“Why is the government forcing children with disabilities to attend board exams when they give a waiver to regular students? The government knows it is difficult for children with disabilities to even understand the word coronavirus. They are simply playing with the lives of the students and the parents,” said Coimbatore-based Abarna, mother of Adithya*.
Adithya is a 17-year-old with autism who will be writing his Class 10 board exams on September 21. Students with disabilities enroll themselves as private candidates for board exams in the state; they were not included in the announcement made by the Tamil Nadu government declaring Class 10 students as ‘all pass’.
On June 9, the state government passed all students of Class 10 and exempted them from writing board exams amid the COVID-19 pandemic.However, private candidates including children with disabilities, were not declared ‘all pass’. One official had told DTNext that as private students do not attend classes and undergo quarterly or half-yearly examinations, their performance cannot be evaluated.
The difference in approach followed by the Tamil Nadu government and the waiver for regular candidates alone have forced parents of children with disabilities to prepare for their wards’ exams after a gap of five months. This after the Madras High Court offered no relief, directing the School Education Department to go ahead with the exams after ensuring students undergo a COVID-19 test two days before they give the test.
With each student needing individual attention, the decision of the government has put them all in a traumatic situation, parents allege.
Revising at home
The process of teaching everything from scratch has been more than tiring for Abarna. “When the news on ‘all pass’ was announced, everyone thought that the order was applicable even for private candidates as well. However, only later we got to know that the order is not applicable for private students. Even then, we thought the government would cancel the exams. The demand for cancelling continues and the practical exams began on Thursday,” Abarna said.
Teachers and schools did not take any effort to continue teaching the students during lockdown. “I had to teach everything from the beginning and I do not know how much he will grasp and write,” she said.
The issue is similar with Santhosh* who will attend the exam in a few days. Santhosh has Sensory Processing Disorder or SPD, a condition in which children have difficulties processing information received through the senses. Santhosh’s parents have been single-handedly trying to teach him portions from Class 10 textbooks.
“I am trying to teach him, but I don’t think he is learning them. The lockdown has been hard on him as well. He wants to attend the exam, so I am helping him but it is taking a toll on my mental health as well. The students will be allowed into the center only after a COVID-19 test and I don't even know if he will cooperate,” said Shankar*, father of Santhosh.
Parents of children with disabilities are under pressure over making their children undergo coronavirus tests.
Pre-exam hurdles
Parents are worried whether their children will cooperate with pre-exam COVID-19 tests and whether their wards will contract the infection from coronavirus test centers. There have been many occasions where Adithya did not cooperate for medical examinations, said Abarna.
“I took Adithya to the doctor in his much younger years since he put a battery inside his nose. He did not cooperate for the treatment and he was pushing aside the doctors all the time. Finally, nine people had to hold him so that the doctor could remove the battery. Now, the doctors will take a swab from the nose and it just reminds me of that scene,” said Abarna.
According to the parents, their children communicate happiness, anger and sadness in different ways. Adithya used to push his mother or people nearby to communicate these emotions. So even if he gets irritated, we do not know how we will handle it in the exam hall, Abarna said.
“Just in case he contracts infection, who will take the responsibility and how can he stay in isolation for 14 days without me? How will he handle everything all by himself? This is not possible, so I need to go with him to the hospital. So the government is putting both our lives at risks,” she said.
The parents are also scared to send their wards to the examination since the compulsory enforcement of wearing masks may not be possible with all the children.
Shankar said, “We are scared to send my child for exams because of the fear of coronavirus spread. We do not know how the students will sit with the masks for so long and interact with the scribe. The risk of infection is higher and the examination centers are also located at a distant place.”
Adding to their woes, the students are allotted examination centers 15-25 kilometers away from their homes. While Santhosh will have to attend the examination in a center located 15 kilometers away in the outskirts of Chennai, Adithya received an examination center 20 kilometers away from their home in Coimbatore.
Shankar said, “I tried my best to shift the exam center within my city, but to no avail. The officials said that I cannot do anything and that I should take my child to the outskirts.”
The parents have been told to get their children ready by 7 am to attend the exams in a few exam centers. This particularly affects the health of children, especially those with Down's syndrome.
“The students got used to sleeping late into the night and waking up late. Now a parent of a child with Down’s syndrome tried to change the routine and the child got seizures. The problems of people with disabilities are endless,” said Abarna.
Demand to cancel exams
The confusion over making the children attend the exams has taken a toll on the mental and physical health of the parents.
Shankar said, “I went to the hospital and took drips. I also sat for counseling sessions because thinking about his future is already disturbing and now, they have rubbed salt on our wound. My child is also scared to attend exams, but he always keeps changing his opinion due to the sensory problem. Initially, he did not want to attend the exam, but now he wants to attend.”
The students have an option to take a break year, but the parents strongly oppose the idea and say that the idea is discriminatory. “My son is studying the same portion as regular school children and he is in fact putting in extra effort to study. If the government can cancel the exam for them, what is stopping them from giving my son a waiver? They can cancel the exam and declare all the children with disabilities enrolled with special schools as all pass,” Abarna said.
“Why should my son waste a year just because the government is not listening to our requests? My son has also invested one-and-a-half years for this,” she added.
Parents of students with cognitive difficulties said that a break year will look bad on their child’s CV and that their children may question their decision in the future.
“The government could have declared ‘all pass’ considering the situation of people with disabilities and people with intellectual difficulties. At least now the government should cancel exams for special children and put an end to their trauma during the pandemic,” demanded the parents.
‘Abiding by HC order’
Speaking to TNM, the Commissioner for Persons with Disabilities Johny Tom Varghese said, "We are abiding by the Madras High Court order and Tamil Nadu Education Department is conducting the exams. Our department for differently-able people is providing all the support for the smooth conduct of the exams. We have personally contacted all the PwD candidates who are attending the exams to know about their decision to attend the exam."
The Department has also given the provision for parents to call the Chief Education Officer and District Differently-Abled Welfare Officer to ask for a change of examination centres. "We have taken a lot of effort to help the students comfortably attend the exam. The students can choose an accessible centre in the schools allotted to them or they can opt for a change of centre to a nearby special school," he said. "The parents can contact the district officials regarding the change of centre by 3 pm of September 18.”
