Michelle
01-08-2007, 12:58 PM
Shocks From the System
Op-Ed Contributor
By MAIA SZALAVITZ
Published: January 7, 2007
ALTHOUGH the New York State Department of Education bans corporal
punishment, each year it uses taxpayer money to send dozens of
children with emotional or learning disabilities to schools that
use physically and mentally abusive forms of behavior
modification. These include electric shocks, seclusion and sleep
and food deprivation. Because these punishments are euphemized as
"aversive therapy," they have until recently stayed under the
department's radar.
But this summer, the New York State Board of Regents decided to
regulate the use of such measures. Thankfully, the proposed new
rules, which the Regents are scheduled to enact this week, ban
aversive treatment after 2009. Unfortunately, however, for this
school year and the two that follow, young New Yorkers who receive
a "child specific exemption" will still be subject to some of
these therapies, and those who get this treatment now could
continue to receive it after 2009.
This is a mistake. Aversive therapy for children should be banned
immediately here in New York and nationwide. Though corporal
punishment can sometimes produce compliance among unruly children,
history shows that regulators cannot prevent it from being applied
dangerously and inappropriately.
The new regulation was spurred by a $10 million lawsuit filed by a
Long Island mother last spring. Her teenage son, who has learning
disabilities, had been placed by the state in the Judge Rotenberg
Center, a private boarding school for special-education students
in Massachusetts that uses electric shocks delivered directly to
the skin to change behavior. After leaving the center, the boy was
hospitalized for post-traumatic stress disorder, which the lawsuit
alleges resulted from his treatment at the school.
In May, New York investigators made an unannounced visit to
Rotenberg, where about 150 New Yorkers are enrolled. There, they
found that shocks were being administered for such minor
infractions as "nagging" or "failing to maintain a neat
appearance." A state survey discovered that nine schools used by
the state for troubled children also use aversive therapy.
Proponents of these institutions claim that they have no
alternative. Testimonials describe Rotenberg as "life-saving." In
one instance, family members said it ended the daily self-
destructive behavior of a child who once needed brain surgery
after deliberately slamming his skull into a sharp object; in
others, parents say it stopped head-banging so severe that it had
caused near-blindness.
If aversive therapies were limited to extreme cases and backed by
strong evidence, they might make sense. But no controlled research
supports aversive therapy over positive alternatives like medical
and reward-based treatments. What's more, it's far from given that
these schools are staffed by highly trained professionals. For
instance, Rotenberg was fined late last year by the state of
Massachusetts for falsely reporting some staff qualifications.
At a cost of more than $200,000 a year per student, it arguably
makes more sense for the state to pay for live-in aides to treat
children with gentler and proven alternatives at home.
More to the point, New York faces a tremendous challenge in
policing these schools, particularly those that are out of state.
Take the Elan School in Poland, Maine, which New York uses as an
emergency placement for emotionally and learning-disabled students
and which has applied to the state for permission to use aversive
therapy.
At Elan, which was founded by a former heroin addict and a
psychiatrist in 1970, counseling involves attack therapy
"encounter groups" led by students. Three former students who
attended Elan in the last five years told me that participants
physically discipline one another and are often made to stay up
all night.
Elan is probably best known for allegedly having produced a murder
confession from Kennedy cousin Michael Skakel in the late 70s
after he was subjected to a "therapy" called the ring, in which
the victim is given boxing gloves, hemmed in by a circle of
students and pounded by fresh opponents until he or she submits.
Elan officials told Maine regulators that it stopped using "the
ring" in 2000, but Daniel Grossman, who attended Elan from 1999 to
2002, said he witnessed it after that time. Through its lawyer,
Elan said that any charges of abuse from former students are "not
accurate." A state investigation by Maine in 2002 cleared the
school. New York officials recently conducted an unannounced
inspection, but the results are not yet public.
Nonetheless, the fact that any school serving disturbed children
would consider electric shocks, beatings, isolation, restraints
and food deprivation as appropriate punishments illustrates the
inherent danger in allowing aversive tactics. Once permitted, they
tend to expand from emergency measures to everyday abuse.
According to the New York Department of Education, the state will
be able to educate troubled children by 2009 with nonaversive
measures. But since proven alternatives exist, there's no reason
to risk another minute let alone two years of abuse.
Maia Szalavitz, the author of "Help at Any Cost: How the Troubled-
Teen Industry Cons Parents and Hurts Kids," is a senior fellow at
Stats, a media watchdog group.
Source: New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/07/opinion/nyregionopinions/
07CIszalavitz.htm?_r=1&oref=slogin
__________________________________________________ ____________
For more children's news issues, see:
http://www.aapd.com/News/children/indexchild.php
# # #
DISCLAIMER: The JFA Listserv is designed to share information
of interest to people with disabilities and promote dialogue
in the disability community. Information circulated does not
necessarily express the views of AAPD. The JFA Listserv is
non-partisan.
