Restraint and Seclusion, Opposing Viewpoints

The Department of Education recently released the new Civil Rights Data Collection that analyzed equities and disparities in educational opportunities in our nation’s schools during the 2009-2010 school year.  Data were gathered from 72,000 schools, or roughly 85% of students.  Among the data examined was the frequency with which students were secluded or restrained.  Almost 70% of the 38,792 students who were restrained during the past calendar year had disabilities, although students with disabilities comprise only about 12% of the student population.  African-American males, who make up only 21% of the student population with disabilities, represented 44% of those students restrained.  And finally, although approximately half of students with disabilities are male, 70% of students with disabilities who were restrained were male.  According to TASH and other disability groups, the data are sobering.  TASH characterizes the use of restraint and seclusion as an issue of “national significance,” which leads to “traumatic physical and emotional harm, and even death.”  In a press release, Barb Trader, the executive director of TASH, states, “Our students need equitable access to education and protection for their personal safety under the law, and clearly that’s not happening for students with disabilities or those from diverse backgrounds.  It is a national tragedy that any child, especially the most vulnerable, is not safe in school.”  

On the same day the Civil Rights Data Collection report was issued, the National Disability Rights Network chastised the Education Department for its failure to do more to restrict the use of seclusion and restraint in schools.  According to Curt Decker, executive director of the NDRN, the Department of Education has failed to provide “any meaningful leadership to reduce the use of restraint and seclusion—despite the fact that students are continuing to be confined, tied up, pinned down, battered and nearly killed on a regular basis.”  As discussed in a January 18, 2012 blog on this site, it was the NDRN which in a January 2009 report (School is Not Supposed to Hurt) shined a painful light on the use of seclusion and restraint, which are often unregulated and used disproportionately on children with disabilities, frequently resulting in injury, trauma, and even death.  As a result of this report, a subsequent study undertaken by the Government Accountability Office in 2009 revealed that an estimated 200 students had died in the previous five years as the result of inappropriate use of restraint.  The GAO report led to pending federal legislation designed to eliminate or restrict the use of seclusion and restraint in public schools. 

Conversely, the American Association of School Administrators (AASA) has also just released a report this month titled “Keeping Schools Safe:  How Seclusion and Restraint Protects Students and School Personnel.” The AASA argues that 99% of school personnel use “seclusion and restraint safely, responsibly, and only when circumstances truly demand their application.”  According to the AASA, seclusion and restraint techniques actually enable students to remain in school and keep them out of institutions.  The report derides legislative efforts to prohibit their use in schools. 

TASH blasts the AASA report which it says ignores the growing evidence that seclusion and restraint are dangerous and traumatic techniques to use for everyone involved.  TASH is disturbed that the AASA report focuses on the safety of school staff and ignores the high trauma rate, injuries, and even deaths of students who are restrained.  Although the AASA claims that these techniques are used only in emergency situations, TASH argues that they are in fact used for convenience and punishment. 

Both TASH and the NDRN say that the Department of Education needs to do more to highlight and end the use of seclusion and restraint in schools.  The NDRN urges the Department of Education not only to offer clear instruction on when these practices violate the Americans with Disabilities Act, Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act, or IDEA, but also guidance on limiting the use of restraint and seclusion.  In addition, the NDRN wants the Department of Education to use its own data to analyze why some school districts use restraint and seclusion more than others, what is leading to the high usage in these districts, and fund research and projects to reduce and ultimately prevent the use of any forms of restraint and seclusion in schools.  Ultimately, both the NDRN and TASH, as well as other disability groups, argue that the data recently released by the Department of Education provide further justification for passing the bills currently waiting in both the Senate and House that preclude the use of seclusion and restraint in schools. Moreover, from a personal perspective, I have seen too many students suffer emotional and physical harm from restraint from seclusion. Many incidents of students being suspended or expelled for "hitting staff" have been in connection with the use or attempted use of restraint or to put a student into seclusion.

