[DRAFT] Education for Mentally Disabled Children (bumped)

[Bears Armed]

"I would like to contest that, Ambassador Helmsworth," says Iksana, raising his hand. "Children means the young of any sapient species, by my reckoning. Elven children are children, human children are children, pretty sure if there are giant lizard folk out there their children would be children too. And I would very much contest the implication that my species isn't people."

I must apologize for my choice of words, delegate. I did not intend to exclude any species from the words 'children' or 'people', but rather to point out that these words do not apply to all species. A relevant example might be the cubs of bears. However I do believe that this point is tangential, and I hope the sponsor of this proposal is not offended by our discussion.

-Ronald Helmsworth, delegate of Ledaj to the General Assembly

"We don't rregard the term 'children' as species-limited: To urrs, that means the young of any sapient beings whereas 'cubs' means the young of any bears -- whether sapient or not -- and so either term can be used for ourr young..."

Artorrios o SouthWoods,
ChairBear, Bears Armed Mission at the World Assembly.

[Ledaj]

"We don't rregard the term 'children' as species-limited: To urrs, that means the young of any sapient beings whereas 'cubs' means the young of any bears -- whether sapient or not -- and so either term can be used for ourr young..."

Artorrios o SouthWoods,
ChairBear, Bears Armed Mission at the World Assembly.

Helmsworth looked down embarrassed, and then, summoning courage, faced the extremely knowledgeable and most respected delegate.
"Thank you, sir, for clarifying this point for me. I wish to apologize to any species I may have inadvertently given offense to. Thank you for assisting me in improving my knowledge of the contemporary interpretation of these key terms."
Helmsworth sat down, and quickly began to studiously examine records of past rulings.
Ronald Helmsworth, delegate of Ledaj to the GA

[Araraukar]

So a term such as "challenged" grates slightly through being non-standard.

OOC: That's a very stupid reason, if it is the only reason, but I changed it to what is mentioned in GA #80's clause 5, which is what I'm basing this thing on for not counting as duplication. (Although GA #80 is also about all citizens, while this one is about children.)

Also made enough changes to the wordings (some of which, while small, significantly alter the intention) to call it a new draft. The changes can be found in the version notes.

EDIT: Did some digging on the Internet...

From here:

Mentally Challenged

"Challenged" has become a preferred word to "handicapped" and mentally challenged is a politically correct catch all for people with mental disabilities. Other terms such as mentally handicapped or mentally disadvantaged also have their supporters, and no word perfectly describes everyone with a mental disability, but mentally challenged is nearly always a respectful and politically correct general term.

From here:

Other organizations are using cognitive disability, intellectual disability, or developmental disability. Still others use the word “challenged” instead of disability. There are subtle differences in the definitions based on each organization and even by state, but most importantly any of these terms are accepted as appropriate by the community being defined.

From Wikipedia

Today, new expressions like developmentally disabled, special, or challenged are replacing the term mentally retarded.

[And later in that article - and I think I found at least a partial cause to all the confusion about learning difficulties vs. learning disabilities.]

In the UK, mental handicap had become the common medical term, replacing mental subnormality in Scotland and mental deficiency in England and Wales, until Stephen Dorrell, Secretary of State for Health for the United Kingdom from 1995–97, changed the NHS's designation to learning disability. The new term is not yet widely understood, and is often taken to refer to problems affecting schoolwork (the American usage), which are known in the UK as "learning difficulties."

Also, finally found an online version of the Finnish-English dictionary definition to show where this confusion on my part comes from: http://www.sanakirja.org/search.php?id=173251&l2=3
The term "mentally challenged" is marked as the politically correct form.

[Uan aa Boa]

I'm not going to get into a protracted trading of links. A number of people who essentially support your proposal have asked you to use "disabled" and these are the people whose support you will need.

I like the content of the proposal, although in my view it needs further work, but terminology is a barrier for me and if it reaches the floor using "handicapped" I will vote against it for that reason. I'm sorry if you consider that to be stupid.

[Araraukar]

I'm not going to get into a protracted trading of links. A number of people who essentially support your proposal have asked you to use "disabled" and these are the people whose support you will need.

OOC: But nobody's been able to explain why, and the info I found online suggested the opposite from the advice I've gotten here. If anyone does have professional site links why "challenged" shouldn't be used at all, they'd be muchly welcomed.

if it reaches the floor using "handicapped" I will vote against it for that reason. I'm sorry if you consider that to be stupid.

