Belén Jurado (‘Quererla es crearla’) and Ignacio Calderón Almendros, (University of Málaga, ‘Quererla es crearla’).
AOSMA Magazine No. 33 – April 2024 – ISNN-e: 1887-3952
SUMMARY. This article briefly explores an online educational initiative that aimed to mobilize citizens to share personal stories of discrimination experienced in school. It was launched in September 2023 via the hashtag #YNoPasaNada and gained significant traction, particularly on Instagram and the social network X (formerly Twitter). All the work to make the campaign successful was carried out by Belén Jurado, co-author of this text, a mother, blogger, and activist for the right to education for all people. The campaign is supported by “Quererla es Crearla,” a social movement that promotes inclusive education in Spain and beyond. This text aims to reflect on the unbearable reality experienced by so many people in a space – the school – that should guarantee safety for all citizens, without exception, to realize their right to inclusive education.
Experiencing discrimination alone…
A large room filled with drawings, several shelves with all kinds of toys, a round table in the middle. A girl who had barely turned 2 years old, a father, and a mother eagerly awaiting their daughter’s diagnosis after several long sessions. And María, a calm woman, confident in herself and with a lot of experience. She was the educational counselor who had assessed Lucía. This was the setting for a lifelong “sentence.”
Lucía is referred to a “Classroom for Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD)” for the next school year because that is “what is best for her.” We needed to believe those words that María told us; we had just heard her diagnosis and it was a difficult time. We needed to trust someone who knew; we were lost.
We believed intensely until a slammed door abruptly opened our eyes. The slammed door was followed by words from Lucía’s first-grade teacher, who said: “I can’t handle your daughter, she makes me very nervous, and she is NOT going to enter my classroom.” And so it was, she didn’t enter hers, nor those of whoever decided that hers either. She didn’t enter in first grade, she didn’t enter in second, she didn’t enter in third, nor in fourth; not even in fifth or sixth grade were they forced to. She didn’t participate in field trips or parties, sometimes she didn’t eat in the cafeteria, etc., etc., etc. And what happened? NOTHING. (Belén Jurado)
This narrative begins with a scene that could easily be staged in a theater or a film. It’s an everyday scene, yet terrifying: a helpless girl after sessions of being scrutinized, an anxious father and mother facing the situation, and a professional with the composure of a judge, not a party involved. It’s guidance as judgment. And the verdict is a life sentence. That sentence to social isolation – like prison – is for Lucia’s own good, and it makes sense. It always makes sense. However, she is imprisoned – deprived of freedom and social contact with the boys and girls around her – even though Lucia was innocent and had no lawyer. Her parents had not studied law nor did they know they were going to a trial. Furthermore, the sentence is not a punishment, but a form of supposed good treatment, rooted in tradition, but in no way in science.
Systematic reviews of scientific evidence and meta-analyses, for example, by Cologon (2019), Hehir et al. (2016), and the European Agency for Development in Special Needs Education (2018), show that inclusive education promotes socialization, a sense of belonging to a community, the well-being of students and teachers due to social relationships, academic learning, communication, behavior… and that it does so better than education developed in segregated environments. And yet, it is science that seems to give reason and authority to that professional who condemns her for her own good.
The third paragraph is the one that delves into reality. It is the “slam of the door” –like the dull roar of an iron door closing the cell and isolating you– that “opened their eyes.” That moment, when a mother realizes that the reason was not her daughter’s well-being, but that it responds to the interests of an institution and its professionals, is like emerging from the cave in Plato’s myth, when the slave breaks free from their chains and realizes that reality is not the shadows they had seen inside their entire lives. The reality is that you are left outside, isolated, even though you are innocent and defenseless, and that this unjust sentence, this punishment without a crime, is prolonged in time and space. However, despite being such an evident injustice, nothing happens. It all remains in the indignation of a mother and a father and the suffering of a daughter, facing a sea of people who act as if nothing were happening.
A connection
And that’s what happens: nothing ever happens. It is precisely because of this stillness and the complicity of the entire school system that things don’t move. This was the reason why Belén Jurado has been sharing her experience on social media for years, through the blogs La habitación de Lucía and the Proyecto Madres, among other initiatives. Sharing these bad practices led to the compilation of experiences that people were sending her, prompted by the pain of another mother. This compilation began in September 2023 and was called #YNoPasaNa-da1. Following the lead of #SeAcabó, which Cristina Fallarás developed in relation to gender-based violence, where people shared their experiences without revealing their names, this initiative could overcome one of the major obstacles that confine the problem of school discrimination to the private sphere: that pain and suffering in solitude, as well as the new way of seeing things after breaking free and leaving the cave, do not come to light due to the fear of causing more pain to the child they are protecting, who is already condemned. In part, the fear is also caused by having seen something new, but not fully understanding that new reality which goes against the grain of most of the adult world, and gradually of childhood itself. In Plato’s allegory, this knowing is represented by leaving the cave where one had only seen shadows:
“Now, if he went back down and sat in the same place again, wouldn’t his eyes be filled with darkness? Wouldn’t he be blinded?” “Certainly,” he said.
