–    One Boy’s Story
“I am not handicapped. I am special…special people do things differently…people do not think like this…that has to change,” said young Gladwin Williams.
The teenager has a learning disability, discovered when he was much younger, and is currently enrolled at the New Amsterdam Special Needs School.
In speaking to the Guyana Chronicle, he confesses that he likes learning and does so more comfortably at the Special Needs School
“It is different here…they take their time with me and I learn more,” he said. However, Gladwin also confessed that it is more difficult because of the discrimination meted out by, not only boys and girls his age, but some adults who think him “stupid” because of his disability and the fact that he attends a Special Needs School.
“I feel bad when they trouble me and call me handicap…I ignore them, but sometimes I fight,” Gladwin said.
Disclosing the fact that he gets into fights, the youngster lowers his head – an acknowledgement that fighting is  something he  would not have to do if more people were more understanding.
When asked, Gladwin notes that he’s not proud of fighting, but it is something he feels he must do, for whatever reason, and there are many – including the right to be respected.
Young Gladwin told the Guyana Chronicle that he wants to learn because there is more that he wants to do in life.
He noted that his career of choice is carpentry.
“I want be a carpenter…I want to build things,” he said.
Gladwin is only one child with  one of many different kinds of disabilities, but like any individual he wants to be given a chance to simply be and fulfil the potential he knows he has.
Gladwin makes it clear that while he may be called handicapped, he is not.
“Everyone is different,” he posits.
Everyone is different and being different is not necessarily a bad thing, it should not be seen as such.
Head teacher of the New Amsterdam Special Needs School, Ms. Zoyce Crandon, has been dealing with special education for 15 years.
She contends that each child has a right to education and the real ‘disability’ is the perception of those with a disability.
According to Crandon, the challenge is getting schools to understand that there is a problem and in recognizing that problem, respond to it.
“Persons with disabilities are being more recognised because of the advocacy that is being done, but we have a long way to go,” she said.
“We all live with the objective of being happy; our lives are all different and yet the same,” according to Anne Frank, Writer of Anne Frank’s Diary.
Anne Frank and her parents were Jews who fled Germany in 1933 as the Nazi’s came to power. They lived in Amsterdam in the Netherlands during the country’s occupation by the Nazis. Otto Frank, Anne’s father hid the family in secret rooms in a warehouse in 1942. Even.