Articles labeled: alex barton

Hundreds of parents of autistic children are outraged over the report that a kindergarten teacher in Florida allegedly allowed the other children in class to vote an autistic boy out of their classroom, Survivor-style.

Morningside Elementary School in Port St. Lucie, Fla., recently alerted Melissa Barton that her son, Alex, suffers from a high-functioning form of autism called Asperger’s Syndrome, WPEC News reported.

Barton claims that Alex was punished for symptoms of his disability, such as humming and eating his homework. She says Portillo went too far last week when she kicked Alex out of class, and then allowed the other students to vote on whether he should be allowed back in.

Each student was also allowed to say what he or she did not like about Alex. By a 14-to-2 margin, the students voted Alex out of class, according to The South Florida Sun-Sentinel.

“She said this was her way of correcting his behavior,” Barton told WPEC. “I asked him how that made him feel and he said, ‘I feel sad.’”