To think this may be disability discrimination (but not really be able to do anything about it)?

[PinkyU]

I’ve been looking for a dance class for my youngest two DD’s, one is neurotypical (NT - no disability) and one is neurodiverse (ND - has a developmental/cognitive disability/condition).

I contacted a dance school requesting a trial for both lo’s and briefly explained my youngest’s DD is autistic and has developmental delays, that I would stay within the building at all times, was able to help her in the lesson if allowed, was happy with a class for younger children to suit her needs better. Basically would bend over backwards in order to help lo participate in the lesson.

Received a message saying that they would take my older dd but could not accommodate my youngest due to her needs (which I did not specify), that she, the owner, has taught children with “a bit of autism”, but didn’t feel the class was “right” for my lo. She based this solely on me saying that my lo has additional needs, not on what those needs are.

Aibu to think that this is disability discrimination (under reasonable adjustments), but to know there’s very little point in fighting it because they just don’t want my little girl?

Not being able to meet needs may not be discrimination, but not bothering to ask what the needs are most definitely is!

Best to weed out the numpties early on - I tried not mentioning autism in a childcare ad (all ds wanted to do at home was read books and be ignored, so really not an issue - the nanny would be for younger sister ), got some calls, and had two potential nannies simply hang up when I mentioned him and another two suddenly decided they were already booked...

Reporting the teacher would serve no purpose because a solo teacher can not be reasonably expected to accept all comers.

The adjustment would be to accept a parent or carer to work with the child with additional needs.

Hobby dance teachers often do it for little or no profit. To expect them to pay for training is very unreasonable.

Pourmorewine. If everyone had to do training courses before volunteering for sports clubs I don't think many people woukd be taking classes and only the athletically gifted would get in.

I’m not entirely sure I feel much better after reading some of the posts on here.

My lo is quiet and gentle, she has no comprehension of violence or disruption. She is compliant to the point of absolute vulnerability.

In short the other children are more a danger to her than she could ever be to them.

Lo needs help with her understanding and engagement, she’ll happily just spin in a corner and needs encouragement or prompting to be involved. She is often in a little daze but will try her best to follow instructions.

We chose ballet as at her age it’s very simple movements, very repetitive, soft music, very exact movements, tends to be singular dancers instead of pairs, which would suit her learning pace. She has a language impairment so can’t participate in conversations, so anything drama or stage related would be very difficult for her. Other dance styles with long sequences or intricate movements would be a struggle for her and louder style music would put her off.

I know I’m biased but she really is the most delightful and easy little child to deal with, she always tries her best, she just needs some support to help her.

It sounds to me as though your DC would be fine in the class with you there with her to support her.

What age is she, and what type of dance schools are you looking at?

At the one the dc went to, the 5/6yr olds were preparing for their primary exam, and a beginner 7/8yr old would usually go straight in with grade 1/2. Dsd at 9 went straight into grade 3, along with another beginner. Of course, most dc, including mine, were once a week activity dancers, but even amongst the younger dc several did it seriously.

So from your description I can imagine why if she's eg 8, a school like dc's might reasonably think a class of dc preparing for an exam, with some already considering vocational schools, wouldn't also be able to meet her needs. However if she's younger, then even at dc's the toddler/ preschool class would have still been suitable. And fwiw she sounds far less trouble than some of the spoilt horrors I remember from those days.

By contrast there's another reasonably local school where they don't seem to do grade 1 till late primary age, so there's no plausible explanation for why she couldn't be in the class.

If the dance teachers advertise that they are members of a particular dance association for exam purposes e.g. IDTA, RAD then I would let the organisation know because they all have requirements for their members to be inclusive.

I came to say exactly this.

It's just sometimes the unpredictable nature of outbursts that can seem frightening to some.

ODFOD. I have two preschoolers with ASD and they’ve never had an outburst in their lives. They have fewer tantrums than any other 3 year olds I know. These schools have no idea if OP’s DD is prone to “outbursts” or anything else because they dismissed her as soon as she mentioned that her child was disabled.

So sorry this is happening OP. It’s heartbreaking seeing your awesome child just not being given a chance. Your DD sounds wonderful.

I am NT but I went back to ballet at 11 after not having done it for years and was in classes with much younger kids. There’s no reason your daughter couldn’t be in a class with younger children if those her age are more advanced.

Definitely ask local SEN parents. We found a brilliant parkour session which was so accommodating to our twins, recommended by another mum in a similar boat.

PinkyU I'm not surprised. Some of the posts are awful.

People providing services have a legal duty not to discriminate against people with a disability, and children with a disability have the right to reasonable adjustments to enable them to participate.

Even if a child does have 'outbursts' (and plenty of NT ones do, in my experience...) it would be reasonable to let a parent/carer support the child to access the class.

If it didn't work, fair enough, not all classes work for all children, but this blatant discrimination and some poster's condoning of it on the basis of prejudice and ignorance are vile.

I’ve been the only teacher at the front of the class and when you’re teaching a group you can’t dedicate yourself to supporting one individual to the detriment of the others. A reasonable adjustment would be bringing in an additional person to offer 1:1 support, but the pupil would have to bring their own support as I doubt the school has the budget to provide it. What exactly did you say to them, could you perhaps have led them to believe that the adjustments would be beyond what was reasonable?

I go back to my original point the fact someone on here put 'outburst' and autism together and assumed they go together as a reason for the dance teacher to say no , shows a lack of awareness and understanding what autism actually is and how it can effect all children so differently, this shows we need more understanding in general to be able to be a more tolerant society. And it worries me for daugthers future.