—And if he were to compete again with those who had remained constantly chained, and were to give his opinion about those shadows, and were to compete with them in discussing that image which he saw when he was in the prison, would he not be utterly bewildered? Would he not be said to have come from above with elevated eyes? And, on the other hand, if for that very habit of looking upwards he were to be dragged by force to the station or place in which he formerly was, would he not be blinded, and would he not seem to be utterly bewildered? And would he not be thought to be a madman, and would not the very fact of his having come from the upper world be a reason for his being hated? And would not anyone be glad to do anything rather than suffer in that way? And would he not be in the greatest difficulty, and would not the spectators say that, from going up, he had come down with his eyes ruined, and that it would be for the worse to try to go up? And if they were able to lay hold of him and kill him, would they not kill him? (Plato, Republic, VII, 514a—521b)
The problem has been privatized –it began to be so in that waiting room– to such an extent that families assume it is a deserved condemnation, that it is a personal problem often referred to by acronyms – SEN, SEND, ASD, ADHD…– and that it would be useless, therefore, to make it public, because there is no remedy. However, many of these families manage to see beyond that common sense that privatizes pain and suffering, and decide to return to the public sphere what is of a social nature. And they are often called “crazy mothers” by the institution, as they have strayed from the mental maps of common sense, which organize our ways of thinking, feeling, and acting:
#AndNothingHappensWhen they tell me I’m crazy for demanding my son’s rights, I think, yes, I’m very crazy, but out of pain and frustration because with my other son, who doesn’t have autism, I’ve never had to demand anything, they’ve never called me crazy. They want us quiet, but that’s over.
#AndNothingHappensThey excluded “minorities” of all kinds of representation for so long that now any inclusion seems forced to them.
What they say seems to make no sense, because they have managed to escape common sense, the kind that has normalized discrimination and prevents them from going beyond the limits of the discourse of usual practices. Often, these practices are controlled by a computer tool – like Séneca in Andalusia, Itaca in the Valencian Community, Delphos in Castilla-La Mancha, Xade in Galicia, Sauce in Asturias… – which acts as a guardian of common sense, forcing a choice among those acronyms that reify the person, and which constitute colossal mechanisms of silencing, to use bell hooks’ words (1989). Therefore, any way of socializing the new interpretations of reality made by students, families, and professionals constitutes a form of liberation that delegitimizes all that indecent labeling disguised as science. A wheel that needs to be stopped.
#AndNothingHappens School continues to be a cruel place for the different and vulnerable, today as it was yesterday.
#AndNothingHappensI am a school counselor, autistic, and a victim of the school system, which has undoubtedly marked me the most in life. This campaign is deeply affecting me. Yes, it does happen, boy does it happen; the school continues to harm, crush, and traumatize our children today just as it did 40 years ago, just as it did us. It’s devastating.
A school that does not want
The latest testimony presented shows how the problem is suffered by the entire school community, and not just by students and their families. Those who work in schools, who have chosen the noble profession of educating, suffer daily the structural violence that is exercised within them. But what is it that does not change, and that a large number of people denounce as cruel in the face of differences?
Perhaps one of the most difficult and painful issues detected is the explicit or implicit manifestation that certain people are not wanted in mainstream schools:
#AndNothingHappensFrom the beginning, they told me Special Education. I went to a public school for 2 hours when I was 2 years old […] and they already determined that I couldn’t be in public school.
#AndNothingHappens “That’s what Special Education centers are for. I didn’t study to deal with this type of student.”
#AndNothingHappensIt is very difficult, extremely difficult, to be in a place where you are not wanted. It is painful.
