I suppose the subject of my blog entry today is pretty obvious: the government’s overhaul of SEND provision as a result of the dramatic rise in the number of students with special needs. The thing is, I honestly have no idea what to make of this spike. As I touched upon here, I grew up in a class of young people with fairly severe physical disabilities: they all had conditions like Muscular Dystrophy and Spina Bifida, which have well established causes and effects. I must thus admit to being rather puzzled by this sudden dramatic rise in kids with special needs: many apparently have far more ambiguous conditions, such as anxiety.

I will obviously know about as much as any other layperson about what caused this increase, yet I must admit it seems very perplexing. It just suddenly feels as if a core aspect of my identity, which I have always had to overcome and which has always set me apart, is now being opened up and politicised. The status of having a disability, of whatever kind, is being claimed by people who never used to; it is being ascribed to kids for more and more tenuous or political reasons. More to the point, the education system is now having to deal with this rapid change. Children are increasingly being othered; their behaviour – which may well have previously been seen as normal – is now being perceived in the same manner as a physical disability. I worry it gives young people pseudo-medical labels which they might not ultimately need, but which they then unconsciously internalise and conform to in a way which may not necessarily be healthy. It sort of seems to me that having a disability of whatever kind has become almost fashionable, and having a kid with special educational needs possibly even more so. I suppose that if it means that young people get the support they need, then it’s fair enough: yet I can’t help feeling that a large aspect of my identity and life experience is being opened up, watered down, and rendered in terms of just another sociopolitical identity without people having any real understanding of what having a physical disability really means.