Program Spotlight

CLAP for Inclusion: City of Hialeah Program Opening Doors for Children with Special Needs

Seated in the rec room of the City of Hialeah’s Creative Learn and Play (CLAP) program at Slade Park, 7-year-old Dario watches as his summer camp playmates eagerly reach for scissors and paper.

They trace lines around their fingers, cut out the pattern and then glue the paper hands to a round sun they’ve colored with a rainbow of crayons.

When Dario slumps in his seat, not sure how to start, inclusion aide Ivys Ribot leans in. She hands him a crayon and helps him trace his hand. A little girl across from him passes him a crayon. “Look, you color this part of the sun first,” she says. Soon Dario has the paper hands glued to his sun and he holds it up, a big smile on his face. 

Dario is one of more than 20 children with special needs in the summer camp at the Slade Park site. He has a severe attention disorder and often requires extra help, and the CLAP program, with its focus on inclusion, makes sure that he gets it.

Inclusion specialist Ivy Ribot lends a hand to help Dario get started.

“CLAP has always taken inclusion into consideration. Every one of our staff has received inclusion training, and we’ve come a long way to educate ourselves about what a special needs child is and what they need,” says Jeffrey Lagomacini, who oversees the five CLAP summer sites and eight after-school locations.

All Children’s Trust programs emphasize inclusion – educating special needs children alongside typically developing children – yet Hialeah’s CLAP program has been especially successful.

The Slade Park site is typical of Children’s Trust-funded summer camps. Activities are geared toward fun, while still stressing literacy, fitness and social-skills development. Certified teachers visit three times a week to strengthen reading skills. They also guide the children in developing an end-of-summer “Showcase” – a performance for parents with dancing, singing and acting. If the afternoon clouds don’t dump their daily deluge, head counselor Marisol Salguero leads the kids outside twice daily to play kick-ball, flag football or race around the big outside field. They go on weekly field trips – to Fantasy Theatre, Jungle Island, the Actors Playhouse, Gameworks and the Miccosoukee Indian Village.

But the high number of children with special needs who are accommodated sets this program apart. More than one in four children at the Slade Park site are identified as having special needs, a number that has increased dramatically in recent years.

“If we have the capacity to accommodate, we do, but there are some tough cases,” says Ana Pol, master inclusion teacher for the program. Pol, who handles similar duties for Miami-Dade County Public Schools, has assisted with CLAP for the past three years. She and Lagomacini reel off the names of a handful of children whose conditions posed too big a challenge, because of risks to their own safety or the safety of other children.

Through policy and training, the program has intentionally sought to increase its capacity to accommodate these children. Pol’s expertise has proved invaluable; she handles all the inclusion intake interviews with parents. Most of the disabilities are social or emotional, though the program handles a few children with physical special needs.

“I can tell nearly right away whether a child has a special need – even when the parents don’t want to tell us,” says Pol, who has 32 years experience in the field. 

Sometimes parents just don’t realize their child has a special need. They’re not aware of the red flags or symptoms. More often they don’t want to say because they fear their child won’t be admitted to a program. Especially within the Hispanic culture, there’s a heavy stigma associated with a special needs child. When asked, mom or dad or abuelo or abuela will sometimes answer “no” to the question on the form.

“I take a friendly approach, advocating for the child and letting them know it’s a win-win situation for us and the child when we know,” Pol says. In CLAP, the child gets special attention and she helps the caretakers arrange for necessary therapy or to set up an Individualized Education Plan (IEP) in their school.

Ribot is one of two inclusion aides at Slade Park. She keeps a watchful eye on Dario and the other children with special needs. The typically developing children need help to make the classroom truly inclusive. 

“Sometimes they reject a little the special needs child, wondering why does he have to be so special and get so much attention?” Ribot says, talking about Dario. “But then yesterday at the Jungle Island field trip they were asking where he was, wanting to make sure he was safe.”

There are some 60 children identified with special needs in the five CLAP sites. Three years ago there were 10.
“There’s more awareness and better diagnosis,” says Lagomacini. Many of the CLAP staff are college students studying education and are sensitive to the issues of children with special needs. He credits Pol’s expertise as a tremendous resource; the younger teachers and aides often seek her advice.
“Oh, yes,” Pol agrees, laughing, “they stop me every day to pick my brain, asking about some child or situation – and that’s why I’m here.”  

Children prepared an arts and crafts project for "Father Pick-Up Day." “Hey, Papi! Great to See you!” In addition to its successful strides to accommodate children with special needs, the City of Hialeah’s CLAP program is trying some novel ways to get more dads involved in the program. On one day last spring and on another this summer, the CLAP sites coordinated a “Father Pick-Up Day,” for dads or a principal male figure in the child’s life to pick them up from after-school or summer camp. The day was communicated by word of mouth, and kids prepared a special arts and crafts project. “Counselors and directors know which children have fathers and which ones don’t; they know if there’s a grandfather or other male role model,” said Lagomacini. Children aren’t told in advance in order to preserve an element of surprise and to avoid possible disappointment. “Then Dad or Abuelo shows up and it’s great. The kids have a smile that goes from ear to ear – it’s a very touching moment,” the CLAP director said. “It’s not a mystery that Hialeah is a working community. Some dads work two jobs to make ends meet,” he added. “We hope to open more doors for more dads/male figures to become involved more naturally.” CLAP plans a “Father Pick-Up Day” in collaboration with local public schools in the fall.

Written by Michael R. Malone