Mother alleges aide forcefully handled non-verbal student with autism at Town Creek Elementary
BRUNSWICK COUNTY, N.C. — The Brunswick County Sheriff’s Office is investigating after the mother of a nonverbal student with autism alleged her son was forcefully handled by a teacher’s aide at Town Creek Elementary School.
Alison Morgan said she reviewed video provided by the school that she says shows a teacher’s aide aggressively grabbing her 6-year-old son, Ryker Gurganious, multiple times during recess last Wednesday, leaving bruises and scratches on his arms.
Morgan said her son, who was diagnosed with autism at age 2 and is nonverbal, previously enjoyed going to school.
“If we would leave to go somewhere on Saturday he would automatically think ‘oh, we’re going to school, I need my backpack, I want to go,’” Morgan said. “He loved it, until he was switched to a different classroom.”
Morgan said Gurganious was recently moved into a classroom focused on adaptive learning and life skills.
She said she noticed bruising and scratches on her son’s arms when she picked him up from school last Wednesday.
“The first thing I did was check his folder for a nurse’s report, an incident report, a note, any type of explanation that could justify this in any way and there was not one,” Morgan said.
Morgan said she met with the school principal and a school resource officer the following day and was shown surveillance video from an altercation during recess involving a teacher’s aide.
“She’s sitting on a bench, and she’s sitting kind of sideways and he walks over and as soon as they get within arm’s distance of each other my son throws his hands up in defense in front of his head,” Morgan said.
Morgan alleges the aide grabbed Gurganious’ arms multiple times, causing the bruises and scratches.
According to Brunswick County Schools policy, restraint should not be used on a student with a disability.
Brunswick County Schools said the employee involved has been suspended with pay. However, Morgan said she was told by school officials that the aide had been fired.
“So my son has had bruises on him for eight days and every one of those eight days his teacher has remained getting paid,” Morgan said.
The incident comes as other school districts review how staff are trained to work with students with special needs. In neighboring Pender County Schools, school leaders recently approved expanded Crisis Prevention Intervention training for staff.
Morgan said she wants to see cameras installed in classrooms serving children with disabilities.
“Just like in my son’s classroom setting, there is not one student in there that can stand up and advocate for Ryker if they wanted to,” she said.
WWAY has reached out to Town Creek Elementary to confirm Morgan’s allegation that she was incorrectly told the aide had been terminated but had not received a response as of Thursday evening.
Morgan said she is not sending her son back to school at this time.
