When I visited a special school earlier this year, staff told me how different their surroundings would have been some 30 years ago.

The school would have been quieter, the walls barer, the atmosphere more clinical. The common understanding was that care must be taken not to “overstimulate” the pupils.

Meanwhile, there was an acute understanding of the harsh realities of the outside world, where disability had long been a guarantee of shame or ridicule, even among world leaders and royals. Franklin D Roosevelt, great wartime US president that he was, was careful never to be seen using his wheelchair in public. Nerissa and Katherine Bowes-Lyon, cousins of the Queen, had learning difficulties and were sent to a psychiatric hospital in 1941, where they were largely kept out of sight and mind until their deaths in 1986 and 2014.

Times seemed to be changing in the 1980s, following the landmark 1978 Warnock report. It promised to usher in an era of greater understanding; the reality was that deep-seated attitudes changed painfully slowly, as seen in the case of Joey Deacon.

He was a man with severe cerebral palsy who became the subject of well-meaning TV coverage, including on Blue Peter. As a child of the 1980s, I can confirm that this backfired: “Joey” became a universally understood playground insult - usually accompanied by a cruel impersonation of Deacon - for anyone deemed stupid or incapable.

Little wonder, then, that the inclination of many in the special education sector was to hide pupils from sight.

But things have changed in 2019, haven’t they? The callous jibes towards people with disabilities are not as common. Events such as the Paralympics and the Special Olympics World Games have provided spotlights for people with both physical disabilities and learning difficulties. Social media has empowered parents to complain about ill treatment of their children and celebrate their achievements with a global audience.

But school staff will tell you there’s still a long way to go in changing societal attitudes. I have spoken to teachers at special schools shocked by how seldom local communities interact with their pupils, and by how even well-meaning comments can be tainted by patronising assumptions about young people’s capabilities.

“People underestimate our children,” a depute headteacher at Isobel Mair School in East Renfrewshire told me when I visited.

Teachers, however, are not prepared to drum their fingers while attitudes change at a glacial pace: more and more, they are taking pupils out into communities (and, often, out of their own comfort zones) and inviting those communities in to see what they do. Schools are running cafés, for example, and inviting staff and pupils from mainstream schools to volunteer.

It’s not only about crossing divides but also about showing that, in many ways, those divides are illusory. So, special schools run proms and prize-giving ceremonies, rites of passage that their pupils are just as entitled to as anyone else. Symbolic reminders to focus on what children can do, not what they can’t.

One school has come up with an idea that shows times really are changing. If the Scouts movement represents adventure, danger and risk-taking, then this is precisely why Kilpatrick School has embraced it. The emphasis on looking outwards - and outdoors - chimes with the special education sector more than ever.

As one Kilpatrick teacher puts it, pupils love the idea of being “part of a bigger, wider group”. Special education has changed dramatically over the past few decades - now it’s up to the rest of us to follow suit.

@Henry_Hepburn

This article originally appeared in the 30 August 2019 issue under the headline “Let’s reach out to embrace the special schools crossing the divide”