The report cited "significant concern" that schools are overusing restraints and so-called seclusion, particularly on kids with emotional or intellectual disabilities. Over the past three years, Connecticut has recorded more than 90,000 instances of restraint and seclusion in public schools and more than 1,300 injuries – at least two dozen of them serious.
The report found one child was restrained more than 700 times over the course of a year.
"The numbers are staggering," Mickey Kramer, the Associate Child Advocate for Connecticut and one of the authors of the report, told ProPublica. "We realize that this is a pervasive, widespread problem."
The report, which explored the cases of 70 students, described a 9-year-old student with autism who was placed in seclusion after refusing to say "hello" to a visitor and a 4-year-old boy with a developmental delay who was restrained after throwing puzzle pieces on the floor and across the room. The younger boy's school plan said he could be shackled to an orthopedic chair that is not supposed to be used for restraints.