No, no, there are much sillier reasons, such as if I used italics anywhere in the proposal, I know at least one person who would likely use their delegate stomp against it just for that reason alone.

---

OOC: Draft 3.5 up now. Changed some wordings, but they don't change the meaning of the content, so didn't mark it as a wholly new draft or save the previous one. Now both challenged and disabled are used (instead of challenged and severely challenged), to signify the degree of disability involved.

Million EDITs because of brainfarts when typing...

[Araraukar]

OOC: Switched my WA status onto Araraukar in preparation for submitting this. That doesn't mean that Araraukar was now a WA state in-character.

Any last comments?

[Uan aa Boa]

Thanks for the movement on terminology. Yes, there are some significant issues I'd like to raise about the definitions and the way the proposal uses them (from the perspective of logic not political correctness, don't worry). I'm not really in a position to set out the details right now, but if you could hold off from submitting I'll get back to you.

[Araraukar]

I'm not really in a position to set out the details right now, but if you could hold off from submitting I'll get back to you.

OOC: Ok. I'll wait for your and Wallenburg's comments, as long as you (both) don't take over a week to deliver without at least an additional note about it.

[Capercom]

If you're set in your ways on most of the vocabulary in this Proposal that is fine, you have the right to keep it, but I feel using the term Mental Disorders instead of Mental Disabilities would garner you more support.

Capercom will not vote positively for this Proposal in its current iteration until further tweaks have been made, but it almost seems too late in the process to offer many detailed changes.

[United Massachusetts]

Full support.

[Uan aa Boa]

If you're set in your ways on most of the vocabulary in this Proposal that is fine, you have the right to keep it, but I feel using the term Mental Disorders instead of Mental Disabilities would garner you more support.

Most people would understand the term mental disorder to refer to a mental health issue, either an illness such as schizophrenia or depression that could be treated using medication or a personality disorder that could be helped with psychological therapy. This legislation is about disabilities such as Down syndrome, cerebral palsy, brain injury or others which cannot be treated in the same way. These are very different things.

[Uan aa Boa]

OK, definitions.

1. You use the term mental disability but don't define it.

2. A mentally disabled student is a defined as child who (a) has a mental disability (b) meets another criterion as a result (c) is designated as such by a medical specialist.

3. This means that it's perfectly possible to be a student who has a mental disability but not to be a mentally disabled student (this is the case for your whole category of mentally challenged students). This is confusing in the extreme.

You should ideally use people first wording as explained in that link to a Down syndrome charity you posted - although "people with a mental disability" should clearly refer to the same individuals as "mentally disabled people" the former is preferable.

4. You fall into this confusion yourself in 2a when you require an assessment for a child whose physician or caregiver has reason to suspect may be mentally disabled. According to the definition you've just given, this means that an assessment should be provided for a child if their carer/physician has reason to suspect they have been already been evaluated by a medical specialist and found to have severe trouble... That obviously isn't what you mean, but it is what you've said.

I can see that the intention in 2a is to find children in the community who have a mental disability and give them the legal status that means they benefit from the provisions of this proposal. But according to your definition, that only applies to children who have been evaluated by a medical specialist. 2a doesn't require the evaluation to be done by a medical specialist. A nation wishing to exploit the loophole could have an evaluation service staffed by teachers or other non-medical personnel. As a result, no children would be identified as a "mentally disabled student" and the nation would have no further obligations under this legislation, even if it routinely denied an education to children with a mental disability.

On the other hand, if you did mandate assessment by a medically qualified person you run into the issues we discussed concerning nations that don't have any and the proposal's "best of their ability" approach.

The definitions and evaluation need a total overhaul and I'm not sure if they're salvageable in anything like their present form.

I hope this post makes sense, it does feel excessively convoluted.

[Araraukar]

If you're set in your ways on most of the vocabulary in this Proposal that is fine, you have the right to keep it, but I feel using the term Mental Disorders instead of Mental Disabilities would garner you more support.

OOC: Like Uan explained, that's not possible.

Capercom will not vote positively for this Proposal in its current iteration until further tweaks have been made, but it almost seems too late in the process to offer many detailed changes.

Which tweaks? It's never too late, unless it's at vote.

---

I hope this post makes sense, it does feel excessively convoluted.

