Assessment of Anne Arundel Autism Service

[Anonymous]

We are moving to the DC area soon and are looking at possible places to live. Does anyone live in Arundel Country and have experiences with their autism pre-k services.

Any insight would be greatly appreciated.

[Anonymous]

I live in AA Co. In my experience, at pre-K they don't separate the autistic kids but rather place them in with the kids with other needs. This was the case at least where my son went to pre-K, Central Special -- which is overall an amazing place and the school where those kids with more severe special needs stay for their educational careers.
Their view was that a mixed exposure yielded better performance overall. So non-verbal kids learning to speak or encouraged to speak from verbal kids, kids, etc. In my kid's classroom there were children with physical disabilities, nuerological disabilities, and kids with needs you couldn't identify by just observing them for 5 or 10 minutes. It was mixed bag for sure and intentionally so. They also had super low rates. I'm talking 3:1 max with a teacher's aide to boot, not to mention all the therapists on-site.

Now at school age I do understand they have schools that have autism programs. One is housed at Millersville Elementary which is a decent elementary. Not top of the heap, but pretty good from what I hear.