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Treatment Abuse, Behavior Modification, Thought Reform => The Troubled Teen Industry => Topic started by: Ursus on December 20, 2009, 03:33:37 PM

Title: Preventing Harmful Restraint and Seclusion in Schools Act
Post by: Ursus on December 20, 2009, 03:33:37 PM

Mother Jones
IN THE BLOGS
New Bill to Ban Restraining Students (http://http://motherjones.com/mojo/2009/12/ed-and-labor-committee-members-introduce-bill-prevent-abuse-students-school)
— By Jessica Calefati | Thu Dec. 10, 2009 4:00 AM PST

There may be a dwindling number of issues with bipartisan support, but protecting students from abusive restraints and seclusion is one of them. Yesterday, a bipartisan group of House Education and Labor Committee members unveiled the Preventing Harmful Restraint and Seclusion in Schools Act (http://http://edlabor.house.gov/video/12-09-09Press-Conf.wmv), which will, for the first time, bar teachers' use of dangerous restraint techniques except as a last resort.

Introduced by a seemingly "odd couple" of legislators—conservative Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers (http://http://mcmorris.house.gov/index.html) (R-Wash.) and liberal Committee Chair George Miller (http://http://georgemiller.house.gov/contactus/) (D-Calif.)—the legislation (http://http://edlabor.house.gov/blog/2009/12/preventing-harmful-restraint-a.shtml) comes six months after the Government Accountability Office released a report (http://http://edlabor.house.gov/documents/111/pdf/testimony/20090519GregKutzTestimony.pdf) detailing how frequently students are restrained and secluded by inexperienced or poorly trained teachers. The GAO reported hundreds of abuse allegations in nearly every state. The results of the abuse were far-ranging, everything from student anxiety disorders and depression, to broken bones and even death. Though children are protected against such abuses in other federally funded facilities (e.g. hospitals) they are not yet protected in the schools where they spend most of their time.

So far, state laws and their enforcement have been flawed, one Texas mother learned tragically. At a 2008 Congressional hearing, mother Toni Price (http://http://edlabor.house.gov/documents/111/pdf/testimony/20090519CedricPriceTestimony.pdf) spoke about her son Cedric's deadly encounter with restraints applied by educators. After being denied his lunch for refusing to do his school work, Price said Cedric was caught trying to leave his classroom, presumably because he was hungry.

"After Cedric attempted to leave the classroom, he refused to sit back down in his chair, so the teacher forced him into his chair and restrained him. She is roughly six feet tall, weighs over 230 lbs. Cedric was short. He was little - he was a little boy. Cedric struggled as he was being held in a chair, so the teacher put him face down and sat on him. He struggled and said repeatedly, 'I can't breathe.' 'If you can talk, If you can speak, you can breathe,' [the teacher] snapped at him.

Shortly after that, he stopped speaking, and he stopped struggling, and he stopped moving. The teacher continued to restrain him. Finally, the teacher ... and aides put Cedric back into his chair and wiped the drool from his mouth and sat him up, but he slumped over and slipped out of the chair. Precious moments passed before a nurse was called. I rushed to the school not completely clear of what was going on and what was happening. When I got to the school, my son was laying on the floor with a paramedic beside him. I kneeled down and said 'Cedric, get up, you're not going to be in trouble,' but Cedric didn't move. Instead, the paramedic stood me up. My son was dead. I didn't know the school was practicing restraint techniques on Cedric. I didn't even know they were withholding food as a punishment."

Though Credic's death was ruled a homicide and his teacher was placed on a registry of educators no longer allowed to teach in Texas, she was never prosecuted criminally. In fact, the GAO found that Credic's teacher left Texas in favior of Virginia, where she continued teaching special ed in wealthy Loudon county.  Somehow, record of the teacher's name on Texas' registry did not follow her across state lines.

