Since 1981, Dr. Judith LeBlanc (now professor emerita in the Depts. of Behavioral Analysis Sciences and Special Education and Coordinator of International Programs of the Life Span Institute of the University of Kansas) opened her heart and her pocketbook, as well as rearranged her professional goals, to come to Peru to teach professionals and parents how to educate and thus prepare people with autism, retardation and severe behavior problems to become independent, productive and happy in life. She was well prepared for this journey because her training and research focus at the University of Kansas were related to developing methods for teaching people who have difficulty learning.
Her first visit to Peru was a result of my searching through the through the United States and Mexico, for a professional who specialized in teaching people with different abilities and who would be willing to come to my country to teach us effective methods for educating these people who had been long neglected in my country.
In 1981 Dr. LeBlanc first visited the garage of my parents home which then housed the two-year-old Centro Ann Sullivan del Perú (CASP) in Lima, Perú. By that time it had grown from serving eight children with severe learning and social limitations in 1979 to serving 50. In Peru resources are few to none, but we knew that with knowledge and persistence we could overcome the barriers imposed by limited resources in order to teach people with different abilities to become independent, productive, and happy in life. Many people would not, and did not have the courage to respond to my challenge and come to teach us, but Dr. Judith LeBlanc did.
Since then she has returned every year, for four to six months, even during the time of terrorism when all foreigners were prime targets. She came even though her colleagues told her she would ruin her professional career, and she has made many financial sacrifices to continue her work with us. All of us at the center feel she is an excellent ambassador to teach us the principles of Behavior Analysis. She is a humanitarian for sharing her life with us even in the most difficult times and under the most difficult conditions.
Dr. LeBlanc, was critical in the original development of the functional/natural curriculum of CASP and is responsible for teaching us how to maintain the quality of services being provided to the students and families served at CASP. She also helped us to envision and develop ways to disseminate the CASP messages and program development throughout the world.
With Dr. LeBlanc´s guidance and partnership, our center is now recognized throughout the world for its success and is a model for similar programs in eight Spanish-speaking countries. We even won a prestigious award for our work from the Queen of Spain. Our goal is to teach those with different abilities so that with proper preparation they can be included into the real world. Dr. LeBlanc has made possible our unique approach and it is she who taught us to treat every person as a loving human being with the ability to live to his or her full and unique potential with our support using a functional and natural curriculum.
After her first brave and unprecedented step, Dr. LeBlanc convinced many other colleagues from the US, to share their knowledge and training with our team in Peru. She continues to teach us how to educate people who experience the most difficult learning problems and she also teaches us how to teach others what we learn. She is a master teacher who allows us to make our own decisions and grow in our own culture, allowing us to independently develop and direct our own way of educating those who need us the most.
Our center has grown from serving eight children in a garage to serving 450 individuals (from a few weeks of age to 50 years) and their families; 100 of our students now work in real jobs with equivalent pay and many are the sole supporters of their families; 50 of our students are included in regular schools from pre-school to high school; and with family training and participation as a mainstay of, and unique to our program, we provide 171 hours per year with 80 percent participation, and much more. Dr. LeBlanc is also committed to educating parents and professionals in the more remote areas of the world is current working with the CASP staff to develop different types of Long Distance Education that can be used in rural Peru and in similar areas of the world. She has also written scripts and helped to develop teacher and parent training programs that are offered via videotape instruction and teleconferencing. Thanks to Dr. LeBlanc our Long Distance Educational Program is now in 17 provinces of Peru. Dr. LeBlanc accepted our challenge, and has dedicated her professional life to all people who she says are not able to learn with typical educational procedures but who, with educational emphasis on their different abilities, can learn and can become valued members of their own societies.
The task is large, there are 3,000,000 people with disabilities in Peru and only 26,000 receive service. There are millions more from other developing countries that we are, in acknowledgement of our educational endowment, developing ways to help.
Dr. Judith LeBlanc, has helped us to develop a first quality program in a third world country, with fourth-class salaries and is educating others all over the world to do the same. Without her dedication to our education and her willingness to suggest ways we might do things, we would not have had an opportunity to show what we can accomplish in spite of the limitations one faces in developing nations. She taught us how to make a difference in the lives of others by making a difference in our lives through her continuing education. Thanks to her teachings, other countries have replicated our program in Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua and Spain. For all these reasons the team of the Centro Ann Sullivan of Peru- CASP says, "Muchas Gracias Dr. Judith LeBlanc for continuing to come to Perú for 26 years. You are the best teacher that we could ever have. You inspire us with your teaching and by observing you work directly with our students. Because of you the Centro Ann Sullivan of Peru - CASP is now an International Education, Demonstration, Training and Research Center. Without you this would not have been possible.”
