Redefining the Right to Quality Education for Autistic Children Through a Neurodiverse Perspective

Context and structure

The right to education is commonly recognized as a central human right in European and international law (Lundy & O’Lynn 2019). The importance it holds in allowing children to develop and enjoy their other rights has long been underlined, especially for disabled children, and among them autistic children (Cera 2015; Courtis & Tobin 2019). However, education has also been criticized for displaying normalization tendencies (Acevedo & Nusbaum 2021; Harris-Short & Tobin 2019) and the educational experience and outcomes of autistic children remain poor (Goodall 2021; Merry 2020; Roberts & Simpson 2016).

Following international law, the right to education of disabled children can be conceptualized as a right to availability and access to quality and inclusive education (Reyes 2019). Regarding autistic children, while the debates have long focused on issues concerning the access and inclusivity of education, research is slowly starting to emphasize the importance of the question of quality education (e.g., Hornby 2021; Marshall & Goodall 2015; Merry 2020). As it will be developed in this paper, the notion of quality education can be conceptualized through the legal provisions of the aims of education. These aims articulate what the content, processes, and environment of education should tend toward (CRC Committee 2001: §8). They are expressly stated in international law, in particular in article 29 (1) of the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) (UNGA 1989) and article 24 (1) of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) (UNGA 2006). The respect given to these aims is what qualifies the education available and accessible to children. Therefore, not having access to an education that would respect these aims, or not having such an education available, constitutes an infringement of the right to education. However, as de Beco (2016) explains, while human rights establish universal standards and goals, their interpretation and application need to be contextualized. A crucial issue therefore resides in how to interpret and contextualize these aims.

Regarding autistic children, their particular communication, social, sensory, and neurological functioning might require a specific conceptualization of at least parts of what constitute quality education. As Jordan (2008) explains, research has for too long focused on how autistic children could access their rights as if the conceptualizations of these rights were not in itself discriminatory because based on a neurotypical development model. Achieving an autistic-relevant, neurodiverse interpretation of quality education thus appears crucial for allowing autistic children to fully enjoy their right to education.

This paper therefore intends to build on recent literature from social, educational, and legal sciences to outline the need for a more neurodiverse interpretation of the legal concept of quality education. First, the central notions of autism, neurodiversity, and quality education will be presented in the remainder of this introduction. The subsequent sections will then discuss some of the main issues and requirements for developing a neurodiverse understanding of the right to quality education for autistic children.

Autism and neurodiversity: terminologies

The definitions of autism occupy a highly contested terrain that has given rise to many discussions (Belek 2019; Chapman 2020b; Runswick-Cole, Mallett & Timimi 2016). The medical definition of autism relies on a deficit-based approach and characterizes autistic people as presenting deficits in social communication and repetitive or restricted patterns of behaviors and interests (WHO 2019). In parallel, autism is often conceptualized and legally recognized as a disability (e.g., in the CRPD [UNGA 2006] or the UNGA Resolution n. 67/82 [2012]). Finally, autism has also been conceptualized as a difference (Graby 2012; Jordan 2019) and an identity (Chown 2020; Hillary 2020; Lollini 2018), thus constituting, for some, a distinct minority (Graby 2012; Milton 2017). This last approach is either additional or alternative to the conceptualization of autism as a disability (Graby 2012; Milton 2017; Wood 2019) and has been developed alongside the emergence of the concept of neurodiversity. This concept can be briefly summarized as depathologizing neurodevelopmental variations among the human species (Chapman 2020a), thus considering autism—and other conditions such as ADHD or Tourette syndrome—simply as different neurological functioning (Jaarsma & Welin 2012). These neurological differences are sometimes compared to those of gender or race (Singer 2017). As such, neurodiversity can be conceived either as a spectrum encompassing all functioning—including the typical functioning—and/or as an identity, centering on nontypical, or neurodivergent, functioning (Ortega 2013). The article will build on this duality, analyzing the implications of the spectrum (i.e., diversity) and identity (i.e., minority) sides of neurodiversity for autistic children’s right to quality education.

