#WithNotFor
There’s a quiet revolution happening in Muswell Hill, London and I’m excited to see where it leads. On Saturday I joined a group of about 100 people to celebrate the 10th birthday of WAVE, an organization that has been working tirelessly to promote inclusion in the Muswell Hill community.
WAVE stands for We are All Valued Equally and are central to the ethos of everything they do. Whether it is their Challenge Group – set up to support parents of a young child with a learning disability, or the Wave Café – a place where people, both with and without learning disabilities, come to have fun, make things, be creative and make friends.
Their fundamental idea of With Not for is simple and yet so complex. How many times do we fall into the trap of thinking that we are helping, when what we are doing is undermining or devaluing another individual’s sense of worth, by doing things for them. And this applies to everyone. I know as a parent how tempting it can be to ensure the kitchen doesn’t get too messy when my sons are cooking, by stepping in and taking over at certain parts of the process. In reality, I’m sending a subconscious signal that they aren’t good enough to do it on their own. It takes all of my willpower to stand back and guide, rather than do it for them.
When we have children who struggle in our homes, our schools and our clubs, how do we ensure that we support them alongside, rather than taking over and doing things for them? It can feel daunting for those individuals to come into our ‘mainstream’ environments. What are we doing to bring them in and make them feel at ease?
There’s also a form of arrogance that comes with inclusion. An assumption that the only learning will be by the person with the learning disability. Ensure they are included and they will learn from their ‘mainstream’ peers. How naïve is that? As I wrote a couple of weeks ago, when I was inspired to talk about the Super Power Baby Project, our children who struggle teach us many things, and there is every reason to expect they will teach all those with whom they come into contact, in the same way.
WAVE has undertaken a 6-month research project, which identified that 57% of people interviewed never or rarely mix socially with people with a learning disability, or (if they have a learning disability) without one.
If we are to move to a truly inclusive society, we need more initiatives like WAVE throughout the country.