Like Price, many parents are unaware if restraints are being used on their children. Other parents sign off on schools' use of restraints mistakenly, or without learning all the details. The federal bill would prevent teachers from ever using certain types of restraints—prescription sedatives or chairs with straps, for example—on special needs students. Even in case of emergency restraint, teachers would have to call a student's parents immediately and provide written documentation of the incident within 24 hours. This is an issue that hits close to home for bill co-author McMorris Rodgers, whose son Cole has Down Syndrome. Though McMorris Rodgers notes that Cole attends a great school with wonderful teachers, she also says that when cases of teachers abusing special needs students came to her attention, she became focused on finding ways to protect children with disabilities, and all children.

The bill will apply to public and private schools, but it's uncertain what effect it would have on residential treatment centers like the Judge Rotenberg Center in Massachusetts, which uses electric shocks to discipline its special needs students (http://http://motherjones.com/politics/2007/08/school-shock). At very least, the bill would establish national reporting standards, documenting for the first time the frequency of student seclusion/restraint. Both McMorris Rodgers and her co-author Miller are optimistic about the bill's prospects. "While we have a lot of challenges to tackle," Miller said, "this bill already has the support of lawmakers from both sides of the aisle, from the disability community, the education community and the Obama administration."


Copyright ©2009 Mother Jones and the Foundation for National Progress. All Rights Reserved.

Title: Preventing Harmful Restraint and Seclusion in Schools Act
Post by: Ursus on December 20, 2009, 03:40:03 PM

Here's a blog entry from George Miller's website regarding that bill (H.R. 4247). Emphasis as per the original:

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Home » EdLabor Journal  » Preventing Harmful Restraint and Seclusion in the Schools Act

Preventing Harmful Restraint and Seclusion in the Schools Act (http://http://edlabor.house.gov/blog/2009/12/preventing-harmful-restraint-a.shtml)
By Kittredge, Betsy Miller on December 9, 2009 11:30 AM

Protecting All Children in School

Every child should be safe and protected while in school. But a recent investigation by the U.S. Government Accountability Office (http://http://edlabor.house.gov/newsroom/2009/05/gao-report-finds-hundreds-of-a.shtml) found hundreds of allegations that children have been abused, and some even died, as a result of misuses of restraint and seclusion in public and private schools, often at the hands of untrained staff. Many of these interventions were used disproportionately on some of our most vulnerable students -- children with disabilities. Unlike in hospitals and other facilities that receive federal funding, there are no federal laws that address how and when restraint or seclusion can be used in schools. State regulations and oversight vary greatly and have often failed to protect children. It is also impossible to determine the full extent to which these interventions are used because there is currently no consistent reporting of data.  

The Preventing Harmful Restraint and Seclusion in Schools Act (H.R. 4247) is the first national effort to address this problem and ensure the safety of everyone involved – both students and school staff. Specifically the legislation would:

Prevent and reduce inappropriate restraint and seclusion by establishing minimum safety standards in schools, similar to protections already in place in hospitals and non-medical community-based facilities

• Allow physical restraint or locked seclusion only when there is imminent danger of injury, and only when imposed by trained staff;
• Prohibit the use of any mechanical restraint, such as strapping children to chairs, misusing therapeutic equipment to punish students,  or duct-taping parts of their bodies;
• Prohibit chemical restraint, meaning medications used to control behavior that are not administered consistent with a physician’s prescription;
• Prohibit any restraint that restricts breathing;
• Prohibit aversive behavioral interventions that compromise health and safety, such as denying students  water, food, or clothing, denying access to toilet facilities, or using noxious stimuli such as pepper spray in order to control behavior;
• Prohibit schools from including restraint or seclusion as planned interventions in student’s education plans, including Individualized Education Programs (IEPs); and
• Require schools to notify parents after incidents when restraint or seclusion was used.

Require states to do their part to keep children and staff safe in school

• Within two years of the establishment of federal standards, each state must have its own policies, procedures, monitoring and enforcement systems in place to meet the minimum standards.