While not pretending to settle the controversy, this article will retain the following working definition of autism: a specific neurodevelopmental functioning, part of human neurodiversity, which is characterized by cognitive, sensory, communicative, and social specificities. Regarding the legal dimensions, in order to reflect both the established and emerging positions, autism will be addressed as a disability, an identity, and a potential minority. This article also acknowledges that there is no full consensus among autistic people on the preferred terminologies to employ (Kenny et al. 2016). However, for purposes of clarity, this article adopts an identity-first language (i.e., ‘autistic children’ instead of ‘children with autism’) and uses the terms autism and autistic as encompassing all shades of autism.

Conceptualizing quality education through the aims of education

Defining the meaning and content of good education represents a highly subjective and cultural question, which has been debated for centuries (Anderson & Boyle 2020). In international human rights law, the concept of the aims of education has been developed to guarantee a right, not simply to any education, but to a quality education, free from detrimental ideological influences (Courtis & Tobin 2019; Lile 2021; Lundy & O’Lynn 2019). As emphasized by the CRC Committee, the aims of education ‘underline the individual and subjective right to a specific quality of education’ (CRC Committee 2001: §9). They are prescribed in Article 29 (1) of the CRC and Article 24 (1) of the CRPD, among other texts. They are also subject to a progressive realization principle (Courtis & Tobin 2019), which must, however, be fulfilled without discrimination (Broderick 2018).

Following the structure of Article 29 of the CRC, the aims of education can be grouped under five categories (Lile 2021): (1) individuals’ aims; (2) human rights aims; (3) aims that relate to identity, culture, and values (hereafter referred to as ‘identity aims’); (4) aims related to tolerance and understanding; and (5) aims related to the respect of nature. While these aims are interdependent and cover different dimensions of quality education (Lile 2021; Lundy & Tobin 2019), not all of them are of equal relevance to autistic children. Given that, this paper will focus on the individual and identity categories, and on how to foster a neurodiverse, autistic-relevant conceptualization of those aims. These two categories were found the most relevant in connection with such a conceptualization as they focus on children’s individual and collective identity, functioning, and needs, all of which might greatly differ between autistic and neurotypical children. They are therefore introduced in more detail below.

The individual aims of education center on the development of the fullest potential of each child. The CRC Committee (2001: §9) states that the ‘key goal of education is the development of the individual child’s personality, talents and abilities, in recognition of the fact that every child has unique characteristics, interests, abilities, and learning needs.’ The development of the child’s personality can be seen as a recognition of each child’s uniqueness, both in their characteristics, interests, strengths, and weaknesses and in their learning needs (Lile 2021). To respect and develop a child’s personality also requires fostering their sense of dignity and self-worth, and for disabled children, education should, in addition, aim at strengthening their own positive self-awareness and self-esteem, as well as others’ respect for them (CRC Committee 2006: §66). To enable these aims, the school environment should be respectful of children’s dignity and free of violence, both physical and mental, including disciplinary violence (Broderick 2015). Education should also aim at the development of children’s talents, and mental and physical abilities. This requirement covers a range of life skills and capacities, including, but not limited to, literacy and numeracy (CRC Committee 2001: §9). For disabled children, the development of life and social skills is also expressly mentioned by Article 24 (3) of the CRPD. Moreover, this development must be tailored to each child, both in its direction (i.e., skills and talents), process (i.e., learning process and pedagogical practice), and outcomes (i.e., results and evaluation). This paper will analyze what might be the implications of respecting autistic functioning, both in general and in regard to communication and socialization, when pursuing these aims. In addition, it will highlight the necessity to address the specific issues related to bullying and anxiety in order to sustain the provision of an education supportive of the individual aims of education to autistic children.

