Gordon Porter says constant attacks on school inclusion not helpful

The man who did the last review of inclusive education in New Brunswick says it is not helpful to constantly raise questions about the underlying principles of inclusive schools.

"What is helpful is to say 'How can we do it better? How can we cooperate to do it better?'" said Gordon Porter.

"If we are going to deliver quality education all over this province then we have to have a flexible system that can do it effectively and I think we basically have that system."

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But Porter, the director of Inclusive Education Canada who reviewed inclusion in New Brunswick in 2011, agrees the system needs some fine tuning.

In recent weeks, the New Brunswick Teachers' Association has demanded the government review how inclusion is carried out in the province's schools.

The association says it has nothing against the idea of including students with disabilities and behavioural issues in the regular classroom, but it worries about how inclusion is delivered and how it affects teachers and students.

Province has come a long way

Porter said when the policy was brought in 30 years ago there was nothing in place for students with special needs, or anything outside of the mainstream.

While inclusion is not always easy, he said New Brunswick has done a good job during the last three decades.

"Kids in New Brunswick do go to their local schools and they're included and it's not easy, it takes work," he said.

"It takes focused approaches; it takes committed people; it takes trained people and it takes sensible ways to support teachers and students,"

Porter said it is unfortunate that the education system is sometimes becomes adversarial instead of cooperative.

He points out the teachers union is just beginning negotiations on a new contract.

"It's not coincidental," said Porter. 

"It's not unexpected that the issues of inclusion, class size, various other questions arise in a more focused way when contract negotiations arise."

NBTA president Guy Arseneault  recently said a review of inclusion is not motivated by current contract negotiations.

Allocation of school resources question by some

Porter said when some people say there's a need to do a complete review of our inclusion policy it implies there is a question about having an inclusion policy at all.

But he said that's not consistent with the law in Canada or the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

The question, said Porter, should be 'How do we support schools to make inclusion work effectively?'"

Some people, while supporting the idea of inclusion in principle, say they take issue with the way it's implemented when it comes to the allocation of resources.

"Any service system can always say they can use more people to do a better job," said Porter.

But he said the reality is there are restraints to resources, so the first step is to make sure current resources are used effectively.

"And that's not really something we can be sure of if we don't really focus on it, and we don't hear much discussion about that," Porter said.

He said in some cases, things like union seniority means people with the right training and experience are not the ones who are working with the students who have the needs.

Review of policies and practices ongoing 

Porter said the way services are delivered is constantly being reviewed by schools and educators on a regular basis. He sees positive things happening in an integrated service delivery model that began under the Alward government in parts of the provinces and expects the current government to expand it.

"This is a tremendous improvement because this brings together services of mental health, social services, education to deal with those most pressing problems," said Porter

He said when you dig deep into the issue of inclusion, the most serious concerns are about the behaviour problems of a few children who are very difficult to deal with.

"Thirty years ago we dealt with them quite simply, we simply had them out of our schools. And that's not the approach in 2016," he said.