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March 31, 2021

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Schools for autistic sought

By Li Qian | 00:05 UTC+8 March 31, 2021 | Print Edition

DISABILITY advocates called for schools built specifically for autistic children at an event held at Jing’an Library ahead of Friday’s World Autism Awareness Day.

It is estimated that around one in a hundred people in China has autism.

Though autistic children are allowed to go to mainstream schools, most quit as they are unable to adapt to “normal” classes. Last year, only 544 autistic children were enrolled in mainstream schools.

“We’ve been calling for schools built specifically for autistic children for many years, but today we still don’t have one,” said Cao Xiaoxia, who has been dedicated to the education of autistic children for more than a decade.

Cao, together with her father and conductor Cao Peng, set up a music salon for autistic children, providing them with a platform to gain confidence and express themselves through music.

She also runs a charity project to help autistic teenagers adapt to society by becoming baristas in a coffee shop.

“We have more and more autistic children these years. When they grow up, they will impose a heavy burden on their families and society as well. One appropriate strategy may simply be to build schools for them,” she said.

At the library, Cao, parents of autistic children and local residents watched a Swiss documentary film “At the Philosophers’ School” that tells how a specialist school in Switzerland helped five intellectually disabled children open up to the world.

“It’s screening well-timed,” Cao said. “We hope to raise public awareness of these special children.”

Metro


 

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