OOC: Most of it made sense, at least. I've read it and while I don't agree with all of it (some of the redundancy and vagueness are intentional, to avoid making a committee and/or getting into the underwear micromanagement category), I'll take some of it under consideration. But I'll wait for Wallenburg's feedback before making further changes.

[Thyerata]

If you're set in your ways on most of the vocabulary in this Proposal that is fine, you have the right to keep it, but I feel using the term Mental Disorders instead of Mental Disabilities would garner you more support.

Capercom will not vote positively for this Proposal in its current iteration until further tweaks have been made, but it almost seems too late in the process to offer many detailed changes.

If the term "mental disorder" were used, my objections would be even stronger than they already are. OOC: as a disabled man, I find this sort of language to be quite sensitive

[Capercom]

If you're set in your ways on most of the vocabulary in this Proposal that is fine, you have the right to keep it, but I feel using the term Mental Disorders instead of Mental Disabilities would garner you more support.

Capercom will not vote positively for this Proposal in its current iteration until further tweaks have been made, but it almost seems too late in the process to offer many detailed changes.

If the term "mental disorder" were used, my objections would be even stronger than they already are. OOC: as a disabled man, I find this sort of language to be quite sensitive

I speak on the entirety of Capercom when I state I mean no offense by my statements! As a non-disabled man, I thought Mental Disorders sounded less offensive. But upon further research, I may have had a misunderstanding into the difference, or the fact that there was one, between classifications.

I have found the following:

Mental illness is a term that describes a broad range of mental and emotional conditions. Mental illness also refers to one portion of the broader ADA term mental impairment, and is different from other covered mental impairments such as mental retardation, organic brain damage, and learning disabilities. The term ‘psychiatric disability’ is used when mental illness significantly interferes with the performance of major life activities, such as learning, working and communicating, among others.

So in the case of this Proposal, to make sure I'm understanding properly (and please forgive me, Capercom had its Independence Day celebrations today, so the day has been long), it's speaking about children who have "mental illness [that, sic] significantly interferes with the performance of major life activities, such as learning, working, and communicating, among others." ...Yes?

[Wallenburg]

"Although a bit later than originally planned, here is your proposal in one hand, and my scalpel-shaped pen in the other."

1. Defines, for the purposes of this resolution;
a. a "child" as an inhabitant of a WA member nation who is under the age of majority in that nation,

"Is this definition necessary at all? I thought, apart from the general clarity of what 'child' means, the World Assembly had previously established a definition for children or legal minors."

c. a "mentally challenged student" as a child who has been evaluated by medical specialists to have serious trouble with the attention, communication or understanding required to attend regular basic education, due to an irreversible mental disability,
d. a "mentally disabled student" as a child, who has been evaluated by medical specialists to have severe trouble with the attention, communication and understanding required to attend regular basic education, due to an irreversible mental disability,

"That these definitions only vary by one conjunction really bothers me, Ambassador. I seriously believe that you only need one definition here, or that you can at least find a way to combine these to eliminate repetition."

2. Requires that member nations;
a. Provide learning ability evaluation service for all children nearing the age for entering basic education, whoif their caretaker or attending physician has reason to suspect may be mentally disabled, or whowhen the children have demonstrated an inability to learn normally during their first year of education,

"This clause has grammatical problems. I have made suggested changes."

b. Institute a training program for special education teachers, if such does not already exist, to train education professionals who have the needed skills to educate children with mental disabilities,

"Isn't such a training program meant to teach instructors how to educate mentally retarded students? As this clause currently reads, the training program targets those who already know how to do so."

c. Provide, to the best of their ability, all mentally challenged students with basic education; either as part of the regular class, a separate class taught by a special education teacher, or personally taught by a special education teacher or a similarly accredited instructor,

"The structure of this clause is not parallel. The last option should read 'or individual instruction by a special education teacher or a similarly accredited instructor'. The same goes for clause three."

6. Allows member nations to restrict the learning ability evaluation service to children who are residents of the nation,

"As opposed to non-residents? Why do you make this distinction?"

[Ledaj]

1. Defines, for the purposes of this resolution;
a. a "child" as an inhabitant of a WA member nation who is under the age of majority in that nation,

"Is this definition necessary at all? I thought, apart from the general clarity of what 'child' means, the World Assembly had previously established a definition for children or legal minors."

