ustxtxb_obs_1975_12_26_50_00013-00000_000.pdf

.1-IALF PRICE RECORDS AAGAZINE AUSTItt iSig LAVACA. WACO: 25014 COLUM.BUg DALLAS: 4535 IviciatiniAVZ. i OS r.Ltii. S119 LOVVRO Bw. 205 S. ZANG lb $X70:07K PRICE5. from professionals in the community mental health centers in their areas. Yet, in spite of the millions spent for this purpose, that help has not been forthcoming. Dr. Irving N. Berlin, chief of the Division of Child Psychiatry of the University of Washington School of Medicine, wrote this year that child treatment in community mental health centers is a “myth.” He reminds his colleagues that the community mental health movement was mandated by federal law to provide children’s services. Berlin estimated that “only about 6 percent of all mental health centers render consultation and education services to the schools, and most of the existing services are for diagnosis and evaluation of severe behavioral disorders and work with disturbed children. The consultative type is rare.” Consultation to teachers is generally defined as dealing with a teacher’s hangups, or in Berlin’s words, the task is “to deal with a teacher’s internal obstacles to working with some children and increase the capacity to deal with them.” The flaws, then, are in the teachers themselves, not in the demeaning aspects of their jobs. Small wonder that the teachers look askance at such help. Calling on the psychiatrists is often not even considered as an option by school officials confronted with a Problem that is clearly within their realm. The July 1975 American School Board Journal included an editorial on how to deal with a female student who reveals to a teacher or nurse that she is being sexually abused by her father in the home. The advice given school authorities is to have the nurse or the teacher help the child to reveal the information to her mother and “authorities,” presumably police. The only “expert” mentioned in the editorial is columnist Ann Landers. Help for emotional, damage done to the child, referrals to special agencies offering help in child abuse were not mentioned, except the self-help type such as Parents Anonymous. If teachers have written off the experts, their bosses have not. They have found in them willing allies in their quest for law and order in the schools. Child psychologists and psychiatrists have directed their labors to the identification of various forms of noncompliance in children. There is now a wide range of labels applied to those who do not fit into the mold set by the schools. By naming children “minimally brain damaged,” “learning disabled,” or “emotionally disturbed,” they may be segregated, removed from school, or drugged. Peter Schrag and Diane Divoky in The Myth of the Hyperactive Child and Other Means of Child Control cite the results of court-ordered testing of children in Washington who were segregated into special classes on the basis of some pathological condition. The tests showed that two-thirds of the children had been mislabeled and misplaced in special classes. Studies in Philadelphia and San Francisco produced similar results. IN “SPECIAL” or “regular” classrooms, many children are drugged to make them docile. In The Nation of Nov. 1, Farnum Gray wrote that “between half a million and two million school children in the United States are given daily doses of Ritalin or amphetamines to make their classroom behavior acceptable.” Gray cites research studies which demonstrate that while the drugs do indeed suppress hyperactivity, they also suppress learning. Columnist Nat Hentoff said that the numbers of school children on psychoactive drugs are rising because they make the children more “manageable” in class. Parents who object to the dangers and the side effects are ordered to consent to continued drugging of their children or see them “banished from the public schools or consigned to sections for the mentally retarded.” For those who are banished by expulsion, the life of the street is waitinga life where feelings of hatred for a society that has no need of children are acted out in increasingly violent ways. For others, there are the state training schools for delinquents, accurately named because delinquency is precisely what their inmates acquire. And there are other specialized institutions for those who have had exotic labels hung on them by the courts. Classified advertising is 20d per word. Discounts for multiple insertions within a 12-month period; 26 times, 50%; 12 times, 25%; 6 times, 10%. BOOKPLATES. Free catalog. Many beautiful designs. Special designing too. Address: BOOKPLATES, P.O. Box 28-1, Yellow Springs, Ohio 45387. PLAYING THE RECORDER IS EASY. Free catalog, best recorders, recorder music. Beginner’s Pearwood Soprano Book, $11.95. Amster Music, 1624 Lavaca, Austin. GUITAR PICKERS. Buy your guitar strings from us and save 20%. Mail orders accepted. Amster Music, 1624 Lavaca, Austin. JOIN THE ACLU. Membership $15. Texas Civil Liberties Union, 600 West 7th, Austin, Texas 78701. BOOK-HUNTING? No obligation search for rare or out-of-print books. Ruth and John McCully. ‘Austin, Texas 78703. WANTED. Political campaign buttons and memorabilia. National or state. George Meyer, 2204 Matthews Dr., Austin 78703, or phone 478-2848. JOIN COMMON CAUSE. Only one person can make democracy work again… YOU. $15 \($7 Lavaca, Austin, Texas 78701. PRISON REFORM Now available from the National Council on Crime and Delinquency: Excerpts from the Final Report of the Joint Committee on Prison Reform. Send $1 to Texas December 26, 1975 13 NCCD, 3409 Executive Center Drive, #212, Austin, Texas 78731. INTERESTED IN CRIMINAL JUSTICE RE-FORM? Join the National Council on Crime and Delinquency in Texas. Write NCCD, 3409 Executive Center Drive, #212, Austin, Texas 78731. THE NEW YORK TIMES Sunday edition delivered to your home in the Dallas area. Call 239-5235 for rates and information. NEW ORLEANS ON $8 A YEAR. The Weekly Courier, 1232 Decatur, 70116. GENERAL HOME AND AUTO REPAIRS. Jim CYCLAR: A Women’s Community Calendar. Women-made and distributed. Monthly photographs, date grid with room for notes, information on famous women, facts and female first. 91/2 inches by 121/2 inches, spiral bound recycled paper. Bulk rates to women’s groups for money raising. $4 each, add 50 \(VI . mailing. Traveling Light, P.O. Box 6063, Austin, Texas 78762 ENJOY READING AGAIN. Texas Center for Writers Press announces: FICTION AND POETRY BY TEXAS WOMEN and NEW AND EXPERIMENTAL LITERATURE plus the bestselling BICENTENNIAL COLLECTION OF TEXAS SHORT STORIES. Each $5.95. Order from: Air Terminal Station Box 6281, Midland, Texas 79701. TABLE TENNIS: Equipment, publications, tournaments, clubs, etc. Details $1.00. Jack Mel, P.O. Box 35025, Houston, Texas 77035. The Outposil Austin’s Best Barbecue 11:00-7:30 Monday-Friday Closed Saturday and Sunday David and Marion Moss 345-9045 Highway 183 North CLASSIFIED