The Fringe Benefits of Failure, and the Importance of Imagination

JK Rowling’s commencement speech at Harvard: The Fringe Benefits of Failure, and the Importance of Imagination is a very good and moving read.

Legal experts say lawsuit in autistic boy’s case could have merit

Legal experts say lawsuit in autistic boy’s case could have merit

West Palm Beach attorney Jeff Vastola sent a certified letter last week placing the district on notice he intends to sue the district on behalf of Alex Barton, the 5-year-old voted out of his Morningside Elementary class last month after class members told him what they thought of his behavior.

His teacher, Wendy Portillo, has admitted to police the event took place, but told police she was trying to make Alex understand how his behavior affected his peers.

Barbara Woodhouse, a University of Florida law professor, said from a human rights perspective, the child’s rights might have been violated, based on what she has heard of the case. The fact Alex was in the process of being tested for Asperger’s syndrome, a type of high-functioning autism, moves the case closer to something that ” ’shocks the conscience’ as opposed to poor judgment or insensitivity on the part of the teacher,” she said.