused him great pain. If some union rule or HR regulation has allowed her to keep her job, then the law needs to be changed so that the next time a teacher bullies a child, especially one with special needs, they will be immediately fired. For me to do nothing would mean I was treating my son with as much disrespect as they had."

 

Stuart has released a youtube video (below) which includes the recording to highlight the incident, and has started a campaign to have the teacher fired.