AIBU to say that not everything can be inclusive all the time?

[Summeriscumin]

A former student has asked for advice and I'm a bit stumped.

She has been running a drama club for 11 - 16 year olds in the village hall. The aim is an introduction to various theatre and circus skills.

These include vocal skills, breathing exercises, trust exercises, mime, juggling, acro, improvisation, script reading aloud, devising scenes and basic contemporary dance skills. It's been going very well and the subs are paying for the hall hire, so she isn't out of pocket.

But she's afraid she's going to have to give it up. A mum came along her son, a wheelchair user, asking to join and he was welcomed. My friend (C) explained what the sessions entailed and said there may be some that her son may not be able to participate in. Specifically she meant the energetic dance stuff and some circus skills and there was an issue with some trust exercises. - DCs have their eyes closed and move around and the wheelchair could prove dangerous.

The lad came for a couple of weeks and seemed to really enjoy it and C tried to make it as inclusive as possible without depriving the others of their skills training. They work in small groups so she always made sure there was a group he could work with.

However, this week the mother has said that her son must be included in everything or it's discrimination and that she should stop the exercises that he cannot participate in.

C says she may as well just give it up as that's just not fair on the others.

AIBU in thinking this mother is BU? I feel so sorry for C who has done her best to include the lad.

Yes, when that child can't be reasonably accommodated.

Life has deprived that child, not the class organiser. He can't do tumbling and acrobatics no matter how much he'd like to. That's reality.

Is it deprivation to not do something you physically cannot do? I don’t think so.

Should 20 other kids not be allowed to do something because another one cannot?
I don’t think so.

I can no longer go upstairs in National Trust house because I’ve become a wheelchair user myself. Should the rest of you now no longer be allowed upstairs because I can’t get there? I don’t think so.

I think C has made him welcome and has made reasonable adjustments without depriving the others of activities they enjoy.

I really hope she doesn’t think “sod this” and closes the class.

This is a hard one. She's not making any money and trying to find extra activites is going to be time consuming for her and take away from the original reason for the classes. I feel sorry for the child, but the mother is being unreasonable doing a class that's not really suitable or catered for her child. It sounds like the teacher is already doing as much as she can do include this child

The mother is unreasonable. None of us can do everything we'd like. That's just life. If her goal is to make her son's experience the best it can be, then she's going about it in the wrong way and potentially putting an end to the whole thing. She sounds like the type who would rather the class be unavailable to anyone than accept realistic limitations. Your friend should tell her that unless she has concrete suggestions for improvements (which your friend could then at least consider, though not be obligated to implement), the class will continue as it is. She's done nothing wrong.

I have a child with severe learning difficulties and some milder physical limitations.

I also have a different child who's a ball of energetic fire, who loves acro, Street dance, acting and singing.

Having seen what child 2 gets up to, there is no way a wheelchair bound person could do the same things. They can be involved in a routine for example, but not doing cartwheels and leaps.

I've had several reasons why my first child has had to be excluded from an activity that's made up part of a class, at school and at school holiday clubs. As long as there has been a good reason for it, I've been ok with it. Safety is often cited, theirs or others.

Suggest your friend brushes up on what constitutes "discrimination" in the eyes of the law. Being physically unable to do something is ok, as long as an alternative solution is provided where possible. Stopping doing an activity because a disabled person is present is called positive discrimination and is frowned on just as much.

Sounds like the mum here is just looking to play victim.

What does he do while the others are doing that activity?? As a kid with cerebral palsy who went to mainstream school, I understood from about 4, that I just couldn't do everything my peers could do. The important thing is that you are given something to work on your skills, while they are working on theirs.

Nothing says "you are useless, so this teacher doesn't care about you" more than being told "everyone is practicing working on this, but you are so bad that we aren't going to let you practice."! For example we would do basketball. I liked the skills part of the lesson, but hated the games (and frankly was so slow and clumsy that I got in everyone's way!) So during the games, I would go to the other end of the hall with a skills target - dribble this distance, dribble changing hands, shoot at the hoop, bounce and catch, even just play catch if I had my one-to-one there, and focus on catching. Your friend needs to make sure he's doing something useful at his level, if he can't join in the main activity.

This is a good suggestion to put it back on the mum, or she could suggest the mum leads some activties for her child as the teacher is not going to stop the core activities that are the original intention for the class

He’s disability is depriving him of doing everything, not C. C has welcomed him into the group, and has already adapted her classes to accommodate him.

You really need to get a grip. It's a drama club that involves circus skills!

Your friend needs to make sure he's doing something useful at his level, if he can't join in the main activity.

@stichguru I personally think that his Mum could also help out with some activity ideas as she knows her son best. One volunteer can’t do everything.

It’s amazing that C. is giving up her free time to organize this group for children. Many people wouldn’t be so generous with their time.

