According to one survey 72% of teachers want children with 'special needs' to be educated in special schools. Most teachers have no difficulty with the 'inclusion' of children with physical challenges so the survey is more indicative of attitudes towards children who have behavioural problems. This is unsurprising ; 1 in 3 UK teachers will themselves suffer job-related mental health problems sometime in their career. What is more natural than seeking to protect oneself in a job that can be hugely stressful

Children with AS can be some of the most demanding children any teacher will encounter. Whilst challenging behaviour is not a core characteristic of AS it is often a by-product of their experience in secondary school. Our children are often therefore seen as a problem.

Our children have huge potential. But that isn't easy for their Geography teacher to appreciate on a wet Thursday afternoon in November in a classroom where s/he has 29 other children to manage and teach . Especially when what has come to matter most is getting as many of the thirty as possible to level 4 functioning in Geography. Target driven classrooms and target driven schools are anathema to the type of holistic and inclusive mindset that young people with atypical neurology would most benefit from.

"Schools have been reduced to almost factories for producing test and exam scores. But scores are not the product of education... schools are there to benefit the children in them." 

Professor Alan Smithers , Buckingham University

This undue emphasis on testing and accountability in Schools has developed at the same time as more and more children with additional needs were being 'included'. The rising stress levels engendered have not produced an environment which is good for our children - or anybody else's children.

But this environment is not one designed by teachers so it would be wrong to point the finger at them if our children find things difficult. Mainstream teachers didn't ask for all the testing/targets and they didn't ask for what passes for 'inclusion'.

Real inclusion is where the institution moulds itself around the needs of the individual. But this level of flexibility cannot pertain if the institution is already hidebound by external pressures to focus on a rigid agenda.

Inclusion as defined above is a laudable objective but it cannot really happen whilst the target driven agenda holds sway. The pressures on a target driven school and within its classrooms can  make the arrival of an autistic child feel more like intrusion than inclusion.

Even without a testing/target regime some teachers would prefer not to have a child with AS in their classroom. (Who else would will a harder job upon themselves). But it would be easier and there would be room for more flexibility and therefore less stress for both teacher and taught.   

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