Special education schools ask parents to assume risk

Civic group, teachers call situation ’discrimination’

Lee is in third grade at a special education school in Busan. On his first day of school, his mother was met with a shock: she was told to sign a waiver stating, "I will not hold the school responsible in the event of an accident."

Although it was nothing new for Lee’s mother to have to take responsibility if she were to bring her autistic child to a skating rink, for example, she was uneasy with the thought of "even the special education school shrinking from responsibility." Other parents of disabled children were made to sign and submit this form, as well.

Representative An Min-seok of the Uri Party and The Joint Association for the Education Right of the Disabled collected school regulations from 141 of the 143 special education schools in South Korea, and announced on October 10 that 73 (51.8 percent) required the parent or guardian of the student to submit a separate document on which they sign away the school’s liability in the event of an accident. Some of the forms went so far as to require a witness signature.

These waivers included such statements as "enrolled students cannot hold the school liable for any problems that occur," "objections may not be presented in the case of expulsion," and that "responsibility for any accidents that occur due to the physical and or mental impediments of the child must be assumed by the parent," thus effectively transferring all responsibility for safety of the student to the parent or guardian.

All schools in Daejeon and South Jeolla and Jeju provinces, and 80 percent of the schools in Gwangju and North Jeolla and South Chungcheong provinces request such documents. If one looks at the instances in which such documents are required, despite the fact that school regulations do not deem them necessary, then the percentages are even higher.

Teacher at a special education school and the policy head for the Committee of Special Education at the Korean Teachers and Education Workers Union, Jeong Jae-u, called it a clear case of discrimination when one considers the case of schools for non-disabled students, where the parents are not requested to fill out such forms.

The number of special education schools that, contrary to the law, limit the total number of students, or leave the decision over admissions to the principal, numbered 71 and 50, respectively. Moreover, though under Korean law elementary and middle schools may not expel their students because they have the right to education, 15 special education schools - or 11 percent - maintain provisions to do exactly that.

On the other hand, a mere 54 schools allow students to form clubs and extracurricular activities, a mandatory right under law. Furthermore, only 97 of the 141 schools had provisions in place for specialized educational administration committees in order to meet the needs of their students.