Hang on, how is including a child in a wheelchair depriving the others of the chance to develop their skills?! It's very possible they may learn something (for starters how to make reasonable adjustments and be reasonable human beings) it's a kids drama group, this kid might be amazing at drama, might even be better than the others and might be able to pick up circus skills. It's not a health and safety risk to close your eyes next to someone in a wheelchair, if it's a trust exercise then they should be able to trust them. Otherwise it's a flawed exercise where anyone could get hurt. Surely the leader has her eyes open to intervene?!

Well you see, I’m a wheelchair user and as such much better placed than you to know how safe it is. The wheelchair isn’t any more dangerous than anything else when walking around eyes closed, but there are simple ways to pad the chair to make it safer during those exercises.
choruses in musical theatre increasingly have disabled dancers. That’s not a reason he can’t take part.
flips etc are fair, but clowning he can get involved in easily enough.
It just takes some effort and willingness to want to include him.

It’s not a gymnastics club, so the point is moot. Whataboutery is unhelpful.

Of course not. But it’s clear that the majority of replies are not from disabled people or parents of disabled kids.

It’s pretty obvious to those of us who experience this kind of exclusion every day who has never had accessibility needs or a child with a disability.

But in many of these things he ‘can’t’ do, with some small adjustments and thinking outside the box, he absolutely could do. That’s the issue.

It clearly isn't. Please stop making assumptions and suggesting you speak on behalf of all disabled people. Several of us on this thread disagree with you.

This is exactly what I would suggest: explain that she isn't too sure how to safely adjust the trust/obstacle exercise to make sure that it is safe for both the child in the wheelchair and the kids who aren't in wheelchairs, and that she would appreciate some suggestions/collaborative assistance in figuring out how to make it inclusive.

More generally I am sure that there are many drama teachers/schools etc out there, together with organisations that lobby for inclusivity/reasonable adjustments for children with disabilities, who would be more than happy to assist your friend with some ideas for trust exercises that would be great for kids regardless of whether they are or are not in a wheelchair. The latter group would also be able to give her some idea of when a request for an adjustment is and is not reasonable. Clearly there are limits - otherwise the word "reasonable" wouldn't be used.

I would also suggest that your friend document all these attempts and actions. Meaning for example that she keep a diary/workbook that notes her interactions - very politely of course - with people she's contacted to get advise about inclusivity and adapting her class, and also notes her interactions with the mother - indeed I would suggest following up the in person chat about how to make the "trust" exercise work for her child with an email that essentially summarises what happened in the conversation - just so your friend has something to refer to in future if the mother decides to cause a ruckus, and in that situation your friend can point to all her attempts/research/meetings etc etc.

It’s not a good deed if it discriminates against disabled people. The Equality Act 2010 doesn't specifically mandate adjustments for volunteers, but it does require organisations to avoid discrimination and ensure disabled individuals have access to their services.

Let's just assume she has and answer the question the OP has asked.

It seems like a big part of this is how much extra time and effort an unpaid volunteer can be expected to give. It’s a lovely idea that C could choreograph at the level of a TV show with a huge budget and paid specialists, but is it realistic?

If C was a professional who was running the group for profit, it would be more reasonable to expect her to develop the activities to be more inclusive. But as it stands, if she feels she doesn’t have the time and headspace to do the research and training to make adjustments while keeping everyone safe, that’s fair enough.

I say this someone whose child - like @BogRollBOGOF ’s - had to miss his class reward trip last week because it was incompatible with his SN.

In this specific instance, the kids mum is asking that the other children do not do an activity the child using a wheelchair cannot do.

That is depriving those kids of the activity they came to do, which is absolutely not acceptable.

Adapting an activity slightly or finding a similar activity and splitting into groups that take turns - thats ok but scrapping an activity entirely because 1 child is not able is bloody ridiculous.

And I say that as a wheelchair user, for whom a lot of things are no longer possible. But hey, shall I join your zumba class or yoga class.. then demand you all stop and do it from a chair because that is the only way I can do it? You'd be pissed off, and rightly so.

I'm not understanding the trust exercise either - presumably they can also walk into each other? Would the trust not come from having a person who can see walking with them telling them how to move? Or from a 'Marco Polo' type game using voices to guide each other away from collision? I imagine it's a different type of trust game from the one we played as children, which involved falling back onto each other and which is, for obvious reasons, no longer considered appropriate. Times change and so did the exercise.

I laughed out loud at the post that suggested the mum of a disabled child was out there looking for a fight. I imagine she's busy enough.

See this is why I'm now feeling sorry for the friend. She would've been better off saying it wasn't suitable from the beginning. Now she'll have to go to alot extra effort (ie hours of her unpaid time), to cater to this parents unreasonable request.