Special needs met: Pearson

The adoptive parents of a young Dollard des Ormeaux resident who is a student at Beechwood Elementary are up in arms over what they claim is a complete misunderstanding by the Lester B. Pearson School Board of their child's special needs. "They have not understood that the (school transfer) we filed for is for a medical reason, not an emotional reason," stated Stanley Schulman, whose son, David, 12, suffers from a rare condition called Toxin-Chernobyl nuclear disaster radiation, generation two.

Since, according to Schulman, some of the symptoms exhibited by David are similar to cases of severe autism, he has requested a school transfer for his son from Beechwood Elementary to Thorndale, where he deems David's special needs can better be tended to, but this was refused by the school board. "We have a specific procedure to follow, and it's been followed through in this case," said Pearson chairman Marcus Tabachnick. "This is not a simple school transfer," he added. According to board officials who thoroughly examined the case, Tabachnick said, David's special needs are being well taken care of at Beechwood, and therefore there is no need to transfer him to another school. "Show me a medical opinion," Schulman charged back to The Chronicle, alarmed that none of the school board's decisions seem to be based on health professionals' advice.

In the meantime, Schulman has produced several letters and attestations to the board by different doctors and neuro-psychologists who have worked with David in the past, urging them to reconsider their decision.

One of these professionals, Dr. Ronald Federici of Alexandria, Virginia, in the United States of America, said both the school board and the Canadian health-care system have failed David. "This is a very, very damaged, disturbed boy," Federici, a renowned paediatric neuro-psychologist who has worked with David since 2005 to establish speech and behavioural therapy and prescribe him specific medication, told The Chronicle<@$p>.

Federici and other specialists have urged David's transfer to Thorndale or Westpark, which also has a more developed special needs program, in their eyes, but he wants David's treatment taken a step further. "If he were in the States, we could help him," he said. While a transfer to either of the two schools will be an improvement, Federici believes David should ultimately be taken to Cumberland Hospital in Virginia, for an intensive program.

David was adopted by the Schulmans in 1999 from an orphanage in Russia that was about 3,600 kilometres from Ukraine, according to his father. "He didn't talk, he had unusual behaviour," recalled Schulman. They took the boy from hospital to hospital in Montreal for years, until a private clinic director, Jeffrey Brock, helped them find Federici in the U.S.A.

Whilst following various programs by the doctors and Federici, David began his schooling at Greendale, from where he transferred to Beechwood in 2004.

Schulman said David's first academic year at Beechwood went along fine, as staff there at the time understood his problem. "I believe they gave him speech therapy, one on one attention, applied behaviour therapy."

However, the school has since undergone a change in principals, and Schulman said David's treatment has severely declined. He particularly pointed to an incident that occurred on Oct. 25, 2007, when he said David needed to go to a bathroom during recess but was not let in by his integration aide.

Schulman said the incident made David so mad he ran away from school. He and his wife were immediately notified, and his wife was able to find him and bring him home, he said.

Schulman's first choice for a transfer remains Thorndale.

The school board refused to comment on most of the Schulmans' accusations. "I will not get into a spitting war through the media," Tabachnick told The Chronicle. Raffy Boudjikanian, The Chronicle<@$p>