Am I Included?

We've now had 16 years of mainstream education

for children with disabilities in Scotland,

after decades of struggle for a more equal society.

Where at all possible, it's now presumed

a child with a disability will go to a mainstream school.

The ethos of Scottish education is an inclusive ethos.

It's about making sure that every child is able to be involved

in the life and the work of the school,

and the educational experience.

But are their needs really being met?

I was constantly running out of classes.

There was just lots of little problems

that were happening all the time.

It's just that I like being classed as normal.

I'm encouraged to do most of the work myself,

which is good.

The opportunity for me to talk to other pupils

using my communication device doesn't happen very often.

Sometimes it can get quite lonely.

One in five children in Scotland

is identified as having an additional support need.

Does mainstreaming mean real inclusion,

or are we letting them drift to the back of the class?

I'm Ian Hamilton,

and I've come to the Royal National College for the Blind

in Hereford, where I was a student.

-Ian.

-Lucy.

Good morning, welcome back to RNC.

-It's a long time since I've been here.

-I bet it is, yes.

So how long's it been now?

I was here in the early '80s,

just to make myself seem really old.

I'm sure it's changed quite a lot since then.

It's changed enormously since then, yeah.

It's going to be quite interesting showing you around, in that case.

-I'll tell you some tales!

-I bet you will!

Where do you want me to go?

-Shall I take your left arm, is that OK?

-Yeah, that's absolutely perfect.

-Thank you.

-OK, and I'll take you into Gardner Hall to start with.

-Oh, Gardner Hall, OK.

-This is the main entrance to the college.

Back in the '80s, when I was here, I had a little bit of sight.

I'm now completely blind.

The layout has changed a bit since my student days.

That was the girls' hostel, down there.

-I was never in there, of course.

-Of course, of course!

I can believe that.

Where are we now, then, Lucy?

Just coming up to what's now the main building,

so this wasn't here at all in your time.

I don't know if there's many students here any more.

No, we're down to 85 students now, at the moment.

-Oh, there were over 300 when I was here.

-Yeah, huge change.

It's down to the funding, essentially.

There's still demand to come here,

but people can't get the funding to get their places.

So, is it expensive to come here?

It can look it, on the face of it,

but not when you really take into account

the full cost of the education.

So, here, the students get absolutely everything,

it's 24/7, it's full terms,

residential provision, round-the-clock support.

And they're teaching off-timetable, as well,

so on the weekends, on the evenings,

there's lots of activities for people to get involved in.

We don't use learning support assistants in the classrooms,

so our students learn independently,

cos our approach is you've got to be ready for work,

you've got to be ready for higher education, and you can't do that

if you're used to having somebody sit next to you in the classroom

who's between you and what's going on.

So that's a philosophy of the organisation, being independent?

-Yeah.

-You're training people to be the best blind person they can be,

-a professional blind person, if you like.

-Yeah, absolutely.

Many things have changed since my days,

but the ethos remains the same.

The college is not just about academic goals.

It's about acquiring skills for independent living and working,

and the college is ambitious for its students.

They have to find their way around their local community,

they have to have the social confidence

and resilience to self-advocate,

and they have to, you know, the difficulty we find

with some of our students who come from mainstream

is they've been overly supported within mainstream.

The focus has been on academic achievement,

and it's not been on about developing them as a person.

I was with a student yesterday who, before he came to RNC,

didn't switch on a computer himself,

a teaching assistant did that for him and did the work for him.

Now, I think it's shameful that he's been through an education system

that hasn't thought about how to make sure

that he is independently learning,

that he is able to do these things for himself,

cos in the workplace, he's going to have to do that.

We're working on that now, and we'll put that right for him,

and he will be fully independent by the time he finishes at RNC.

So, today we are going to have a look

-at the little route to the stairs.

-Yeah.

-OK.

Thomas is in his first term at the RNC.

He came from a mainstream school,

where he was the only pupil with a visual impairment.

He's studying for three A-levels.

But one of the first things he's learning

is how to get about the campus by himself.

OK, and tuck in right over to the right wall for me.

Yeah. That's the rail up the stairs?

