The Power of Inclusion
What a First-grader Can Teach Us About Belonging
Reid Spring is a first grader at Campton Elementary School in Campton, New Hampshire. He has a classmate named Ben — a seven-year-old who is deaf and has other special needs. Ben is the only deaf student in his entire school district. New Hampshire is one of the few states in the country without a dedicated school for the deaf, which meant that when Ben showed up to first grade, there was essentially no one in that building he could talk to.
His aide described it plainly: “He didn’t have relationships with his peers or teachers, for that matter. He was very alone. And he acted very alone.”
Reid noticed, and he decided to do something about it.
He started learning a few signs. Then his classmates joined in. Then the whole class decided to learn sign language together. Then teachers in other grades started taking sign language classes — and here’s the part that gets me — they started signing even when Ben wasn’t in the room.
They were practicing it as a way of life.
Ben’s adoptive mothers, Etta and Marlaina O’Reilly, found out what was happening and could barely process it. “I could barely breathe,” Etta told CBS News. “Like it was just so overwhelming.”
His aide watched the transformation up close: “You could just watch his world open up with communication. It was amazing.”
I think about this story in the context of everything we’re navigating right now as a country — the arguments about who belongs where, who gets access to what, which kids are worth accommodating and which ones are an inconvenience to be managed.
And then I think about a seven-year-old in rural New Hampshire whose classmates decided, with no mandate and no policy and no political argument, that they wanted to be able to talk to their friend.
They didn’t debate whether it was fair that Ben required extra effort. They didn’t ask whether including him would give him an unfair advantage over kids who could already hear. They just learned the language. Because he was their friend, and that’s what you do.
Inclusion isn’t complicated when you see it from a child’s eye level.
The rest of us should see it the same.
The full story was reported by Steve Hartman for CBS News’ On the Road segment. If you haven’t seen it, go find it. It’s two and a half minutes and it will do something good to your day.
The Dad Briefs covers the civic and political stories — and the quietly human ones — that shape family life in America. If this piece resonated, share it with someone who needs it today.
Yes, sometimes the only adult in the room is a first-grader.
I love this. We need more of these stories about how humans are being humans to others.