County Magnet School Receives Grant to Teach Life Skills to Children With Autism

A news release from Verizon:

Thanks to a grant from business, local students with autism will be learning life skills in a whole new environment, that of a small town.

The Shore Center for Students with Autism is expanding a special program that will create the environment of a small town to teach children at the school the basic skills they need to function in everyday life.  The expanded program, aided by an $8,000 grant from the Verizon Foundation, will be a model for other counties to emulate.  

The curriculum of the magnet school, located on Tornillo Way in Tinton Falls, follows the approach of a prominent behavioral analyst, Dr. Vincent Carbone, who emphasizes encouraging verbal interaction with children with autism.     

At the school’s cafeteria, to be named the Shore Diner, students will learn about the etiquette for dining in public and, eventually, how to order meals as well as prepare some basic foods.  

The classrooms will be designed to look like houses, and each will have an address instead of a room number.  Street signs will be installed in the halls, and the halls will be painted with trees and skies to enhance the idea that the inside of the building is a downtown.  At a school “movie theater,” students will learn the proper behavior for going to the movies and how to respect other patrons.   

Tim Nogueira, superintendent of the Monmouth Ocean Educational Services Commission and the Bayshore Jointure Commission, the two agencies that oversee the school’s operation, said of the expanded program, “It’s going to have the feel of being in a regular town, and students will be able to travel around in it.”  

John Szeliga, regional director of external Affairs for Verizon New Jersey, said, “”This program  can easily be replicated at an incredible cost savings for local school districts. One out of approximately every 66 children has been diagnosed with autism in New Jersey.  This is a vulnerable constituency that can truly benefit from this type of program.”         

The Shore Center, which opened six years ago, offers instruction for children from kindergarten through the 12th grade, and officials eventually plan to add an adult day care program.  Fifty of the school’s students have made enough progress to allow them to transition back to their home public school district.  

The school is funded entirely through tuition, grants and donations, without any direct taxpayer money.