It is, yeah.

Just keep yourself tucked in for me,

because if anybody else is coming down those stairs,

we need them to have the room, as well.

-OK.

-Do you want to try going up the stairs?

Yes, OK.

So, what kind of skills are you getting here, Thomas,

that maybe you struggled to get elsewhere?

Independent living skills...

..mobility,

help to be able to travel around independently

and live independently.

So, just keep walking forward for me.

Do you think, you know, having other impaired people at this college,

what's that been like?

Has that been important to you, that peer group?

It's important, because we're all going through the same thing.

Because at school, I had so much support that I was kind of...

really didn't have that many close friends.

If your entire mainstream experience is beside an adult

who is with you through all your timetable activities,

you're not going to have the opportunities

to socialise with people around you that your peers have.

If, at the end of the day,

you're escorted from the school back to your family,

that social network isn't there for you,

so often, the young person will spend a lot,

too much time on their own.

Especially at the age... from 15, 16 upwards,

their social group diminishes, and they're often left isolated.

So you talk about taking people from their community,

we're all about making sure

people are fully engaged with their community.

So everything we do, everything we provide for our students

and our transitions team, and through sport, is about making sure

they participate fully in their community.

At a mainstream school,

it can be difficult to be included in sport if you have a disability.

These facilities can be a big draw for students.

I remember when I was at school, Lucy,

I had the worst sight, so I always thought I wasn't very good

because I couldn't see.

It was only when I came here I realised, actually,

I'm just not very good and my sight had nothing to do with it!

Many education providers tend to risk assess people

out of sporting activities,

whereas our ethos is about risk assessing people in,

making sure they participate fully in all parts of the programme.

So, this'll be the first time a lot of them will get a chance to play football.

Oops! I've got it. I should have flicked it into there,

would've been a great shot!

See, this is what happens if you don't eat your greens!

A former student,

too much drink, this is what happens to you!

We're going to be going into our complementary therapy classroom.

This is a hugely popular course for the younger students,

but also for the adult trainees going into employment.

One of the things people don't realise about a course like this

is there's a lot of business admin that goes into it as well,

you've got to have really good computer skills to do complementary therapy

cos you've got to be able to understand a huge range of things,

from the human body through to how you're going to keep your books,

how you're going to run your business.

-And the social, those soft skills as well.

-Yeah, absolutely.

Customer service, client care, absolutely critical.

Oh, right.

When I was at primary school,

I was the only person with poor sight there.

When I was at the school for mixed disabilities, again,

I was the person with the worst sight there,

so to come here and find a community

that was geared just to visual impairment

was really important to me.

And for the first time ever, I had a peer group,

a peer group that I could understand and they could understand me.

I think that special schools do a great job, but arguably,

they isolate disabled people from the rest of society.

If we want our world to be truly inclusive,

surely all being at the same school is fundamental.

If you put people in special schools,

are you not just hiding them away?

Out of sight, out of mind.

Up until 1974, here in Scotland,

children with a disability had no legal right to an education,

although most deaf or blind children did attend a special school.

In the 1970s, campaigning started in earnest.

Disabled people wanted the right to a full life.

David Barnett has a severe physical handicap,

which hides an active and enquiring mind.

Here at the New Trinity Centre in Edinburgh,

he works in a sheltered workshop,

where he's able to talk to his workmates and instructors

with the aid of a head pointer, a board of symbols,

and a bit of imagination from his friends.

Through the '80s and '90s,

the disability movement started to get a bit of traction.

They wanted to see change,

and one of the big changes they wanted to see was in education.

They believed that the quality of education

for people with disabilities was poor,

and it was limiting opportunities.

In 1995,

it became illegal to discriminate against someone with a disability.

And in the year 2000,

the presumption to mainstream education for disabled people

became law in Scotland.

The thinking was, it would give better academic opportunities

for children with additional support needs,

as well as removing the stigma of a special education.

Simply, what a right-thinking society should be doing.

The ethos of Scottish education is an inclusive ethos.

It's about making sure that every child

is able to be involved in the life and the work of the school

and the educational experience, and that they're fulfilled

as a consequence of that interaction.