Article 29 (1) (c) of the CRC has made the development of respect for the child’s parents, for the child’s cultural identity, language, and values, for the national values of the country in which the child is living as well as the country from which he or she may originate, and for different civilizations all part of the aims of education. These aims are specific to the CRC and have been criticized for the potential paradoxes they create (Lile 2021). The CRC Committee has however explained that the importance of these aims resides specifically in the requirement for balance that they introduced between different values, on the one hand, and the individual and collective dimensions of the right to education, on the other (CRC Committee 2001: §4). So far, these aims have mostly concerned ethnic, linguistic, or religious diversity. However, the inclusion of the concept of ‘human diversity’ in the text of the CRPD (Article 24 (1)) coupled with the growing acknowledgment of a collective autistic identity and culture (Kapp 2020; Rosqvist, Chown & Stenning 2020; Silberman & Sacks 2016) might encourage the inclusion of neuro- and developmental diversity within the realm of these dispositions. This paper will therefore examine what implications the concept of neurodiversity, both as a form of diversity and as a potential minority type (Ortega 2013), could hold for the conceptualization and the realization of these aims in the case of autistic children.

Finally, since human rights are indivisible and interdependent (Cera 2015; Tobin 2019), the aims of education must also be apprehended together with other children’s rights, in particular the principle of the child’s best interests (CRC, Article 3 (1); CRPD, Article 7 (2)), the right to development (CRC, Article 6 (2)), the right to participation (CRC, Article 12; CRPD, Article 7 (3)), the right to protection from violence (CRC, Article 19), and the right to an individual and collective identity (CRC, Articles 8 (1) and 30; CRPD, Article 3 (8)).

Understanding and supporting autistic children’s identity, development, and cognitive functioning

Alongside academic theories and identity politics, those studies that explore the lived experience of autistic children report that being respected as autistic is of crucial importance to them (Goodall 2019; Goodall 2021). Respecting autistic children’s identity and functioning necessitates breaking from the idea that autistic children need to be, need to act, and need to develop like nonautistic children (Slee 2008). It involves conceptualizing autism as a difference rather than a deficit (Brownlow et al. 2021) and parting from the current adherence to a normative framework of development (i.e., neurotypical development) (Conn 2019). When it comes to the individual aims of education, it requires recognizing that neurodivergent ways of developing and learning are to be supported and enabled rather than corrected (Freeman 2020). However, at least in Westerns states, education, which is mostly conceived as schooling (McCowan 2010), tends to rely on a normative development model built around age-based standards (Brownlow et al., 2023; Waltz 2020). Therefore, while teaching curriculums and processes might have progressively evolved toward more flexibility overall, children are still educated en masse (Barua, Bharti & Shubhangi 2019) and expected to reach common learning standards at common ages (Brownlow et al. 2023; Waltz, 2020). As detailed below, these structural characteristics, while potentially detrimental to other children as well, contribute to rendering education highly irrelevant to many autistic children.

One of the most important features of the autistic development and functioning—and a feature often less understood—is that it is highly heterogenous (Griffin et al. 2019; Roberts 2019). To give some illustrations, while neurotypical children are also unique and might develop at a different pace, they will in general have acquired basic motor, verbal, academic, and social skills by the age of seven (CDC 2021). An autistic child in comparison can learn to read by the age of three, though only talking at a much later age and remaining unable to handle fine motor skills or common social interactions into adulthood. These developmental patterns therefore diverge from the normative development pathway established by developmental psychology on which school heavily relies. However, autistic development and cognitive functioning is not in itself pathological and demands to be respected and capitalized on, instead of cured or corrected (Beardon 2023; Brownlow et al. 2023; Chown 2020).

