What is Pearl?

 

Pearl Special Needs Foundation is a learning centre for children and young people with varied challenged and Special Educational Needs (SEN). Our sole purpose is to provide consistent support to the differently abled population. We at Pearl strive to promote equal access and opportunity for individuals who are differently abled support them in all  promotes equal access and opportunity for individuals who are differently abled and supports them in all aspects of life by enhancing their personal, social, emotional, academic, and career oriented development.

Pearl Mission

Pearl Special Needs Foundation is a learning centre for children and young people with varied disabilities or special educational needs. Its solo purpose is to provide relentless support to the disabled population of Ahmedabad city.

Disability defined as per UN,

‘Any restriction or lack (resulting from an impairment) of ability to perform an activity in the manner or within the range considered normal for a human being.’

Special education is a branch of education, which studies about the individuals who have problems or special talents in thinking, seeing, hearing, speaking and socializing. In other words it is the study of the individuals who are different from average persons. These group of differently able bodies fall under the category of  children with special needs.

Special education provides education to the students who have not benefited-or sometimes will not benefit-fully from regular classroom experience. The scope of special education is very wide as it provides several types of services and training programs from early intervention to vocational placement. It may also include school-based and home-based programs for children according to their special needs. The core of this education is to give special education students the opportunity to gain appropriate socialization skills and access to the same education as regular students while still allowing them access to resource rooms and special education classrooms.

In connection to the Indian governments’ Persons with Disabilities Act,[PWD]1995,Integrated Education for the Disabled Children[IEDC] 1992, and Sarva Sikshan Abhiyan, our aim is to ensure that the Ahmedabad children and young disabled/special needs people  have the chance to fulfill their potential by reducing levels of educational failure. It is an initiative to support the disabled school going people in achieving their full potential.

The Pearl foundation endeavours to provide the Ahmedabad disabled population with:-

  • Mainstream Education facility;

    • Safe and healthy environment;

      • Empowerment to make a positive contribution to the community;

        • Access to community life;

          • Economic well-being

          We want to put children at the heart of our policies, and to organize services around their needs. We aim to bring a radical change in the existing education system and to break down the organizational boundaries. Pearl Special Needs Foundation plans to make the society a better place for the deprived and underprivileged young population of the city.

          Pearl Objectives

          Through the Special Needs Project initiative, the base is to provide fair and equal opportunities to special needs children. To implement the mission the foundation is geared to:

          • Spread awareness in the society
          • Provide early intervention support
          • Family Support Program
          • Support mainstream schools to facilitate inclusive education
          • Facilitate services of professionals and paraprofessionals
          • Operating as a surrogate school Aid employment

          Individuals Supported at Pearl

          The centre will provide service to the stated special needs category as mentioned under Individual with Disability Education Act [I.D.E.A]:

          • Autism:
          • It is a disorder of neural development characterized by impaired social interaction and communication, and by restricted and repetitive behaviour. These signs all begin before a child is three years old.
          • Deaf blindness:
          • Deaf blindness is the condition of little or no useful sight and little or no useful hearing. Deaf blind people have an experience quite distinct from people who are only deaf or only blind.
          • Hearing impairment:
          • It is a full or partial decrease in the ability to detect or understand sounds.
          • Emotional disturbance:
          • It defines children with a serious emotional disturbance as those who are from birth to age of maturity who have had a diagnosable mental, behavioural, or emotional disorder of sufficient duration as meet diagnostic criteria specified within the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorder [DSM].
          • Intellectually Challenged:
          • It is a generalized disorder, characterized by significantly impaired cognitive functioning. It includes both a component relating to mental functioning and one relating to individuals’ functional skills in their environment.
          • Multiple disabilities:
          • It has a combination of more than one disability. This can in combination of any physical and intellectual disability.
          • Orthopedic impairment:
          • Severe orthopedic impairment that adversely affects a child’s educational performance. The term includes impairments caused by congenital anomaly (e.g., clubfoot, absence of some member, etc.), impairments caused by disease (e.g., poliomyelitis, bone tuberculosis, etc.), and impairments from other causes (e.g., cerebral palsy, amputations, and fractures or burns that cause contractures).
          • Other health impairment:
          • Having limited strength, vitality or alertness, including heightened alertness to environmental stimuli, that results in limited alertness with respects to the educational environment, that: is due to chronic or acute health problems such as asthma, attention deficit disorder or attention hyperactivity disorder, diabetes, epilepsy, a heart condition, hemophilia, lead poisoning, leukemia, nephritis, rheumatic fever, and sickle cell anemia; and adversely affects a child’s educational performance.
          • Specific learning disability:
          • A disorder in one or more of the basic psychological processes involved in understanding or in using language, spoken or written, that may manifest itself in an imperfect ability to listen, think, speak, read, write, spell, or to do mathematical calculations, including conditions such as perceptual disabilities, brain injury, minimal brain dysfunction, dyslexia, and developmental aphasia.
          • Speech or language impairment:
          • Communication disorder, such as stuttering, impaired articulation, a language impairment, or a voice impairment, that adversely affects a child’s educational performance.
          • Traumatic brain injury:
          • An acquired injury to the brain caused by an external physical force, resulting in total or partial functional disability or psychosocial impairment, or both, that adversely affects a child’s educational performance. The term applies to open or closed head injuries resulting in impairments in one or more areas, such as cognition; language; memory; attention; reasoning; abstract thinking; judgment; problem-solving; sensory; perceptual, and motor abilities; psychosocial behavior; physical functions; information processing; and speech.
          • Visual impairment including blindness:
          • An impairment in vision that, even with correction, adversely affects a child’s educational performance.