Families Against Restraint and Seclusion

Friday, December 3, 2010

Pahrump school officials charged in special ed abuse case

Thursday, Dec. 2, 2010 By Jackie Valley (contact)

Nevada - Four faculty members at Floyd Elementary School in Pahrump have been formally charged in connection with the alleged abuse of children in a special education class, Nye County District Attorney Brian Kunzi announced today.
Principal Holly Lepisto, teacher Sarah Hopkins, and classroom aides Kathryn Cummings and Phyllis Du Shane have each been charged with one count of child abuse or neglect, a category B felony, officials said. They were arrested Nov. 23.
Hopkins, Cummings and Du Shane allegedly used physical force on four students in Hopkins' special education class during the past year, according to the criminal complaint. The 5- to 7-year-old children, who have a variety of physical and mental disabilities, were subjected to "spankings," "flicking," "pushing," "slapping," "violent shaking" and "grabbing," the criminal complaint alleges. Please click on the link below to read the full article.
http://www.lasvegassun.com/news/2010/dec/02/pahrump-school-officials-charged-special-ed-abuse-/

Welcome to Families Against Restraint and Seclusion

If you've clicked on this blog, most likely it's because you or someone you love has experienced the overuse or unnecesary use of restraint and seclusion. If that's the case, we're glad you've found us, but are sorry you've had need to. We're here to provide guidance and support to those who need it.For everyone else, we wish to inform you that restraint and seclusion are very real and could happen to anyone's children. Every day children with disabilities are restrained or put in seclusion against their will with no parental notification for "noncompliance" and "behavior issues." We understand that under emergency conditions restraint and seclusion may be necessary as a last resort in order to protect the child from harm to self or others, but in many cases these incidences could be avoided.It is our belief that all children should be entitled to a free, appropriate, and SAFE education in the public school system, as specified under IDEA.Together, we can make this a reality for our children!

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Shouldn’t School Be Safe?

Parent Guide – Prevention, Identification and Response to Restraint and Seclusion Developed by parents and for parents. Shouldn’t School Be Safe? is a guide covering the prevention and identification
of, as well as the response to, instances of restraint, seclusion or other aversive interventions.
View and download this report by clicking on the link
below.

http://tash.org/wpcontent/uploads/2011/05/TASH_Shouldnt-School-Be-Safe1.pdf