Library / Watch / Autistic Pride Day Symposium 2024
Debate, Autistic Pride Day Symposium 2024
A panellist argued school can’t children should never be tricked into class
In short
At the 2024 Autistic Pride Day Symposium in Sydney, a participant praised an inclusive school model with learning plans for every student. A diverse learning teacher raised the cost of the plans, and a panellist used a story about a lion to question the premise.
Read it instead, 5 minutesThe transcript
The story
A participant at the education panel of the Autistic Pride Day Symposium in Sydney in June 2024 described an inclusive education model they had recently come across and wanted the panel’s view on. Its central idea was to reduce the stigma of individualised learning plans by giving one to every student, so that a plan no longer marked a student out as having learning difficulties.
The participant described the model’s other elements in some detail. Every student could signal to the teacher, without speaking, where they sat on a ready to learn scale. There were interventions for students who were not ready to learn. Students had agency and input into their own plans and were present when they were made. Parents were involved, along with a circle of support that included learning specialists. And because, in the participant’s words, school refusal was at its highest at the moment, the school had redesigned its entry. Students came in through large electric doors, and a student who felt they were not ready to learn before even reaching that entry could go to a breakout room to regulate and communicate where they were on the scale.
Sign in to keep reading, listening and watching.
Sign in with your email and everything in the Library is open to you: every story, every talk and every episode. It is free and it always will be. If you can, a donation helps keep it free for everyone.
Sources the story draws on
- The national trend of school refusal and related matters, Chapter 1: Introduction (opens in a new tab), Senate Education and Employment References Committee, Parliament of Australia
- Student attendance (National Report on Schooling in Australia) (opens in a new tab), Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority
- National Report on Schooling in Australia 2024 (opens in a new tab), Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority
- Evidence Requirements for the Nationally Consistent Collection of Data on School Students with Disability (NCCD) (opens in a new tab), Australian Government Department of Education
More from Autistic Pride Day Symposium 2024
All 94-
2 minutes 53 seconds, captioned A Sydney panel named the classroom rules that count stillness as learning Kyriakos Gold The education panel at the 2024 Autistic Pride Day Symposium in Sydney began with the rules of an ordinary classroom, and ended by arguing the system that sets them has to change. - 2 minutes 8 seconds, captioned Why three extra weeks fail autistic students who do not understand the question Autistic Pride Day Symposium 2024 A panellist on the Sydney education panel argued in 2024 that university adjustments are offered from a fixed list, and proposed that autistic people check assessment questions before students ever see them.
- 4 minutes 13 seconds, captioned Autistic university students said they were left to educate their own lecturers Autistic Pride Day Symposium 2024 Research reported at the 2024 Sydney education panel found stigma, discrimination and outdated knowledge among university staff. The proposed next study would question the staff instead of the students.
- 2 minutes 56 seconds, captioned Dr Siobhan Lamb wanted classrooms where no student needed an accommodation Dr Siobhan Lamb At the 2024 Autistic Pride Day Symposium in Sydney, a panellist working in secondary education called neurodivergent students the canaries in the coal mine. A participant who works at Headspace warned that one design rarely fits every young person.
- 1 minute 55 seconds, captioned Schools need openly neurodivergent teachers students can look up to, Sydney panel said Sandra Thom-Jones Panellists at the 2024 Sydney education session argued for visible neurodivergent staff and autistic experts in schools, and described three local examples of schools starting to make that change.
- 2 minutes 6 seconds, captioned Letting autistic students leave an overwhelming room would cost schools nothing, panel heard Marion Rabuka, Sandra Thom-Jones At the 2024 Sydney education panel, Marion Rabuka named the sensory barriers in classrooms and Sandra Thom-Jones argued the cheapest fix was giving students the autonomy to walk out.