By Andrew Brown
andrew@peicanada.comLesley MacCallum of Brudenell has a 3-year-old son with Autism, and she is struggling to get him the help he needs on PEI.
"My son was supposed to start assessments on October 19 for an intensive behavioral intervention, but the specialist fell ill and is off work indefinitely. Now I’m told I have to wait until January when two new specialists arrive on the Island," MacCallum said.
The specialist is important because they are the go-to person for everything. The specialist decides what the child needs to learn, and how he or she should be taught. On top of that, a tutor, who works up to four hours daily with the child, is hired to be in contact with the specialist.
Without the assessment, however, parents do not receive funding to pay for the tutor.
"I have a tutor hired, she’s on hold," Ms MacCallum said. "We’re all ready to go but we need that specialist to know what to do. The funding comes from disability support, and we won’t get that until the autism specialist sees them."
No one at the Department of Education and Early Childhood Development was available for comment. The department is sending out a letter this week that includes the following:
"Currently 26 preschool children are receiving the IBI (Intensive Behavioral Intervention) service. The department has recently been successful in hiring a Preschool Autism Coordinator. A new preschool Autism specialist will also start in early January.
Recruitment of qualified staff with the necessary education and experience in applied behaviour analysis is a challenge across the country. We are fortunate to have recruited three new staff in recent months, well qualified individuals to Prince Edward Island to work in this field."
When working with children who have autism, studies show it’s best to start helping them as young as possible. This isn’t the first time Ms MacCallum was told by the province she would have to wait.
"I was told there was a question of Autism in August of 2008, when my son was two, and I would have to wait until September, 2009, for his assessment. I went off the Island and paid a private psychologist to do his assessment in January, 2009," Ms MacCallum said. "I’m grateful I did this because he did get on the Autism pre-school list a year earlier than if I had waited."
For now, Ms MacCallum can do nothing but wait while months that could be used to help her son pass.
via peicanada.com