"Sir, that clause was included by the author to please me, and I will provide evidence for the author in his decision as to whether to keep or remove it."
Helmsworth began to flip through the passed resolutions compendium:

Wa#222: "DEFINES the following for the purpose of this resolution:

A child as any individual under the national threshold of majority, or equivalent,"
Helmsworth cleared his throat. "After the repeal of WA#19, a new definition for the word child was set by the above resolution. In the intervening period, and afterwards, many resolutions did use the word 'child' without defining it."

WA#235 viewtopic.php?f=9&t=30&start=225#p13323697
"This resolution uses the exact same definition as WA#222"
WA#297: "DEFINES, for the purpose of this resolution, the following:

child: an individual under the threshold of majority in both the country of origin and the recipient country,"

WA#300: "DEFINES "child" as someone who has not yet attained the age of consent in the nation in which he/she is present at the time of recording, regardless of citizenship or residency."

Helmsworth set down the compendium. "Sir, I believe that in most resolutions, defining the word 'child' is unnecessary. However as shown by the above examples, it is not unheard of to define the specific meaning of the word as it applies to the specific proposal. WA#297 is concerned with adoption, and the transport of children across borders, and so requires a specific definition. The same is true of WA#300, which concerns pornography. However well intended these two definitions may have been, they serve to give the word 'child' three different possible meanings in WA law. Certainly the definition set by WA#222 makes the most sense in this case,but all could be considered reasonable interpretations.
Therefore if this author is happy with his proposal being interpreted using any of the three possible definitions, she need not specify one of them. If, on the other hand, the author wishes to use only the first definition, then she should specify that.
The definition currently in the proposal should be deleted or replaced by one of the above three to avoid placing a fourth definition in WA law, however similar the definitions may be.
However, copying the definition exactly would constitute plagiarism, which seems to be the case in WA#235 "any individual under the national threshold of majority, or equivalent"
Therefore I do not know whether the plagiarism restriction applies in this case.
If the exact definition cannot be used, putting a fourth definition into law is not desirable, and so it may be best to not make any definition in this resolution at all."
Helmsworth sat down with a sigh, having been forced to negate his own point from a few days ago.

-Ronald Helmsworth, delegate of Ledaj to the General Assembly

[Uan aa Boa]

It is worth noting that the current draft talks about "mentally disabled students," who it defines to be, of necessity, children. This is further misleading because in most nations the word student refers to any person whose occupation is the pursuit of education, many of whom are not children.

[Araraukar]

All OOC. Since Araraukar isn't in the WA in IC, despite current status change, I'm keeping my arguments in OOC when replying to multiple recipients.

"Is this definition necessary at all? I thought, apart from the general clarity of what 'child' means, the World Assembly had previously established a definition for children or legal minors."

Yes, because people will complain otherwise, as was proven above.

"mentally challenged student" ... serious trouble ... or
"mentally disabled student" ... severe trouble ... and

"That these definitions only vary by one conjunction really bothers me, Ambassador. I seriously believe that you only need one definition here, or that you can at least find a way to combine these to eliminate repetition."

Originally they did only differ by one word. Now there are several words, the smallest of which (or/and) give the preceding lists a large difference. "Challenged" needs only have serious trouble with one of those things, "disabled" severe trouble with all of them. But I am trying to think of ways to shrink the definitions down, believe me.

"This clause has grammatical problems. I have made suggested changes."

Thank you.

"As this clause currently reads, the training program targets those who already know how to do so."

"The structure of this clause is not parallel."

Eh, moar grammar needing fixes.

"As opposed to non-residents? Why do you make this distinction?"

Because if I don't make the distinction, people will moan about how their nation's not gonna pay for the evaluations of the children from the Noncomplianistans out there. Or they could claim that I'm trying to affect non-member nations. Or that any vacationing child must be evaluated. You know how these claims go.

It is worth noting that the current draft talks about "mentally disabled students," who it defines to be, of necessity, children. This is further misleading because in most nations the word student refers to any person whose occupation is the pursuit of education, many of whom are not children.

Hence why it has a definition, as the meaning is not 1:1 to how the word is used in RL. It also defines anyone under the age of majority as a "child", which is even more absurd in my opinion, but apparently a necessity.