Indeed, while autism is often conceptualized in terms of delays or deficits (Brownlow et al. 2023), it can be better captured in terms of differences, which include both specific weaknesses and specific strengths compared to the standard development model. For instance, autistic children might possess specific strengths and interests on which to build (Clark 2019; Wing 2007) independent of their cognitive level, which can range between extremes (Jordan 2008). Some, for example, might display extreme focus and self-motivation ability (Freeman 2020), perseveration and systematization ability (Orsini & Davidson 2013), and/or exceptional skills in one or several areas, including mathematics or literacy (Clark 2019). However, these skills are often embedded within a highly uneven profile (Jordan 2019) and tend, therefore, to be overlooked or pathologized. Overall, the heterogeneity and atypicality of autistic functioning often renders irrelevant for autistic children the education provided to their peers of similar age (Clark 2019), an age-based level being simultaneously far below and far above autistic children’s actual needs and abilities. A respect for autistic identity and a consideration of the heterogeneous development and functioning of autistic children, both in terms of understanding each child’s needs and of the design of appropriate, potentially cross-level educational options, appears needed in order to provide them with a quality education.

Accepting and promoting autistic children’s communication and socialization styles

In addition to specific developmental patterns and cognitive functioning, autistic children also display atypical forms of socialization and communication. For instance, when it comes to (neurotypical) socialization and communication, most autistic children may need to learn, explicitly and systematically, skills that are acquired early on and incidentally by other children (Barua, Bharti & Shubhangi 2019; Jordan 2008; Jordan 2019). Thus, the acquisition of social, emotional, and communication skills is commonly identified as important for autistic children’s education (Attwood 2019; Bouck & Shurr 2019; McNeil & O’Toole 2019). However, here again, moving from a deficit to a neurodiverse conceptualization of autistic children’s social and communicative abilities appears essential.

For example, through the double empathy theory, authors have put into perspective autistic people’s alleged impairments in communication and socialization (Chapman 2019; Chown 2020; Milton 2017). This theory posits that communication difficulties are reciprocal and that, in instances of communication or socialization between autistic and nonautistic people, both populations actually display difficulties. While these difficulties are often made more visible in autistic persons due to the neurotypical dominance of most communication and socialization arenas (Hodge et al. 2023; Jurgens 2020), they are also rendered apparent in nonautistic persons when immersed in autistic spaces (such as autistic forums or retreats—Chapman 2019; Wood 2019). By contrast, in interautistic communication or socialization, autistic persons do not seem to display similar difficulties (Chapman 2019; Conn 2019; Wood 2019). While further research remains to be conducted on the topic, that already done underlines the need to question the deficit-oriented conceptualization of autistic persons’ social and communication skills, and the different forms of training associated with that conceptualization.

Similarly, studies and life accounts of nonspeaking autistic children and adults tend to deemphasize the place of spoken language in communication and socialization processes (Wood 2019; Wood 2023). Autism has already contributed to questioning the overreliance on speech in the conception of intelligence or cognitive capacity (Barua, Bharti & Shubhangi 2019; Hodge et al. 2023; Purkis 2019). In line with the Deaf movement, a neurodiverse approach to communication would also decenter the place of spoken language in communication (Ashby 2010; Wood 2023). As will be developed further in the second section of this article, some authors have therefore argued for a reconceptualization of autistic socialization and communication as a linguistic or cultural difference rather than a deficit (Chapman 2019; Hillary 2020). Given that, while many autistic children will still need support with the acquisition of social and communicative skills, it might be better conceived as acquiring adaptive skills (Runswick-Cole 2014). Such skills focus on enabling autistic children to communicate and socialize in their (mostly neurotypical) environment, and to thus participate in education and society, but without aiming to make them acquire a neurotypical functioning (Runswick-Cole 2014). The goal should be not only to make autistic children more in line with their neurotypical peers’ social or communication expectations but also to direct their peers toward more awareness and acceptance of autistic children’s functioning. This would then require adopting a more neurodiverse conception of socialization and communication, one that includes neurodivergent modes (Conn 2019; Wood 2019).

