Tate and Thalia
Content Warning: These stories are about violence, abuse, neglect and exploitation and may include references to suicide or self-harming behaviours. They may contain graphic descriptions and strong language and may be distressing. Some narratives may be about First Nations people who have passed away. If you need support, please see Contact & support.
Thalia is a mother of two boys, Tate and Atticus, who are both autistic. Thalia is autistic and lives with post-traumatic stress disorder.
Thalia talked about her sons’ experiences in public schooling.
Her eldest son, Tate, attended his school’s ‘child development program … for special needs kids’. ‘[It] seemed wonderful,’ Thalia said. ‘They helped him a lot.’ However, because he was doing well academically, they ‘pushed’ Tate into mainstream schooling despite his poor social skills.
When Tate entered mainstream schooling, Thalia told the teacher about his difficulty remembering to drink without someone telling him to. The teacher and the special needs unit assured Thalia ‘it wouldn’t be a problem’. However, it was an ongoing problem. Finally, the head of the special needs unit told Thalia, ‘[If you are] going to complain … I’m just going to pour his damn bottle down the sink.’
Thalia and other parents noticed that, at first, the ‘special needs teachers … took every special needs child out and did extra teaching … every day for an hour or two, and then they would go back into their classroom’. After a month or two, however, ‘this suddenly stopped’.
Thalia says that while each student with disability is allocated a certain amount for educational support depending on need, she thinks schools are ‘recruiting the kids into the school’ by promising support. They provide support ‘for the first few months … or weeks, and then … it disappears’.
Teachers rarely walk Tate through tasks, wrongly assuming he knows what to do. Teachers tell Thalia that Tate does not need help because he is smart and has good grades. However, he has few social skills and becomes anxious, often freezing up.
‘I don’t care about the grades … My son wants to go to university … How is he supposed to do that when he can’t communicate … because teachers left him in the back row?’
As Thalia was organising Tate’s transition to high school, she found out that although he was ‘verified’ as having disability for supports such as physiotherapy and occupational therapy, he was no longer verified for educational support. Thalia believes it was because the school had stopped keeping records about the assistance they provided to Tate.
When Tate commenced high school, the school provided little support. Other students bullied him, and teachers became annoyed when he sought help. Thalia requested that teachers not ask Tate to do anything that focused attention on him, but they put him in the drama class – despite his request to join the computer and coding class – and told him he had to go on the stage. Tate became anxious and called his mum. When Thalia contacted the school, teachers were angry with Tate for phoning her.
On one occasion, when Atticus was in meltdown, the teacher asked Tate to come and help.
‘Now [Atticus] at the age, even though he’s four years old, younger than his brother, is literally bigger in size,’ said Thalia. ‘’He belt the crap out of his brother, having a meltdown. And his brother, who is very placid, just took it and kept trying to calm him down. “It’s okay, [Atticus]. It’s okay.”’
The principal and special education teachers ‘watched on and didn’t do anything’. Thalia was ‘livid’. She made a complaint to the education department, but they seemed unconcerned.
Thalia withdrew Tate and began homeschooling him. She has ‘had enough’ of the public system and intends to send him to a private school.
Disclaimer: This is the story of a person who shared their personal experience with the Royal Commission into Violence, Abuse, Neglect and Exploitation of People with Disability through a submission or private session. The names in this story are pseudonyms. The person who shared this experience was not a witness and their account is not evidence. They did not take an oath or affirmation before providing the story. Nothing in this story constitutes a finding of the Royal Commission. Any views expressed are those of the person who shared their experience, not of the Royal Commission.