<p>What are your thoughts on sending special needs children that CAN NOT be served locally to Special Needs boarding schools?</p>
<p>What age group are you talking about? It is my VERY strong opinion that special needs students should be educated as close to home as possible. They need that connection to their family and community and may actually need it more than typically developing peers. These students are the ones most likely to live in their home communities when they are done with school. They need to become part of the fabric of their home community…not some place that is far away. </p>
<p>I would say that you need to think about the reasons for sending the child to boarding school. Yes, this is what some kids NEED. But your local school district really should be able to provide an educational program that will meet your child’s needs…or find one that is reasonably close to your home so that your child doesn’t lose their family too.</p>
<p>This is a college board…you might find better and more comprehensive information by finding a board that deals with special needs students. There are plenty of them on the web.</p>
<p>Well, I think you’re answering your own question somewhat–if they absolutely can not be served by their home communities, then the only option left would be to look outside the home community. I don’t think it’s desirable, but I could understand that in very rural areas it might be extremely difficult to be prepared to serve a lot of really diverse needs. </p>
<p>That said, I think that Deaf children are a big exception to that rule. Because Deaf children will not initially have access to their family’s language and culture, they need other Deaf children and Deaf adult role models so that they can learn sign language and not have their cognitive and linguistic development impaired. For many children this can be accomplished with a magnet program or Deaf day school, but in rural areas it might be much harder.</p>
<p>When I was four years old, I began attending the school. The local public school, lacked the facilities for me to attend there school, they did not have the adaptive technology that I needed to succeed in the classroom, an aide or a vision teacher, so my parents enrolled me in the blind school. The school considered me a residential student, during the week I stayed at school. A bus would take me to school on Sunday and not bring me home until Friday. My dormitory had eight other girls. Weekends, Christmas, spring, and summer vacations, were the only times I went home. The school was like my home away from home, the people in my dorm were like my family. On the weekends I had a nice visit with my family. Summer vacation was like a breathe of fresh air, three whole months with my family at home. The only time I remember going home during the week is when I was seven years old. My dad was taking classes, he would pick me up after school, take me home over night, bring me back early the next morning. Being able to go home during the week to see my family was like a rainbow. It only lasted a few weeks before it had to end, I was so tired at school that I started falling a sleep in class. </p>
<p>My school was a five day boarding school, where the whole school closed on the weekends and everyone went home. My family lived an hour and a half from the school. My best friends Jessica and Lisa, lived at the other end of the state, had to ride the bus for five hours twice a week, just to attend school.</p>