#AndNothingHappensI am a counselor, last year I was in charge of an open classroom. It is very sad that they did not feel the students were ‘theirs’, they belonged to the open classroom. Many times I went home crying. [ver que los maestros del aula de referencia] […]
Therefore, the act of marking a diagnostic category in the computer program goes far beyond a mere administrative action; it constitutes, along with the subsequent enrollment report, a clear manifestation that the institution rejects certain individuals (Calderón, Moreno, and Vila, 2022), that their school lives are dispensable (Soldevila, Calderón, and Echeita, 2022). This, so explicitly expressed by families, is only the beginning of a process of social exclusion that accompanies the person throughout their life:
#AndNothingHappensWe, those with special educational needs, are annoying and unwanted, we are uncomfortable and superfluous everywhere. This originates in schools and then extends outside, into society in general. […]
That discomfort is presented every day in schools through children’s languages. Escaping, getting distracted, not paying attention, shouting, not learning, lying… constitute forms of resistance that children employ when they are not being respected. In other words, they are forms of protest that, although poorly articulated, represent steps towards freedom, and should be addressed as a huge transgressive element that allows for the transformation of what isn’t working in schools. However, the school’s reaction often goes in the opposite direction:
#AndNothingHappensSince I enrolled my daughter with ASD in the educational center, every few days I was summoned to the Principal’s office to be invited to leave the girl at home because “it was best for her”.
But what is best for the rest of the school-aged students? What happens every time a manifestation of student dissent is resolved with a supposedly kind expulsion? The answer is obvious: nothing changes in the context that makes the person feel like a stranger.
#AndNothingHappensMy son is always alone at recess and nobody ever does anything. I cry every day, all the time.
Removing a person from the mainstream classroom, allowing them to be alone in common areas, or inviting them to leave are different forms of invisibilization and exclusion, incisive and very persistent. Others are even more evident:
#AndNothingHappensAn autistic preschool student who is removed from class during open house days so that families can see everything as wonderful, lest they be having a tantrum at that moment and, of course, “that doesn’t give a good image.” And many families witness this. Therefore, a fundamental part of that invisibilization is to neutralize any dissent, including that of families.
Calling a mother crazy–“for wanting things that do not “belong” to her”– is a clear way to delegitimize any construction she makes, and which calls into question school culture and its practices. This often happens with significant ignorance of what is being done, but it is. Everything pushes you to leave the place you were never a member of.
#AndNothingHappens […] Desde el primer día, aun sin conocerlo lo suficiente, ya nos estaban ofreciendo reservar plaza en el aula enclave. Se trataba de una ‘invitación’ repetida cada trimestre, cada año, y a la que nos veíamos siempre diciendo que no y viendo las miradas de extrañeza y tensión en los docentes implicados. […]
Thus, the school space becomes a hostile place, instead of being a place where people enjoy, learn, and find a community in which to grow together.
#AndNothingHappensI cry every day because I have to take him where they don’t want him. […] I cry from Monday to Friday.
#AndNothingHappensMy son (diagnosed with ADHD) suffered so much at school that, at just seven years old, on a Sunday night he told me he would rather be dead than have to go to school the next day.
#AndNothingHappens“Mom, if I died today, nothing would happen.” (María, 11 years old)
And despite all this, in mainstream school, nothing happens. There is no real questioning of what occurs within it. There is no space for deep debate where families and students can be heard. Everything continues, with our complicity.
#AndNothingHappensThe counselor told me: “inclusion is very nice, but when your daughter can’t take it anymore, switch to special education.”
#AndNothingHappens“Your son has to go to a special school. Because it’s like when you have cancer and you go to Houston, they have more resources.”
A school that rises up
Lucía was “sentenced” to live confined to an ASD classroom for all the hours of every day of her entire school career. She was annulled as a person. She depended on the teacher on duty, on whether that day they wanted her to enter the classroom or, on the contrary, she stayed in the ASD room. She depended on whether they wanted her or not. Now yes, now no. It was like plucking petals off a daisy. There were some who did want her, many more who didn’t, and that is a “sentence,” no matter how you look at it. ASD or special classrooms and special education schools serve to subtly sentence children, to steal their rights, to make them invisible, and they remain trapped in those places without ever being able to reverse that decision. In all the years I have lived with my daughter, now almost 16, I have been able to see how her greatest need is to live with her peers; that is the key to avoiding social death. Who will invite Lucía to a birthday party if they never see her in the classroom? Who will play with her if they barely know her? Not to mention the loneliness in adolescence and adulthood. I am sure that María did not do it with bad intentions, perhaps it was the “it’s always been done this way” mentality. I know that the Education System often demands, imposes, and it is difficult to disagree, but it is possible, because it is preferable to condemning children to die for others. (Belén Jurado)
It is in that collective indignation that the problem becomes public again. The initiative makes it clear that the reasons are not correct, but random; that they do not favor the person, but rather prop up an education system that gravely and systematically violates the right to education of students with disabilities (UN, 2017). And that the role of teachers and guidance teams must challenge the directives of a tradition and the orders that go against inclusive education, which is a fundamental human right (Calderón and Echeita, 2022). And we can do it, as long as we focus on the social, on what unites or separates us, on what prevents or facilitates our growth together. Despite the fear, a competitive and selective tradition, and the expected reaction from other adults too socialized in it, we are adults, and we cannot continue to let all of this fall on the shoulders of children.