---

Still OOC: This weekend is the Midsummer (juhannus) weekend in Finland, and for those of you who aren't Finns... Well, juhannus and Christmas are the two most important traditional holidays in Finland, and of the two I think people take juhannus more seriously. The whole country basically shuts down. I'll be spending it with my parents, away from my computer, and will need to get some preparations done before Friday, so I can't 100% promise a new draft before then, but you never know. They've promised rain for this week (naturally, what with juhannus coming... a couple of summers back it snowed on the week before juhannus!).

[Wallenburg]

"Is this definition necessary at all? I thought, apart from the general clarity of what 'child' means, the World Assembly had previously established a definition for children or legal minors."

Yes, because people will complain otherwise, as was proven above.

Damned if you do, damned if you don't, I suppose. It isn't a deal breaker for me, but I prefer a concise proposal to a verbose one.

"That these definitions only vary by one conjunction really bothers me, Ambassador. I seriously believe that you only need one definition here, or that you can at least find a way to combine these to eliminate repetition."

Originally they did only differ by one word. Now there are several words, the smallest of which (or/and) give the preceding lists a large difference. "Challenged" needs only have serious trouble with one of those things, "disabled" severe trouble with all of them. But I am trying to think of ways to shrink the definitions down, believe me.

Good to know. I hope that you can figure something out here.

"As opposed to non-residents? Why do you make this distinction?"

Because if I don't make the distinction, people will moan about how their nation's not gonna pay for the evaluations of the children from the Noncomplianistans out there. Or they could claim that I'm trying to affect non-member nations. Or that any vacationing child must be evaluated. You know how these claims go.

Would there not be a potential for Noncomplianistanian children living permanently, or at least for a long period of time, in a member state? Would these be considered residents? Wallenburg, for instance, has hundreds of thousands of foreigners living as legal residents, many of them children.

[Araraukar]

Would there not be a potential for Noncomplianistanian children living permanently, or at least for a long period of time, in a member state? Would these be considered residents? Wallenburg, for instance, has hundreds of thousands of foreigners living as legal residents, many of them children.

OOC: I first had it at "citizens/legal residents" (can't remember which) but CD said it'd be against GenSec precedent, so "residents" is now meant to echo CoCR's "inhabitants". Think of how it works in real life: if the family lives in a foreign country because, for example, the parents work there; the children go to school there. So this would apply to the children of such a family. The "resident" is meant to specify it doesn't apply to people who are just, say, on a holiday, or passing through.

[Wallenburg]

Would there not be a potential for Noncomplianistanian children living permanently, or at least for a long period of time, in a member state? Would these be considered residents? Wallenburg, for instance, has hundreds of thousands of foreigners living as legal residents, many of them children.

OOC: I first had it at "citizens/legal residents" (can't remember which) but CD said it'd be against GenSec precedent, so "residents" is now meant to echo CoCR's "inhabitants". Think of how it works in real life: if the family lives in a foreign country because, for example, the parents work there; the children go to school there. So this would apply to the children of such a family. The "resident" is meant to specify it doesn't apply to people who are just, say, on a holiday, or passing through.

Fair enough. Thank you for the clarification.

[Araraukar]

OOC: Assuming the currently at vote proposal doesn't pass, or is quickly repealed if it does, updated the draft in this proposal.

I'd appreciate it if the new definitions could be looked at by native English-users, to make sure I haven't made further grammar/punctuation errors that change the meaning unintentionally. And same for changes in 2.b. Decided to keep the definition of a child, since the previous child-related resolutions use the wording "for the purposes of this resolution". Decided not to change "mental disabilities" into "learning challenges" in clauses 4 onwards, due to the wording in definitions 1.b. and 1.c., to keep it clear what the focus of the proposal is meant to be.

[Bakhton]

Lara Qzu leans over and whispers, "Is this the official replacement? If not can it be?"

[Araraukar]

Lara Qzu leans over and whispers, "Is this the official replacement? If not can it be?"

If you look at the dates of the documents, you'll notice that the one being voted on right now, appeared only recently and out of the blue. This one's been in drafting for a long time (OOC: This particular incarnation for over a month, and that's not counting the earlier version in its own thread.) Also, the one at vote right now seems to concern only physical disabilities - even if such were caused by some kind of mental disability - while this one concentrates on learning difficulties caused by mental disabilities.

OOC: In other words, it's hardly a replacement, when it existed first and legislates on a different category of disability.