Parents ‘Blindsided’ After Teacher Gives Boy With Autism the ‘Most Annoying’ Award

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Parents Rick and Estella Castejon from Gary, Indiana, are furious at their son's fifth-grade teacher, who gave an award that insulted their boy with special needs. Eleven-year-old Akalis has autism, a fact he was reminded of when his teacher humiliated him with a special end of the year award for "Most Annoying Male." His parents didn't find the award amusing and are pushing back at their son's school for being cruel.

Rick had gone to a special end-of-year awards luncheon for his son's school, but he was mortified by what he saw.

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As a symptom of his condition, Akalis is nonverbal, but that doesn't mean he should be treated any differently at Bailly Preparatory Academy. The school held the awards ceremony on May 23 at Golden Corral, reported CBS News. Other students got charming awards such as “best student,” “funniest,” “class clown,” his father Rick explained to WGN 9. But when his son's award was called, the entire room fell silent.

"So when they called him up, they’re calling the names, and they were like, ‘Most annoying male award,’” he said. "I wasn’t expecting that, not for an autistic kid, at all.”

The dad said he tried not to make a scene and even tried to causally leave the offensive award at the table, but to no avail. His son's teacher casually reminded him not to forget to take the award home at the end of the luncheon.

The parents say they were "blindsided" by the award even though the teacher didn't see a problem with it.

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Rick said Akalis' teacher tried to play off the award as a joke, but neither he nor his wife were laughing. When he came home and told her about the award later that night, she was heartbroken.

The dad explained that in the past, his son's teachers had made many calls home with regards to Akalis' behavior. But Rick felt that his son's special-needs teachers should know how to manage him. Aside from being nonverbal, Akalis will sometimes rock back and forth or will become emotional, and now he's questioning if these behaviors contributed to the award.

Estella told WGN 9 that she called the school immediately. “For a teacher to do that, I believe it was a huge mistake. I also feel it’s how she feels about my son,” the mom said. 

"We were blindsided. We just weren't expecting it," the dad said. "As a principal or teacher, you should never let this happen to any student."

He added that he has since met with school district's emergency manager, Peter Morikis.

Morikas confirmed that the school has taken action against the teachers who gave the award, but has not commented on whether they've been terminated.

In a statement to The Times of Northwest Indiana, the school has issued an apology to the family: 

"The Gary Community School Corporation does not condone this type of behavior and will continue to put the safety and well-being of our students first. We extend our deepest apologies to the impacted student, the family and anyone else who take offense to this unfortunate occurrence."

But administrators have not spoken out on whether the responsible staff member has been terminated. Rick explained that Morikis mentioned that the teacher might be suspended for two weeks or the teacher would be fired, but neither action has been confirmed.

The dad added that he was happy with the school's response and said that his son's teacher was not in attendance at the fifth-grade graduation on May 27.

He said he hopes that if other educators can learn anything from his son's story, it's how to treat kids with special needs with respect. “Treat him like you’d treat any other kid,” Rick said. “They need more affection and stuff like that. Just treat him right, that’s all. They don’t want to be treated like an outsider or left behind.”

Rick continued that his family will be moving to a nearby town next year so his son will not be attending school within the Gary school district.