School Staff Raise Own Awareness About Disabilities

When the Cromwell Center provided disabilities awareness training for ed techs and cafeteria staff from five elementary schools, they posed questions about interactions with students with disabilities. And guess who provided the answers? Other cafeteria staff! This is how the Cromwell Method works. The staff had a wealth of personal experience and knowledge to draw from, and the program builds on these insights to change attitudes.

Eliminating Bullying and Accepting Differences

Bullying in schools and cyberspace is suddenly in the public eye since the tragic suicides of several young people-- apparently as a result of teasing and harassment that escalated out of control. Students with disabilities are among the groups that experience the highest rates of verbal and physical violence; for children on the autism spectrum these experiences can be everyday occurrences.  Not only are these students at great physical risk, but the emotional damage can be life-long and devastating. What can be done?  Eliminating bullying starts with acceptance of differences, which is what we teach in our Student Disabilities Awareness Program.  We leave books such as A is for Autism, F is for Friend in elementary school classrooms. One of the Program's goals is creating a safe and healthy learning environment for all students. 

Disabilities Training Provided to School Employees

We are excited about disabilities awareness training we've begun in a large public school district. When the superintendent's office jumped at the opportunity to have the Cromwell Center return to their elementary schools, we arranged multiple sessions to offer training to their teachers, ed techs, cafeteria and custodial staff, and bus drivers. (We've already scheduled 21 sessions with their 3rd-5th graders making this our seventh year in the district.) More than two dozen ed techs and cafeteria staff from five schools participated in the experiential exercises and discussions designed to examine and change attitudes about people with disabilities.