Shane Joins The Classroom Crowd
Sydney Morning Herald
Wednesday July 17, 1991
Emma Moss, Shane Niblock, Neil McLean and Antony Clements - Year 7 and 8 students in wheelchairs - all had difficulties adapting to school life when they were integrated last year into St Clair High in Sydney's west.
Crippled by spina bifida, cerebral palsy or scoliosis, they were in constant need of help, particularly in science, home economics or industrial arts classes where everything was designed for mobile teenagers.
As Shane, 14, said yesterday: "We couldn't reach things before, the oven doors would fly down and hit you on the head ... we couldn't get our wheelchairs under the benches and everything was too high ... we depended on everybody all the time. It was pretty hopeless."
Not any more. Now the kids are exactly what they want to be - just heads among the classroom crowd.
The innovations which changed their lives were initiated by educators such as Mr Jeffrey Bogan, from the Metropolitan West Region office, together with a group of special subject teachers, occupational therapists, draftsmen and cabinet-makers. In a landmark project for NSW public schools, they redesigned the classroom to suit the 350 disabled students attending regular high school classes throughout the region.
Now, in all workshop-style classrooms, cupboards and drawers on wheels can be pulled out from lowered bench tops so the students can park their wheelchairs underneath.
Insulated sinks protect partially paralysed children, who have no feeling from the waist down, from burning themselves.
Short-turn taps, adjustable height tool benches, special clamps and side opening ovens have also been installed.
"It's so easy to use everything now," said Shane, who plans to become an engineer. "Best of all, we don't need anyone's help."
Special initiatives based on the St Clair trial will be launched tomorrow by the Department of School Education. By the end of 1992, all NSW schools -which include about 3,000 disabled students - will have received similar facelifts.
© 1991 Sydney Morning Herald
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