Addressing the issues of bullying and anxiety

In connection with autistic children’s atypical functioning, the overarching issues of bullying and anxiety ought to be addressed when considering the conceptualization and realization of the individuals aims of education for them. Bullying is well known to negatively impact children’s self-esteem and mental health, often interfering with the healthy development of their personality and hindering their success in terms of academic outcomes (Roberts 2019). Anxiety is likewise inhibiting of children’s personality and academic development, and damaging to their self-esteem and mental health (Lüddeckens 2021). In addition, both bullying and anxiety can lead to school avoidance, which then impedes access to education and autistic children’s absenteeism is regularly reported as particularly high (Lüddeckens 2021; Roberts 2019). While it is not always possible to clearly differentiate between common and autistic-specific factors underlying these phenomena, examining what role autism might play appears essential to integrate autistic-relevant responses in school and national policies (Bottroff et al. 2019).

While issues regarding bullying and anxiety can arise for any children, they constitute a major problematic for autistic children (Attwood 2019; Roberts 2019). For example, studies consistently report that autistic children are more likely to be bullied than other children, including other disabled children (Bottroff et al. 2019; Lüddeckens 2021; Symes & Humphrey 2010; Williams et al. 2019), and autistic children often identify a lack of autism awareness or acceptance as the basis of these negative school experiences (Goodall & MacKenzie 2019). Addressing the question of neurodiversity and the understanding and respect of neurodivergent functioning would seem to be crucial, therefore, to tackling the issue of bullying for autistic children.

Moreover, and partly in line with their being at a greater risk of bullying, autistic children also suffer from heightened and specific anxiety (Attwood 2019). Besides the social and communication difficulties they can encounter, autistic children also experience extreme sensory-related anxiety in relation to their school environment (Attwood 2019; Wood 2019). The sensory specificities of autism and their impact on autistic people’s well-being are becoming more and more acknowledged (Wood 2019). Within school settings, autistic children are often subjected to overwhelming sensory stimulus, such as the level of noise, lights, or crowds. In tandem with potential neurological predispositions and negative social encounters, these sensory experiences contribute to heightened autistic children’s anxiety (Attwood 2019). Designing efficient and neurodiverse responses to alleviate this anxiety has proven to be extremely difficult, especially in mainstream school settings (Croydon et al. 2019; Moore 2007; Symes & Humphrey 2010; Wing 2007). The few accommodations that have most commonly been implemented, such as the use of noise-canceling headphones or quiet rooms, appear exclusionary, as they rely on isolating autistic children from their environment rather than adapting this environment to their specificities (Graham 2020; Jordan 2019). Similarly, while emotion management education is sometimes helpful to relieve autistic children’s anxiety (Attwood 2019), it does not involve the adaptation and modification of their school environment.

Providing children with a school environment where they are and where they feel safe from bullying and overwhelming anxiety is paramount to delivering quality education. However, to do so will also necessitate changes at the collective level. Indeed, to provide a quality neurodiverse education to autistic children at the individual level, a greater acknowledgement of autism and neurodiversity at the collective level appears indispensable. The second section of the paper will elaborate on how this could be done through the identity aims of education.

Autism as a new minority

In the case of autistic children, an initial issue related to the identity aims of education lies in the question of the legal recognition of an autistic minority. Indeed, the concept of neurological diversity and its impact on constitutional and minority rights have slowly started to be addressed by legal scholars (Lollini 2018). Although there is no agreement on what constitutes a legal minority in international law (Harris-Short & Tobin 2019), the UN special rapporteur on minority issues recently proposed the following working definition:

An ethnic, religious or linguistic minority is any group of persons which constitutes less than half of the population in the entire territory of a State whose members share common characteristics of culture, religion or language, or a combination of any of these (UNGA 2019: §59).