I think the point the op made is the dance teacher never even attempted to ask what support the child would need before saying no. Just said no straight away

"I go back to my original point the fact someone on here put 'outburst' and autism together"
The autistic society itself puts the two words together when describing meltdowns that many people with autism have, so I dont think it's too terrible to put the two words together.

Op, you say she's three?

The behaviour you describe is that of 50% of every three year old 'dancer' i've ever seen.

Pick a traditional school, no competitions etc and just send her.

I can see why you wouldn't be allowed in class with her - that would be a safeguarding issue for most schools and would be unarguably disruptive at that age, because every child would immediately want mum and that's any hope of teaching a balanced class gone just on parent behaviour! - but there's no way of knowing if you're needed.

If you happen to be near Bury in Lancs, i can pass you the name of a school or two?

Don’t give up op. I run a Performing by Arts school and we have students with SEN, but we do have a meeting with the parent before the child starts class to see if we can meets the child’s needs. Sadly our school cannot always meet the needs of every child and it does sometimes depends on if other Sen children are in that class already and if the teacher (some classes only have the teacher and no assistant) could safely care for another child with extra needs as well as still competently teach the class. We do try our best to offer what we can to every child who wants to join our school no matter if they have a disability or not and if we can not accommodate them in the class they want we will try and see if there’s an alternative class (again not always but we do try). Also pp saying about the parent staying in the studio to help during class our studio has a no parents in the studio policy (mother and baby/toddler classes only), they can watch the classes through the viewing window, we have had to implement this policy and enforce it for serious reasons and cannot make exceptions. I am
Sorry the school is just saying a flat no and not trying to help.

Also just to add a lot of our classes after the age of 4 are exam or competition based only 2 hobby classes a week (and these fill up very fast we currently have a waiting list for them) we would love to run more hobby classes but cannot fit anymore in the timetable currently. Also our teacher are 80% ex dancers and do not have the same training as a teacher in a actual school which can also be a factor.

TabbyMumz but OP didn't mention her daughter having 'outbursts' - quite the opposite in fact.

Nor did she mention that she has autism (she doesn't).

Bringing in 'having outbursts' and autism to this discussion is disablist. It's making sweeping generalisations about a child with a development disorder, using this to justify discrimination and then still standing by this irrelevant prejudice when it's pointed out to you.

"Nor did she mention that she has autism (she doesn't)."
If youd like to read the op's opening post on line 7 she clearly states her child is autistic.

"TabbyMumzbut OP didn't mention her daughter having 'outbursts' - quite the opposite in fact."
No she didnt. Neither did I. I said how I wondered if the dance teacher had an experience with a previous autistic child in her class, and wasnt sure she was trained to deal with incidents. Think I went on to say outbursts can be unpredictable and perhaps this was what she was worried about and that she may have been concerned about safeguarding of other children. I have also said that I'm not saying I agree with her decision, but that's perhaps how and why she made it.

"Bringing in 'having outbursts' and autism to this discussion is disablist."

No it's not. Many people with autism often have outbursts, meltdown etc, it would be disingenuous to claim that it is not a common theme/possibility, especially seeing as many parents of autistic children on mumsnet describe their children doing this and the autistic society also explains this in detail. So not unreasonable to wonder if this is why the dance teacher responded like she did.

Who was justifying discrimination? Not me.

Bloody hell yes! It's because these dance schools only want dancers who can show off the schools credentials to other aspiring dancers, rather than an inclusive enjoyable experience for children.

@TabbyMumz if the teacher isn’t sure she’s trained to deal with such incidents, why not open a dialogue about it?

For example:
‘What sort of support would your child need?’
‘I don’t have much experience in that area, any good resources you could recommend?’
‘Shall we have a trial session?’

To say an outright no, based solely on one characteristic is the very definition of discrimination. And you are trying to justify it because you have a family member with a brain injury so you understand why they’re discriminating?

How would you/your family member feel if when they tried to access a service, you were told ‘No. People with brain injuries often have outbursts so we can’t risk it’?

TabbyMumz yes you're right OP does say that her dd has autism and developmental delays.

And it was because OP mentioned her dd's disability that you jumped to an imaginary scenario whereby the teacher might have a child with autism who did have 'outbursts' in her class. That is disablist - it's focusing negative aspects of a disability despite the fact that this is irrelevant to OP's child and indeed may not have actually ever happened to this teacher.

The teacher didn't say that it had, it was you that invented this imaginary scenario.

You're justifying making assumptions about the dance teacher's motives being based on previous negative experience rather than refusing a child based on their diagnosis with no knowledge of their actual presentation or needs, then trying to pretend that you're not doing that.

That's disablist, and justifying discrimination in one.

Many children NT or not have outbursts, which are also described on MN and society at large, but your sole association of these with autism is also disablist.

It's these sorts of attitudes that permit the overt prejudice of the dance teacher to be so prevalent; 'they're not discriminating, they just don't want to...'.

"TabbyMumz if the teacher isn’t sure she’s trained to deal with such incidents, why not open a dialogue about it? "

Yes indeed, why not? I guess you can ask the op if she asked the teacher about that?"

"To say an outright no, based solely on one characteristic is the very definition of discrimination. And you are trying to justify it because you have a family member with a brain injury so you understand why they’re discriminating?"
How rude. I didnt say that at all. I have merely wondered why she came to that decision, and tried to guess what she might have been thinking when she made that decision. Which is what I try to do when seeing people react to my family member with a brain injury. I try to understand why and understand both sides. That is not (for the third time) condoning their decision, just trying to understand it. I can imagine there is some fear of being presented with different types of behaviours, which is understandable.