And that's got to be delivered

for absolutely every single child in Scotland.

Right, let's get you up to English.

Ella is in her first term at a busy Glasgow mainstream secondary school.

She needs daily medical support, but is clearly thriving.

My first year has been really amazing.

I've had a good transition from primary to secondary.

And what about the other students, what are they like?

Some of the other students are very nice.

And I...

I get on really well with quite a lot of the students.

Have you got new friends here, though?

-Yes.

-Right.

-Quite a lot of new friends, actually.

-Have you?

In comparison to what I had in primary.

It's very busy here, though, isn't it?

Yeah, it's...

It's relatively busy here.

How do you cope with that?

I think it's OK.

The rush, sometimes there's, like, a big rush.

Like, children in a big rush, effectively.

So, what classes can't you do?

I can pretty much do all the classes.

What about PE?

Not so much PE, but I do the music in PE sometimes.

-You have somebody to give you a wee hand, don't you?

-Yes.

What's it like having them with you all the time,

or don't you have them all the time?

Not in all periods.

I'm encouraged to do...

..most of the work myself.

Right.

Which is good.

Would you like to go to a special school, or are you quite happy here?

I'm quite happy here, actually.

Ella has an assistant,

but is encouraged to be as independent as possible.

But not everyone is having such a positive experience.

The Duggans live in Elgin.

They have three children with additional support needs.

Caitlin is ten, and has cerebral palsy.

Her brothers, Ali, who's seven, and Jake, who's three,

have behavioural problems linked to autism.

Caitlin is doing well in mainstream, but it's not working for Ali.

I do think there's kids that need more than mainstream.

In what way?

Needs-wise, sometimes they just can't cater

for kids with extra needs.

There's not enough support, there's not enough time, funding.

Some kids can't cope with classroom noise level.

And I think a more specialty school would be a better option.

There is some kids that do need

just one-to-one support to be able to learn,

if they're not able to learn as part of a group for whatever reason,

and in mainstream school, it's just not possible

to have that all the time.

And I would hope, certainly,

that a special school would be able to offer that.

As is common in small, rural local authority areas,

there are no special schools in Moray.

Ali is often excluded, or on a restricted timetable.

We're very concerned about how much he's missed.

I mean, the amount of time that he was excluded from school last year.

And just put in the base

with kind of no education input from a teacher, as well.

It's just...it's not good. And, I mean...

I...I think that the only thing that you can genuinely say

he learned at school last year was how to make a cheesecake,

which is great for me cos I like cheesecake,

but it's not so great for him later on down the line,

when he's trying to get a job or whatever,

if he's struggling with basic reading and writing.

Do you find, does he get excluded?

He used to get excluded quite a lot.

He would flip bookshelves, tables,

and just cause disturbances in the class.

He'd hit his teacher, or his helper.

-Very threatening, as well.

-Yeah.

Threatened to stab people with his pencil, and things like that.

-That must be upsetting for other children, though?

-Yes.

It's led to his class being evacuated a few times.

How do other parents react to you, or him?

Not well.

No. He's the bad child, basically.

He was desperate that a friend of his would come to play,

and he came running up to him in the playground,

and the mum was very dismissive of him.

She seemed just not to want her child

to associate with the disruptive one.

Which I guess I can understand on the one hand,

-but for a wee boy...

-It's hard, isn't it?

It's very hard, cos he just wants to play with his pals.

What fears do you have for the future, in terms of education?

I just want him to have a normal education.

A normal life, to feel included.

Cos they know when they're not included,

and it hurts deeply, doesn't it? Especially Ali.

Yeah. I'm trying to explain to...to a seven-year-old

why all the other kids in his class are getting to do something

and he's not. Or...

Why other kids go round to other kids' houses to play,

and he never gets invited.

Trying to explain that to a young child, it's just impossible.

There's no way of doing that.

With autism twice as prevalent as it was even ten years ago,

Ali is an example of

how mainstreaming can be problematic for all involved.

There are organisations that support these families

who cannot cope with mainstream.