As a result, discussions have started to emerge around the possible recognition of autism as a legal minority. So far, the main approach has revolved around the characterization of an autistic culture, which could then lead to the recognition of autism as an ethnic (i.e., cultural) minority. Indeed, the special rapporteur on minority issues has indicated that ‘[a]n ethnic minority is a broad, inclusive, category bringing together individuals on the basis of origin, lineage or culture’ (UNGA 2020: §76 (c)). The UN Economic and Social Council had previously stated that ‘ethnicity is generally defined by a broad conception of culture, including a way of life’ (UN ECOSOC 2001: §6). In addition to their numerical aspect, it therefore appears that ethnic minorities can be constituted by lineage and/or a shared culture or way of living. Without entering the controversial question of heredity (i.e., lineage) in autism, if we accept that autistic people share a common culture, they could therefore claim protection as an (ethnic) minority. While this discussion has so far mostly developed outside of legal science, many authors and self-advocates have argued that autistic people do indeed share a common and specific culture (Bovell 2020; Chown 2020; Milton 2017), somehow comparable to other marginalized populations, and especially, to Deaf culture (Runswick-Cole 2014; Straus 2017). For instance, Gokh et al. (2018: 1954) explained that the autistic cultural identity includes:

[a] cognitive, communicational, linguistic and symbolic cohesion; [a] feeling of a universal oneness of an autistic population; [a] group conscience; [an] awareness of deep commonality of long-term interests [and] unity of destiny; [a] sense of joint purpose, [a] mindset for transformation and personal growth.

Farahar (2023) has also proposed the existence of an autistic cultural identity, rendered highly visible in autistic spaces. Finally, Chapman (2019) has gone as far as to define autism as a different form of life. Whether or not these cultural elements are enough to constitute a culture in the legal sense is yet to be determined, but if so, autistic people might thus qualify as an ethnic minority.

Other authors have also advanced the idea that autistic people share a common and specific language, which could then allow their recognition as a linguistic minority. The special rapporteur on minority issues has defined linguistic minorities as those speaking a language that is not that of the majority in a State, specifying that ‘[i]t does not need to be a traditional language, have a written form, a threshold number of speakers or to be officially recognized’ (UNGA 2020: §45). He further defined the notion of language as including ‘non-verbal languages, such as sign languages, as well as languages that may have little or no literary tradition or even alphabet or script, and may be orally unintelligible from others, even if they share an identical script’ (UNGA 2020: §76). Regardless of which definition is used, autism is characterized by specificities in communication, and recently, the concept of an autistic communication or autistic language—characterized for examples by specific vocabularies, stimming, echolalia, or info dumping—has started to emerge (Chapman 2019; Farahar 2023). As shown previously through the double empathy theory, autistic communication appears in fact to be both consistent and exclusive to the autistic population. Whether or not this would legally qualify it as a language remains to be determined, but if so, autistic people could benefit from the status of a linguistic minority.

Similarly, authors have developed the concept of a cognitive or neuro-minority to refer to autistic people (Graby 2012; Lollini, 2018; Milton 2017; Rosqvist, Chown & Stenning 2020), although it seems unclear if it would constitute a new ground for the recognition of a minority (in addition to the religious, ethnic, or linguistic ones) or would act as an additional element of a culture. Scholars have also argued that autistic people do seem to meet the recognition guidelines developed for new minorities, such as some other disabled populations or LGBT+ people (Lollini 2018; for an opposite opinion, see Broderick 2015), although the legal status of such minorities is also to be further determined. Finally, on the European side, both the European Court of Human Rights and the European Committee on Social Rights—whose related conventions do not provide for specific minority rights—have included autistic people under the concept of vulnerable groups (e.g., in International Association Autism-Europe v. France, 2002, no. 13/2002; see also Broderick 2019). The concept of vulnerable groups offers a higher judicial protection by reducing the margin of appreciation of states and by involving a stricter judicial review (Limante 2022). It has been used both in relation to legally recognized minorities (e.g., Roma, Deaf) or other communities (e.g., some disabled populations or LGBT+ people), which might indicate a willingness to transcend the traditional religious, ethnic, or linguistic criteria found in international law. However, although these different arguments might hold some promise, it is important to stress that, so far, autism is still not considered a legal minority in international human rights law (Broderick 2015).

