Today is the world's first Autism Awareness Day, proclaimed United Nation's Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon. He called on every country to raise awareness of autism and respond to the needs of autistic children and their families with "a powerful combination of determination, creativity and hope." Autism affects tens of millions worldwide, including 1.5 million Americans and (unofficially) 1 million Chinese. "Let us empower them and respond to their needs today, so as to make our societies more accessible, enabling and empowering for all our children tomorrow," said Ban. Therefore, it is only fitting for me to write about the only educational institute for autistic children in China, and one mother's fight against the system to give her autistic son "a little bit" of hope.
Tian Huiping, founder of the Star and Rain Education Institute for Autism, had rather humble beginnings. The institute, the only school and outreach program in China with particular focus of educating autistic children, helps more than 3,000 students a day of all ages, many of whom traveled hundreds of miles to take the 11-week course on offer. Tian is not an entrepreneur looking for a niche Chinese market in autism. She isn't the most optimistic person in China either.
When her son was diagnosed with autism, she planned on poisoning herself and her son. Before her institute was founded 15 years ago, help from the government was minimal, usually "help" came in the form of persuading parents to have another child by taking advantage of a loophole in the One-Child Policy concerning parents of disabled children. Luckily for China, Tian did not poison herself (nor her child) and instead stumbled upon a pamphlet written by the Taiwan Autism Association on the basics of teaching children with autism. With six autistic children, including her own child, she began with a kindergarten class and saw hope, albeit only a little bit, before the kindergarten had to close down due to financial troubles. Yet that hope carried her a long way, transforming her from a pessimistic mother to an educator.
The Institute now worked with an American counterpart, the Kansas-based Heartspring. Educators from Tian's Institute often travel to Kansas to train, and vice versa. According to an educator from Heartspring, the Star and Rain Education Institute has almost no resources and limited access to modern technology/research due to lack of government funding. However, what can be see in China is the "value of family, the passion, the empathy, the sacrifice that I don't see as much in the United States."
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