The mother of a 12-year-old boy with Tourette's Syndrome told The Royal Gazette there was nowhere on the Island for her son to be properly educated, and no services or support for him.

Mrs. Ellen Baxter said because her son Andrew could not be mainstreamed he had to be tutored at home, which was not mainstreaming at all.

There were too many people deciding what happened to special needs children who were not trained in special education, Mrs. Baxter claimed.

Tourette's -- which some believe afflicted the famed composer Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart -- is comprised of body ticking, repetitive verbal phrases, and sudden outbursts of movement.

Andrew also has obsessive-compulsive disorders, and suffers from "crippling'' depression.

Mrs. Baxter said she was at first enthusiastic about Government's plan to mainstream her son, but quickly became disappointed when she heard what was in store for him.

"In January we had nine months to get together,'' she said. "I met with them (education officials) and it was just like someone threw cold water in my face. They wouldn't even look at his reports from Boston.

"They just said he had to go to secondary school and that was it.'' She said Government was giving the public the impression that once a special-needs child entered puberty all their problems were over.

"The impression given to the public is that at 12 they're better, and that is not true,'' Mrs. Baxter said.

"Until I met Dr. Judith Bartley (Government inclusion specialist) they (Education officials) said he was going to secondary school whether I liked it or not.'' She said it was Dr. Bartley who finally convinced officials that secondary school just would not work for Andrew.

Mrs. Baxter said her son is clever and speaks very well, but when asked to do something like write an essay or do long division he is lost.

Because he has Tourette's, Andrew also often says whatever comes into his head.

"At Sandys Secondary he would be eaten alive,'' Mrs. Baxter said. "I know what's going to happen. His mouth is going to open up and he's just going to spew forth whatever he thinks of the person standing in front of him.'' She said she had read in the newspaper many quotes from Government officials reassuring parents that they should not worry about mainstreaming because services would continue for special students in regular schools.

"It has never been a question of services continuing, they never had them!'' Mrs. Baxter said.

"There is nowhere for my son to go. Andrew has been provided with three one-and-a-half-hour sessions a week of tutoring so that he can catch up with the others.'' Mrs. Baxter said this was not a solution for her son and nor was the recently-closed Cedar Grove (special) School.

"It was horrendous,'' she said.

She said the main problem at Cedar Grove was that children with emotional problems and conduct disorders were being placed with children with biological learning disabilities.

"There was no discipline at Cedar Grove, the kids were running wild and there was lots of violence.'' At Sandys Secondary, Andrew would be placed in a special classroom with the very same five children he "couldn't walk to the bathroom with''.

She said her son needed an appropriate school setting that provided a "modified, tightly structured programme''.

"I'm not against mainstreaming,'' Mrs. Baxter stressed, "but they should have had the programme up and running before they place the children.'' Her worst fear, she said, was that Andrew's "shut-down periods'' -- typical of many special needs children who are progressing -- will become permanent if he is overburdened.

"We're losing time with Andrew, and I feel angry that he should have to leave the system.'' Asked what would happen to children who cannot be mainstreamed, Student Services education officer Mrs. Joeann Smith said she could not discuss individual cases.

However, she said most special students could be mainstreamed, but there were "a number of arrangements'' for children who could not.

Mrs. Smith would not give details on such "arrangements''.