While it mainly remains a legal fiction at this stage, being recognized as a specific minority would give another dimension to the identity aims of education provided for by Article 29 (1) of the CRC and related to children’s rights to collective identity (CRC, Article 30; CRPD, Article 3 (8)). Indeed, states are required to assume both negative and positive obligations to allow minorities to preserve and develop their group identity and to protect their existence, nonexclusion, nondiscrimination, and nonassimilation (UN ECOSOC 2001: §4 and §23). Such a recognition would therefore further support the right of autistic children to an education fully respectful and supportive of their autistic identity and functioning, both at the individual and group levels. However, as will be developed below, this legal recognition is not the only mechanism through which autistic children as a group might benefit from a better quality education.

Autism as a new diversity

Whether or not autism will be recognized as a legal minority, authors and advocates have been asking for a better integration of neurodiversity and autism within the debate of diversity in education (Ashby 2010; Chun & Fisher 2014; Freeman 2020). The identity aims do not require that children belong to a legal minority for the aims to apply to them, and the questions raised by autism, whether it is conceived as a minority or a community, appear relevant to the topics of identity and diversity. Some authors have, for example, proposed to view autism under a multicultural or cross-cultural lens. For instance, Hillary (2020) relies on the notion of autistic or neurodivergent cultures to analyze the communication between autistic and nonautistic people as a cross-cultural or cross-neurotype communication. Others have similarly qualified autism as forming a distinct culture and/or language (Chapman 2019; Farahar 2023; Milton 2017; Straus 2017)—though not necessarily in the legal sense—thus creating neurodiverse interactions between autistic and nonautistic people (Conn 2019).

Education is a crucial arena for autistic and neurodivergent children to develop and foster their culture, collective identity, and values (UNESCO and the Right to Education Initiative 2019), similarly to other marginalized communities. Compulsory schooling should not prohibit them from learning and belonging to a nondominant community (Arkadas-Thibert & Ruggiero 2022). Thus, to counter the ableist, normalizing, and neurotypical domination of education (Ashby 2010), schools and education systems need to become more neurodiverse. A first step in this direction can be conceptualized under the enactive neurodiversity framework developed by Jurgens (2020). As Jurgens explains:

[T]he development of an enactive neurodiversity paradigm for education … would educate students about neurodiversity as a property of people in general, rather than singling out particular neurodivergent people for what many people consider to be ‘special treatment’ (2020: 86).

However, as with other diversity issues, such as multiculturalism or sexual diversity, neurodiversity should be integrated within all elements of education—teaching and curriculums, but also environment, culture (CRPD Committee 2016, §11–12), educational staff (Conn 2019), and knowledge production (Jaramillo, McLaren & Ryoo 2012). As Perry (2011) explains, teaching or acknowledging differences is not enough, and divergence must also be legitimized to allow diversity. For example, an education that would recognize different cultures but only value the dominant one (e.g., Western), or an education that would tolerate different sexual orientations but still presuppose one as the norm (e.g., heterosexuality), would not be deemed to be multicultural or respectful of sexual diversity. To be fully neurodiverse, education should therefore not only acknowledge the existence but also the validity of neurodivergent functioning, and more specifically here of autistic functioning, both at an individual and a collective level. In addition to being required by the identity aims of education, and other related rights, the acknowledgment and enforcement of neurodiversity in education would also participate to satisfy the structural, cultural, and attitudinal changes required by article 24 of the CRPD (CRPD Committee 2016: §11). Whether autism is recognized as a minority or as part of a wider human (neuro-)diversity, if education systems and schools are to provide quality education to autistic children, they have, thus, to integrate the question of neurodiversity in their wider diversity discussions and strategies.