And one of these is Kindred, run by Sophie Pilgrim.

Our organisation works with...

This year, we'll probably work with 1,000 families,

and we see that there are children who just...

You know, they can't... They're not going to manage in mainstream,

so children with very challenging behaviour,

who might be a risk to themselves or other children.

Children with very high-level anxiety...

..or children with very high-level medical needs,

there's small numbers of children who can't be educated in mainstream,

as mainstream is at present.

A report by the Children's Hospice Association

shows that recent advances in medicine mean

that more premature babies are surviving.

This survival often means multiple disabilities for these children.

Between 2010 and 2014,

their numbers in Scotland rose from 12,000 to 15,000.

To have thousands more children with complex needs

for local authorities to cope with,

each child has a very, very significant package of care,

so educating a child with very complex needs

is a huge cost to local authorities.

And those children will be...

They have to be educated in specialist provision,

with a very high level of medical support.

So I do think there's a pattern

where you've got more and more complex children in special schools,

and the children who maybe had challenging behaviour,

who might have previously got specialist support

are moving more into mainstream.

For these children who can't cope in mainstream,

one alternative is The New School at Butterstone in Perthshire.

The school caters for children with a range of additional support needs

and many are on the autistic spectrum.

Duncan recently moved to the school from his mainstream secondary.

I was constantly running out of classes.

There was just lots of little problems

that were happening all the time.

So what happens here that's different, then,

that does meet your needs?

The teachers are a lot more understanding.

There's a lot more staff as well.

As well as...

I'm doing the subjects that I'd like to do.

Like what?

Science, and I'm doing outdoor work,

which involves just all sorts of different things outside,

like cutting grass, planting plants, pruning trees.

You said to me earlier on, at your old school,

you used to get frustrated, and get angry.

Does that happen as much here as it did before?

Most definitely not.

Dramatically different. Dramatically, much different.

And why is that?

It's just, it's a lot more calmer here,

and everybody's a lot nicer and a lot more calm.

This school does not come cheap.

The student places are funded,

either by the local authority or their parents.

But the head teacher, Chris Holmes,

believes that this kind of education is essential

to stop children falling through the cracks.

It is not possible for a mainstream school to cater for everybody.

Where somebody can be in mainstream and succeed,

then that's great.

But it's not just enough

for children to be in mainstream and not succeed.

We need to have the success,

they need to have the success to be able to move forward,

so that's why schools like The New School

and some of our colleague schools are necessary.

It can be difficult for an autistic child to learn

in the hustle and bustle of mainstream.

But with modern accessible buildings,

and additional support staff,

many physical disabilities are no longer a barrier.

Bobath is a support and therapy centre

for children and teenagers with cerebral palsy.

Most of these students are attending a mainstream school,

but that doesn't always mean they feel fully included.

I need to have a pupil support worker with me,

and I don't like that at all.

They've basically taken away half my independence,

with this pupil support worker,

because they've got to go everywhere with me now.

I'm not allowed to do anything,

I'm not allowed to walk down the stairs

because it's health and safety risks.

I'm not allowed to use the lift myself,

I've got to have somebody in the lift with myself.

So I've got to wait for somebody to come in to get me from class

and take me down the lift to my other class,

and sometimes it's resulted in me being

10, 15 minutes late to my other class.

So I've missed out on that 10, 15 minutes of work.

I attend a mainstream school.

The school has been really supportive of me,

and have included me as much as possible.

They have gone out of their way to accommodate for my needs,

as much as they can.

Sometimes, this is not always possible,

as the school has hundreds of other pupils,

and at the moment, I'm the only one with a physical disability.

However, the social aspect of school is not great for me.

The opportunity for me to talk to other pupils

using my communication device doesn't happen very often,

so it is hard for me to form friendships.

Sometimes, it can get quite lonely.

Today, this group of teenagers are meeting up

to talk about their plans for when they leave school.

How important is it for you to meet up with your peer group?

Yeah. Cos...

Yes, I like to do it, cos... Not every day, you get to see people

that's got the same difficulties as you.

We can teach each other how to do stuff.

