Sattik was diagnosed with Cerebral Palsy with hemiplegia due to asphyxia at birth and swallowing of meconium fluid. His struggles were daunting but with the untiring support of his parents, he has come a long way. He has mild speech and language problems with motor difficulties in the left leg and hand which affects the speed of his work. In 2010 he joined SBS in Grade 6 in the mainstream class with full learning support and remediation in English. Encouragement from the mainstream as well as the remedial teachers helped him to gain confidence.
The SBS ethos reinforced his ‘never give up’ attitude and made him more assertive in conveying his thoughts and opinions. Sattik’s tenacity along with a strong support system at home aided him to pass his class X board exams in 2015 with flying colours. Today he proudly travels on his own to Shaheed Bhagat Singh college, Delhi University where he is pursuing the B.Com. course. He participated in the college cricket team in his first year and in the second year he helped under-privileged children in Jamia during weekends.
Arav was diagnosed with dilation of the right ventricle of his brain. This affected his creativity and imagination. Also, because his processing speed was affected, he used to take time to collect his thoughts before speaking. In his previous schools, he had been facing academic difficulties especially in reading and writing.
In 2010, when he was 11 years old, Arav joined the Department of Special Needs at Step By Step School. Here his parents were closely involved in his teaching-learning process. They were empowered with strategies to develop reading skills through a customized reading program. He progressed from reading sight words, to simple sentences with familiar words and then on to short stories. Along with academics, there was a consistent focus on skill sets in areas of Activities of Daily Living (ADLs), Adolescent Education Programme (AEP) and general awareness. A customized sports and fitness programme contributed majorly in his overall development. At the age of 14 years, as part of the Prevocational Training Programme Arav got an opportunity to work in various training domains in the school like Kitchen, Library, Stationary Supply Store and IT Department. The programme helped him to enhance his work skills.
At the age of 16 years, he started a two year Intensive Prevocational Training in the IT Department and also attended summer training programmes there. Arav assisted in assignments such as updating software in the ICT Labs, maintenance of projectors, covering events in school (still photography as well as video shooting) and rendering of students’ photographs for school ID Cards.
In 2018, after leaving school at the age of 18 years, he passed the Secondary School exams through the NIOS board.
In April 2019, Arav joined the IT department at SBS as a Trainee. This is the first time that a student, and that too from the Special Education Department, has been given this opportunity. Apart from being a feather in our ‘Inclusive Cap’, it is a great step forward for him. This was possible only due to the combined efforts of school, parents and of course Arav.
