Wagga mum disgusted at school's response

By Ken Grimson
Updated November 7 2012 - 2:44pm, first published March 23 2011 - 10:51pm
FED UP: Jaimie Hornitschek with her son yesterday. Fearing the possibility of further abuse, the upset mum asked for her son not to be identified further and that their faces not be shown. Picture: Michael Frogley
FED UP: Jaimie Hornitschek with her son yesterday. Fearing the possibility of further abuse, the upset mum asked for her son not to be identified further and that their faces not be shown. Picture: Michael Frogley

A WAGGA mother is so angry at the response of Mount Austin High School to the verbal abuse thrown at her autistic son by eight students, as well as past incidents, she has dropped plans to help its special needs program through her business."I feel bad for the special needs students who are missing out, but I can't have anything to do with that school," said Jaimie Hornitschek.Ms Hornitschek said she had also been subjected to foul language from school students when she shopped at the nearby Tolland shopping centre, but the abuse of her vulnerable 11-year-old son was the "straw that broke the camel's back" and led her to contact The Daily Advertiser and lodge a formal complaint with the Department of Education and Training."I have had issues on numerous occasions and contacted the school and its gotten me nowhere," Ms Hornitschek said."The most they can offer me is the students have had a bad life, and what can they do about it."I have tried to get the school to deal with these problems for 18 months now and it's been swept under the carpet."Someone has to take responsibility."Ms Hornitschek said her son was riding his bike along Bourke Street on the way to school on Tuesday when eight Mount Austin High School students demanded to know what he was looking at as he watched them cross the road.She said a condition of her son's autism was that he did not like social contact, so he did not reply.In response to his non-reaction, the group surrounded him and called him words not fit to print, according to Ms Hornitschek."A child should be able to ride to school without being terrified," she said.Ms Hornitschek said she had been abused by students smoking and milling around shopping trolleys at the shopping centre."You only have to look at them and they tell you to get ...," she said.Ms Honitschek accused the school of double standards for having expelled a student for smoking on his way to school and being outside school grounds during school hours, but not dealing with bullies.Ms Hornitschek said her son was prepared to identify the bullies by looking a photographs of students, but that offer had been rejected by the school for privacy reasons.

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