What does seclusion look like in an elementary school?

[Anonymous]

If she was allegedly held down for not complying, how would holding her down create compliance? Something doesn’t add up in this story.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If she was allegedly held down for not complying, how would holding her down create compliance? Something doesn’t add up in this story.

You don't sound like you're very familiar with illegal restraints. Take it from me, that's a good thing.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This is OP. She wasn’t a danger to herself or anyone else. They aren’t claiming she was. They were just trying to get her to do what they wanted/needed her to do. I am a lawyer. I’m not actually asking for advice about the hold. It was blatantly illegal. I’m asking about the seclusion part.

My concern is that if they are so comfortable illegally restraining children, perhaps they are comfortable illegally secluding them as well. I want to be clear that they are not permitted to do either. I don’t know how seclusion comes up, though. It’s not like they have a padded room they put kids in, as far as I know! Does anyone have insight?

Ok, thanks for clarifying. Your post led with the restraint so I think a lot of the responders thought you were confused about that too.


OP, on what authority do you think you can demand that a school not seclude your child? In my state, it is allowed. Perhaps it is not in your state?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This is OP. She wasn’t a danger to herself or anyone else. They aren’t claiming she was. They were just trying to get her to do what they wanted/needed her to do. I am a lawyer. I’m not actually asking for advice about the hold. It was blatantly illegal. I’m asking about the seclusion part.

My concern is that if they are so comfortable illegally restraining children, perhaps they are comfortable illegally secluding them as well. I want to be clear that they are not permitted to do either. I don’t know how seclusion comes up, though. It’s not like they have a padded room they put kids in, as far as I know! Does anyone have insight?

Ok, thanks for clarifying. Your post led with the restraint so I think a lot of the responders thought you were confused about that too.


OP, on what authority do you think you can demand that a school not seclude your child? In my state, it is allowed. Perhaps it is not in your state?

In Maryland, seclusion is no longer allowed. Exclusion is allowed, but limited to a time period of 30 minutes. Seclusion means the child is in a room alone, and blocked from exiting the room. Exclusion means that the child is removed from the classroom, but remains with a staff member and is not blocked from leaving.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It depends on your school system. In FCPS we did have seclusion rooms in special ed center programs. They were small rooms with windows, no padding. They were outlawed, and now there are children who continue to have severe mental health crises and need to be contained, but can’t be. That’s a whole different topic. They were only used after other interventions were tried and documented, with close supervision while the child was inside. Only if the child was a danger to self or others. Just a small room.

While that may have been the intent, that's not what was going on. My child was in a CSS program in FCPS. At first we were in favor of the "quiet rooms" -- a safe place to calm down an regulate? No harm in that. The problem is that it became the automatic punishment for any sort of infraction. Didn't matter if the child was a danger to himself or others. Ripping up a writing assignment because of frustration? Off to the quiet room. My kid couldn't handle the room, and knowing where he was being brought, he'd try to run away to avoid the room, or when placed in there would wrap his shirt around his neck and bang his head on the floor or walls. Anything to try to get out of the room. The room was having the opposite effect of what was intended, and made the behavior so much worse. Impulsivity may have been why he did something wrong in the first place, but the fear of going to the room as a result would amplify the behaviors. And yet the school wasn't willing to try anything different because the script just called for putting kids in the room.

But this was in the days before the rooms were phased out. On the "plus side" for us, there was always documentation, and there was supervision -- this wasn't at one of the schools that concealed the info from parents.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If she was allegedly held down for not complying, how would holding her down create compliance? Something doesn’t add up in this story.

You don't sound like you're very familiar with illegal restraints. Take it from me, that's a good thing.

I’m very familiar with legal restraints and emergency restraints and something about this still doesn’t add up. What were they trying to achieve by doing this?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote: Former NoVa family. My son's elementary school had a utility closet in the main office that they would lock one of the kids in. It was terrible. Just knowing that this could happen at school really messed up my kid.

What year was this?

I pulled my special needs child out of the public school system because I'd rather pay for an aide. One of our home therapists described a similar situation in the public school she worked at.

You can get it on the IEP but good luck proving it

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This is OP. She wasn’t a danger to herself or anyone else. They aren’t claiming she was. They were just trying to get her to do what they wanted/needed her to do. I am a lawyer. I’m not actually asking for advice about the hold. It was blatantly illegal. I’m asking about the seclusion part.

My concern is that if they are so comfortable illegally restraining children, perhaps they are comfortable illegally secluding them as well. I want to be clear that they are not permitted to do either. I don’t know how seclusion comes up, though. It’s not like they have a padded room they put kids in, as far as I know! Does anyone have insight?

If this is MCPS I don't think we are allowed to do any holds or seclusion without documentation on the IEP. Also, I think seclusion specifically has to be done only in certain programs because the rooms have to meet certain specifications. They should DEFINITELY not be holding a kid down due to noncompliance. Yikes! I teach in gen ed home school model and I wouldn't put my hands on a kid, ever. If a student refuses to do something we just wait. I even had a kid elope outside the school and I just followed. We don't lock kids in places and we don't hold them down. If I had to remove anyone I'd remove the other kids. No way would I put my hands on a kid in gen ed.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What kind of lawyer are you, OP?

Seclusion happens all sorts of ways. It can be as overt as sending kid to hallway alone, or as covert as sending kid to library during class time.

I am also a lawyer and would be on the news if school restrained my child. You seem very calm.

You need to look up the definition of seclusion, cause sending a kid to the library ain't it.

[Anonymous]

OP - I don't think you are able to tell them that they can't use either restraint or seclusion in appropriate situations, if the district allows it. If they use it as an emergency procedure, then a parent doesn't have the right to say no, just like a parent doesn't have the right to say no to a fire drill. That isn't to say you shouldn't go after them for illegal or inappropriate use of restraint or seclusion - you should!

Does your child have a positive behavior support plan? This would ideally outline antecedent and consequent strategies. Having a strong plan in place could help prevent inappropriate use of restraint and seclusion.