(note: It’s my day at Hopeful Parents, but I’m also publishing the post here too. This was something I want to keep here with me for a long time, to refer back to when I need to. So you can read the post here or below.)
What if someone came to you and said the following things:
Why do we view “disability as a deficit model”? Meaning, why do we look at what people with learning differences are lacking or without? Why do we try to remediate those “deficits”?
Why are special education graduate programs geared towards teaching “behavior modification” in the classroom? Why aren’t schools interested in understanding why kids think and behave the way they do but instead focused on fixing the “deficits” to fit in?
Why do we look at celebrities who have disabilities as achieving IN SPITE of their disability, rather than BECAUSE of it?
Why do some “first responders” like teachers and doctors view disorders like autism as the end of the world for our kids?
Why do we believe that people can not achieve because they have a label?
One twenty-eight minute video. And all these questions were asked.
I watched Garret Westlake, CEO of Stem Force Technology, talk, and my heart grew. I had hope for the future. Not just for my kids on the spectrum, but for any kid who has been labeled with a “disorder” or “disability”. In his talk “Disability as a Catalyst”, he lays out all these questions.
Garret flipped the world on its head for me.
We’re told as parents that our kids’ disabilities will hold them back.
But what if it’s the very thing that moves them forward?
What if colleges looked at a student’s individual strengths and what they could contribute to their campus community, rather than rejecting them based on a composite test score? What if employers did the same?
What if special education teachers were trained to understand the science behind our kids’ brains? What if they knew how to find that spark that makes them special and bring it out?
What if our kids were made to feel proud of their learning differences? What if someone told them that their Asperger’s was a strength, not a weakness?
What if the very thing that makes our kids “different” is what makes them more marketable? More in demand? More incredible?
What if we as parents knew that from the start?
Watch the video. As my friend Jess said over at a diary of a mom, people like Garret are “…creating a path to full participation, brazenly removing the barriers to success for people with autism – and doing it by standing the entire paradigm on its head. This is how it begins.”
This is how it begins. I am a hopeful parent again.
For these guys:
For more on what companies like Stem Force Technology are doing, click HERE. For information on their Asperger’s Leadership Conference, click HERE.
And watch the whole video here:
“Do you know who I am
Do I know who you are
See we one another clearly
Do we know who we are
We are of the spirit
Truly of the spirit
Only can the spirit
Turn the world around” – Turn the World Around by Harry Belafonte
January 17, 2012 at 10:22 am
I love this post. That video is amazing (saw it when DOAM posted it). I am hopeful that my boys will achieve great things…and I am sure it will be because they think differently than others.
Ironic, isn’t it, that we are always told to “think outside the box”, and yet, the people who naturally DO think outside of the box are so often forced back into one….
January 17, 2012 at 11:18 am
This is so timely. I had a really bad meeting with Danny’s teachers about 2 weeks ago and all they focused on was his weaknesses. I left feeling bereft and crying. It wasn’t until I calmed down that I got angry. They didn’t look at his strengths at all and if they don’t do that, then how can they really know my kid, and how can they help him? I have some work to do in educating this group of teachers and in teaching them and me to think about this differently. I don’t know if that makes sense, but it’s all a little garbled in my head. I can’t wait to watch this video.
January 17, 2012 at 12:51 pm
thank you sharing this, alysia! for years I’ve been thinking that we exert so much time, energy and often money to modify behaviors or have our kiddies see the world in a different way… a more “typical” way. all the while, I want to shout to the world, “look at this child… look at his (or her) mind and the way they see the world… so detailed, so focused, so pure and authentic… why do they need to change the way they think or do things? they were put on this earth, in our lives (thankfully!) just the way they are for a reason… for many reasons, actually” …well, thank you. xo
January 17, 2012 at 2:22 pm
what a fantastic post
Fantastic you !!
January 18, 2012 at 4:27 am
Wonderful stuff Alysia, thanks for another lovely, thoughtful post. Can’t wait until i have time to watch the whole video!