Do you ever feel you maybe wish you'd gone to a special school?

No, not at all.

-Why?

-Because I like my school.

I like being classed as normal,

whereas if you go to a special education school,

they'd class you as... Oh, aye, you have this special disability,

and you need 24-hour care or whatever. Whereas I don't need that,

I'm perfectly capable to do whatever I want myself.

What plans do you have, Gavin, for when you leave school?

I plan to go to university.

I'm interested in doing sports science or sports management.

Also, I participate in a disability sport called RaceRunning,

and I would like to see how far it takes me.

Some of these films are great, aren't they?

Have you ever seen Happy Feet?

The language of inclusion and exclusion around that is incredible,

isn't it, how they've got the language?

They've got it right off, right in the heart of it.

Cos he hasn't got the song, has he?

He can't do the singing, but he can dance.

he's got a whole other kind of gift going on.

This is a workshop designed to help children with additional support needs

to be better included into a mainstream school.

So this is the stuff we want to be feeding our children,

alongside the reality stuff.

Colin Newton, who describes himself

as a recovering educational psychologist,

believes it is always possible to create a supportive environment.

I would say,

no matter what the label is,

what the condition is, what the difficulty is,

we should start with inclusion. The right to be present,

to participate, to contribute, that's where it begins,

whatever the child or young person's difficulties might be.

And then we just get creative, we build the team,

we do the problem-solving, we get the resources,

the right resources in place for that person,

and then we figure it out.

And I've seen some of the most profound difficulties

being included very successfully.

But what is the reality of teaching a class

where there's a variety of children with additional support needs?

I think at this point in time, there are real issues

with the resourcing of additional support needs.

It's not that teachers and schools don't want inclusion to work.

What I hear in my current job

is that teachers really do want to be inclusive,

they want to have a comprehensive system

that supports every youngster.

But what they're finding at the moment is

there aren't just the resources to do so.

Whether it is bodies on the ground,

whether it's appropriate training for staff,

it makes it more difficult

to make the Additional Support Needs Act work in that way.

When one in five children in Scotland have additional support needs,

it's extraordinary that the teaching qualification

does not include any formal training in this area.

I do think that there is a problem with the level of teacher expertise

in additional support needs in Scotland.

I think sometimes, people thought that if you had inclusion,

it would work automatically, just having children with their peers.

But you do need to have specialist staff,

as well as generic teaching staff.

It sounds to me like we're sitting on a time bomb here, aren't we?

Well, I do think that we are going to have to have a reassessment

of how inclusive schools are staffed,

and how children with additional support needs are supported.

Because just simply identifying a child

as having additional support needs

doesn't automatically mean that that child is going to get

the support they need to flourish in schools.

Mainstreaming sounds like a great idea,

but if it's failing some children,

is it nothing more than a social experiment?

Philosophically, I remain absolutely committed to mainstreaming,

but I also remain committed to making sure

that we get it right for every child.

And mainstreaming will not work for every single child in our system,

and we have to make sure the needs of every child are met

by our education system.

And that's the principle to which I'm committed.

Is it time, then, to review this presumption to mainstream?

We gave a commitment to review the guidance around mainstreaming

within the education system, and we're going to do that,

and we'll do that with a wide consultation involving stakeholders

to make sure we have a proper sense of the needs of young people

at this stage after the passage of time that has gone on

since the establishment of the mainstreaming principle.

And to make sure we have in place the proper and full and appropriate

arrangements that will meet the needs of those young people.

So that review will be undertaken,

it'll be undertaken in an open and participative way

to make sure the government hears

exactly the experience of young people and their families,

and that we can act accordingly to address those issues.

I and other disabled people fought hard to get to where we are now.

We wanted a better education, more opportunities,

and to be included in mainstream society.

One of the ideas behind mainstreaming children with disabilities

was to try and improve their prospects.

In the year 2000, the employment rate for disabled people was 40%.

Today, it's 41%.

It's only one measurement,

but it makes me question how much society has changed

over the last 16 years, since mainstreaming was introduced.

In my view, a child's education

cannot be based on a philosophical dogma.

It's too important.