Educational Law and Students with Disabilities - Essay Example

This has been realized by the formulation of a number of legislation that made it mandatory to offer the same educational standards and facilities in all public schools for the disabled children. These legislations gave children protection under the law that acted as a safeguard to their right of education. This paper seeks to highlight educational law and students with disabilities. The article from the New Jersey Times by Erin Duffy/The Times of Trenton highlights the plight of Trenton school district’s Life Skills program in Daylight/Twilight High School.

In the article, Duffy gives information pertaining to the situation regarding the plight of education for disabled children. She uses testimonies garnered from a member of staff at the institution who claims to have witnessed the below par educational practices with regard to the Life Skills program at the school. Of particular interest is the case of a disabled youth who is termed as problematic, which leads him to being punished by washing the hallways and washrooms during class time. Another example of student neglect is the case of a Liberian student who gets robbed nearly everyday by his classmates, and there has been no intervention from the teachers.

The situation at the institution is further aggravated by the fact that there exists no set school curriculum to cater for the immediate learning requirements of the disabled children in the institution. According to Duffy’s source who goes by the name Deborah Downing Forston, there is cheating when it comes to what the teachers are supposed to teach. This is exemplified by her statements that these students are subjected to the same repetitive learning content everyday of the week throughout the term.

Forston claims there is lack of motivation in both the teachers and students which is characterized by low expectations caused by what she termed as a complete lack of learning within the program (Duffy, 2013). Duffy highlights the plight of the disabled students and some concerned members of staff by putting her job on line when she condemns the way things are run at the school with regard to the Life Skills program. In a second article reporting on the same issue after about a week, Erin Duffy is able to learn the history of the institution with regard to education and students with disabilities.

Duffy tells of the improving situation not only in Twilight/Daylight High School, but throughout the Trenton area with similar Life Skills programs. According to Duffy, this is being done by efforts from the district’s education Superintendent Francisco Duran who is coordinating visits to schools to assess the situation and formulate policies and instruction of improving the situation. These improvements will include training special education teachers and according to Duran, to broaden and expand life skill activities by increasing the activities for students with higher levels of disabilities (Duffy, 2013).

According to Forston the whistle blower, the approval of resolutions by the school board to address this dire situation by investing more attention and funds is long overdue. This will go a long way in alleviating disabled children’s chances of making it out on their own after school. She recognizes earlier efforts by the district’s special services director Stuart Barudin, because the Life Skills p