#AndNothingHappensSome professionals said I was “crazy.” If being “crazy” means wanting your daughter to be included in her class, then I am, very much so. My daughter will finish her school years, no one will give her back all that has been taken from her, but we still have time to not take it away from others who come after. The Education System must be for ALL, if it is not, it is useless.
#AndNothingHappensI believe this is one of the most effective and hardest initiatives you’ve undertaken, Belén. I read, I think, and I remember all the situations I’ve had to live through as a mother and a teacher, and I’m filled with indignation and anguish. I’ve spent all day reading the posts with this hashtag, and I can’t seem to sort out my emotions. I hope to be able to do so soon. […] It hurts, but it’s necessary.
#AndNothingHappensA few days ago, crying with a mother in my office. Apologizing on behalf of the entire school institution. Acknowledging and supporting the harm.
#AndNothingHappensI work in a special school as part of the educational guidance team, and more than once I have refused to sign a student’s admission. I have offered suggestions and pointed out reasons why they were being referred, which had nothing to do with the students’ diagnosis or potential. Many of those students have managed to overcome these prejudices by leaps and bounds, because in reality the difficulty was never with them, but with those who did not want them in their classrooms.
Transgressing in education, as hooks (2021) posits, is something anyone can learn. And within a framework like the one outlined on these pages, it is something we can no longer postpone as members of the school system. But it is something that proves devastating and immense if we try to do it alone. The strength of the campaign analyzed here comes precisely from collective and public work. And it is in this context that great possibilities for improvement for our schools can emerge.
Quererla es Crearla (www.creemoseducacioninclusiva.com) is a social movement that has been working in an organized way for years among the different sectors of the school community to advance the inclusive education agenda. In it, teachers, families, guidance teams, students, and universities research together to make inclusive education a reality, and so that all people can project their agency in this construction. To connect our stories in a way that generates a new story (Calderón and Rascón, 2022). To provide school guidance that respects human rights, and to jointly form a network of schools committed to the identical value of every human being.
Notes
- A brief compilation of publications can be seen, which provides a good overview of the initiative at https://tinyurl.com/224p5b7z. To learn more about the campaign, you can access Lucía’s Room profile on Instagram (https://www.instagram.com/la_habitacion_de_lucia/) or the hashtag on the X social network (https://twitter.com/hashtag/YNoPasaNadasrc=hashtag_click), as well as news in La Voz de Galicia (https://tinyurl.com/2dxrjkk5), The Education Diary (https://tinyurl.com/22cnam2y), elDiario.es (https://tinyurl.com/2xltrv2q), La Voz del Sur (https://tinyurl.com/2bmqst8c), among others. Particularly interesting is the Madresfera podcast episode dedicated to the campaign (https://tinyurl.com/23rltvcd).
References
- Calderón, I. & Echeita, G. (2022). Inclusive Education as a human right. Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Education. https://doi.org/10.1093/acrefore/9780190264093.013.1243
- Calderón, I. & Rascón, T. (2022). Weaving struggles for the right to education: collective and personal narratives for inclusion from the social model of disability. Pedagogía Social. Revista Interuniversitaria, 41, 43-54. https://doi. org/10.7179/PSRI_2022.41.03
- Calderón, I., Moreno, J. & Vila, E. (2022). Education, power, and segregation. The psychoeducational report as
- an obstacle to inclusive education. International Journal of Inclusive Education, 1-14.https://doi.org/10.1080/ 13603116.2022.2108512
- Cologon, K. (2019). Towards Inclusive Education: A Necessary Process of Transformation. Children and Young People with Disability Australia.https://tinyurl.com/yoh4uo7n
- European Agency for Development in Special Needs Education (EASNIE) (2018). Evidence of the link between inclusive education and social inclusion: A review of the literature. EASNIE.https://tinyurl. com/2jx7pqx5
- Hehir, T. et al. (2016). A summary of the evidence on inclusive education. Alana Institute.https://tinyurl.com/yxook4yx
- hooks, b. (1989). Talking back: Thinking feminist, thinking black. South End.
- hooks, b. (2021). Teaching to Transgress: Education as the Practice of Freedom. Capitán Swing.
- UN, Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (2017). Report of the inquiry relating to Spain under article 6 of the Optional Protocol. United Nations.https://bit. ly/2LmFYve
- Soldevila, J., Calderón, I. & Echeita, G. (2022). My (school) life is expendable: radicalizing the discourse against the miseries of the school system. In J. Collet, M. Naranjo & J. Soldevila (Ed), Global struggles for inclusive education: lessons from Spain (pp.17-32). Springer.https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-11476-2_2