Ask states to provide support and training to better protect students and staff and prevent the need for emergency behavioral interventions

• Improve the culture and climate of the schools by providing grants to states to help provide professional development, training and positive behavior support programs;
• Encourage schools to have procedures established in school safety plans to keep both students and personnel safe when student behavior poses an imminent danger; and
• Ask states to ensure that enough school staff are trained to keep students and staff safe, but gives states and local districts the flexibility to determine the training needs at each school.

Increase transparency, oversight and enforcement to prevent future abuse

• Require states to collect and report data annually to the Secretary of Education;
• Make data about restraint and seclusion publicly available, including data on the number of incidents, injuries, cases of death, and cases involving untrained staff; and
• Provide the Secretary of Education the authority to withhold federal funds from states who do not establish policies and procedures consistent with the minimum standards.

Definitions of terms used in the Preventing Harmful Restraint and Seclusion in the Schools Act » (http://http://edlabor.house.gov/blog/2009/12/definitions-of-terms-used-in-t.shtml)
Text of the legislation » (http://http://edlabor.house.gov/documents/111/pdf/legislation/HR4247Seclusion_Restraint.pdf)
Watch a video of the press conference where the bill was announced (67.4MB) » (http://http://edlabor.house.gov/video/12-09-09Press-Conf.wmv)
Read a letter from U.S. Education Secretary Arne Duncan to Chairman Miller outlining the administration's principles for seclusion and restraint legislation » (http://http://edlabor.house.gov/documents/111/pdf/letters/20091208-SeclusionandRestraint-Duncan.pdf)
Read more about a May 2009 committee hearing about seclusion and restraint in schools » (http://http://edlabor.house.gov/hearings/2009/05/examining-the-abusive-and-dead.shtml)

Supporters of H.R. 4247 (http://http://edlabor.house.gov/blog/2009/12/editor-content.html?cs=ISO-8859-1)

American Federation of Teachers
National Education Association
National School Boards Association
National Association of State Directors of Special Education (http://http://edlabor.house.gov/documents/111/pdf/letters/20091216-HR4247-NASDSE.pdf)
Council for Exceptional Children (http://http://edlabor.house.gov/documents/111/pdf/letters/20091207-HR4247-CEC.pdf)
National Disability Rights Network (http://http://edlabor.house.gov/documents/111/pdf/letters/20091209-HR4247-NDRN.pdf)
National Autism Association (http://http://edlabor.house.gov/documents/111/pdf/letters/20091211-HR4247-NAA.pdf)
TASH
National Down Syndrome Congress
National Down Syndrome Society
The Arc of the United States
Children and Adults with Attention Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder
The Bazelon Center for Mental Health Law (http://http://edlabor.house.gov/documents/111/pdf/letters/20091209-HR4247-Bazelon.pdf)
The National Alliance on Mental Illness
Family Alliance to Stop Abuse and Neglect
Council on Parent Attorneys and Advocates
Respect ABILITY Law Center
National Association of Councils on Developmental Disabilities
Association of University Centers on Disabilities (http://http://edlabor.house.gov/documents/111/pdf/letters/20091208-HR4247-AUCD.pdf)
Families Against Restraint and Seclusion
Easter Seals (http://http://edlabor.house.gov/documents/111/pdf/letters/20091208-HR4247-EasterSeals.pdf)
Association of University Centers on Disabilities (http://http://edlabor.house.gov/documents/111/pdf/letters/20091216-HR4247-AUCD.pdf)
Autism Speaks (http://http://edlabor.house.gov/documents/111/pdf/letters/20091217-HR4247-AutismSpeaks.pdf)
Alliance to Prevent Restraint, Aversive Interventions and Seclusion (http://http://edlabor.house.gov/documents/111/pdf/letters/20091204-HR4247-APRAIS.pdf)


Tags: bill, child safety, seclusion and restraint