JFA ARCHIVES: All JFA postings from 1995 to present are
available at: http://www.jfanow.org/jfanow/
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Op-Ed Contributor
By MAIA SZALAVITZ
Published: January 7, 2007
ALTHOUGH the New York State Department of Education bans corporal
punishment, each year it uses taxpayer money to send dozens of
children with emotional or learning disabilities to schools that
use physically and mentally abusive forms of behavior
modification. These include electric shocks, seclusion and sleep
and food deprivation. Because these punishments are euphemized as
"aversive therapy," they have until recently stayed under the
department's radar.
But this summer, the New York State Board of Regents decided to
regulate the use of such measures. Thankfully, the proposed new
rules, which the Regents are scheduled to enact this week, ban
aversive treatment after 2009. Unfortunately, however, for this
school year and the two that follow, young New Yorkers who receive
a "child specific exemption" will still be subject to some of
these therapies, and those who get this treatment now could
continue to receive it after 2009.
This is a mistake. Aversive therapy for children should be banned
immediately here in New York and nationwide. Though corporal
punishment can sometimes produce compliance among unruly children,
history shows that regulators cannot prevent it from being applied
dangerously and inappropriately.
The new regulation was spurred by a $10 million lawsuit filed by a
Long Island mother last spring. Her teenage son, who has learning
disabilities, had been placed by the state in the Judge Rotenberg
Center, a private boarding school for special-education students
in Massachusetts that uses electric shocks delivered directly to
the skin to change behavior. After leaving the center, the boy was
hospitalized for post-traumatic stress disorder, which the lawsuit
alleges resulted from his treatment at the school.
In May, New York investigators made an unannounced visit to
Rotenberg, where about 150 New Yorkers are enrolled. There, they
found that shocks were being administered for such minor
infractions as "nagging" or "failing to maintain a neat
appearance." A state survey discovered that nine schools used by
the state for troubled children also use aversive therapy.
Proponents of these institutions claim that they have no
alternative. Testimonials describe Rotenberg as "life-saving." In
one instance, family members said it ended the daily self-
destructive behavior of a child who once needed brain surgery
after deliberately slamming his skull into a sharp object; in
others, parents say it stopped head-banging so severe that it had
caused near-blindness.
If aversive therapies were limited to extreme cases and backed by
strong evidence, they might make sense. But no controlled research
supports aversive therapy over positive alternatives like medical
and reward-based treatments. What's more, it's far from given that
these schools are staffed by highly trained professionals. For
instance, Rotenberg was fined late last year by the state of
Massachusetts for falsely reporting some staff qualifications.
At a cost of more than $200,000 a year per student, it arguably
makes more sense for the state to pay for live-in aides to treat
children with gentler and proven alternatives at home.
More to the point, New York faces a tremendous challenge in
policing these schools, particularly those that are out of state.
Take the Elan School in Poland, Maine, which New York uses as an
emergency placement for emotionally and learning-disabled students
and which has applied to the state for permission to use aversive
therapy.
At Elan, which was founded by a former heroin addict and a
psychiatrist in 1970, counseling involves attack therapy
"encounter groups" led by students. Three former students who
attended Elan in the last five years told me that participants
physically discipline one another and are often made to stay up
all night.
Elan is probably best known for allegedly having produced a murder
confession from Kennedy cousin Michael Skakel in the late 70s
after he was subjected to a "therapy" called the ring, in which
the victim is given boxing gloves, hemmed in by a circle of
students and pounded by fresh opponents until he or she submits.
Elan officials told Maine regulators that it stopped using "the
ring" in 2000, but Daniel Grossman, who attended Elan from 1999 to
2002, said he witnessed it after that time. Through its lawyer,
Elan said that any charges of abuse from former students are "not
accurate." A state investigation by Maine in 2002 cleared the
school. New York officials recently conducted an unannounced
inspection, but the results are not yet public.
Nonetheless, the fact that any school serving disturbed children
would consider electric shocks, beatings, isolation, restraints
and food deprivation as appropriate punishments illustrates the
inherent danger in allowing aversive tactics. Once permitted, they
tend to expand from emergency measures to everyday abuse.
According to the New York Department of Education, the state will
be able to educate troubled children by 2009 with nonaversive
measures. But since proven alternatives exist, there's no reason
to risk another minute let alone two years of abuse.
Maia Szalavitz, the author of "Help at Any Cost: How the Troubled-
Teen Industry Cons Parents and Hurts Kids," is a senior fellow at
Stats, a media watchdog group.
Source: New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/07/opinion/nyregionopinions/
07CIszalavitz.htm?_r=1&oref=slogin
__________________________________________________ ____________
For more children's news issues, see:
http://www.aapd.com/News/children/indexchild.php
# # #
DISCLAIMER: The JFA Listserv is designed to share information
of interest to people with disabilities and promote dialogue
in the disability community. Information circulated does not
necessarily express the views of AAPD. The JFA Listserv is
non-partisan.
JFA ARCHIVES: All JFA postings from 1995 to present are
available at: http://www.jfanow.org/jfanow/
JOIN AAPD! There's strength in numbers! Be a part of a national
coalition of people with disabilities and join AAPD today at
http://www.aapd.com.
Justice-For-All FREE Subscriptions
To subscribe or unsubscribe,
send an email to majordomo@JFAnow.org
with subscribe justice OR unsubscribe justice
in the body of your email message.