 

Comments

[Sandy Alperstein]

Terrific piece, Charlie! We at Our Children Left Behind (parent volunteer website) are focusing on this issue and working to get the bills moving again in Congress. I would urge all concerned people to call, fax, and email their federal legislators, write letters to the editors of their local newspapers, and reach out to spread the word to friends, neighbors and beyond! To get involved (as much or as little as your schedule allows), please check out www.OurChildrenLeftBehind.com, reading this blog, and finding out as much as you can about this critical issue facing our families!

[Heather]

My personal opinion...when done SAFELY and CORRECTLY, restraints can be and should be the last step used in keeping all parties safe. However, there is NO PLACE for seclusion in our schools. The seclusion room (the special needs, public school my son was in called in "the quiet area") resembles a seclusion room in an old prison and through negligence they broke three of his bones and the open would required emergency surgery. This on a 10-year-old, approx 80 lb boy. Parents can't get stats on R and S in Virginia's regional, public, SN schools either. This is an archaic and lazy way to "control" our children

[EB]

We must be all in favor of policy changes that limit the use of restraints and seclusions, and that give extra scrutiny to districts whose usage of these techniques is high. BUT, the reality is that, properly used, these are last resorts to keep students safe. If you ban them there will be far more 1) referrals to specialty schools and 2) calls to the police. Is that really what we want?

[Teri-Lynn]

I am the exception it seems.I am pushing the school to physically intervene and use physical prompting to guide my daughter to a cool down area / safe space and IF needed then briefly and safely restrain until she can regain a sense of self control. My daughter does not have autism nor is autistic. However she does have a emotional regulation disorder and is very hard to read as choice defiance and learned escape from uncomfortable environments. She is squeezing through locked gates and danglingdangoureously from tall fences.panics and tries to head for home... Now because of how the school lacks in taking charge and learning what her needs really are we now have to deal with the police and CPS through the school and my daughter fears being removed from our home. What about her safety? Where is the restraint for the child's safety? Fight or flight is and uncontrolled response made by a person lacking the ability to be in control.The risk for a horrible accident is preventable with proper training and a timely response.

[renee]

"The GAO report led to pending federal legislation designed to eliminate or restrict the use of seclusion and restraint in public schools. "

I eagerly await the elimination of the use of seclusion and restraint in ALL schools. Let's get real: The problem with the situation is that untrained individuals are often brought into the situation. At the moment, people think they are doing something right. When your principal/education director asks the front office person or maintenance person to lend a hand in restraining a child, they are doing it because that person their boss. They are not thinking about the student or the reasons, but doing what their boss has asked of them. First off the principal/Special Educator director should be trained in very specific method of restraint, as should anyone who ever lends a hand on a child. Further more, in the situation I was in, the student was simply trying to hide. He was not in danger of hurting himself or anyone else. He needed to be given space and watched from a distance until his parents could be contacted or he calmed down. The restraint (if you want to call it that) was used for behavior correction and punishment. The education director was a large woman, weighing at least 5 times the weight of the small boy. When she needed a break, she asked two grown men to take her place. A 170 pound man should not be needed to restrain a 40-pound boy! The child was traumatized and had bruises on his arms for a few days. I don't think the parents ever knew their child had been touched. I imagine that situations like this and worse, happen every day. This is simply child abuse, plain and simple. This child will have that experience of being restrained in his mental memory, and it will now possibly be something that he does to his children, or other children. Yes, I agree there are situations when a child is out of control, but that is a time to call the parents or have a counselor or highly trained individual be available at all times. This is not the case in most schools. Again , let's get real: Let's ask ourselves what needs to happen to make sure that random and untrained individuals in subjective situations are not abusing children in schools. The training used at my current organization is Nonviolent Crisis Intervention Training Program. Regardless, there still needs to be very specific guidelines when working with Special Education students. Thank you for your consideration to this important issue.