Yeah, good morning to you, darlene.
We're here this morning inside the school that is inside the
hospital. We're here in 1/4 grade classroom.
This is really a wide open space,
you can see here at the entrance to the room and that's to
accommodate Children who are in wheelchairs, stretchers,
Children who are using oxygen, even ventilators. The Children,
the 12 Children in this fourth grade classroom are medically
fragile but they're also well enough to want to go to school and
to be around other kids.
You want to hit the ball. I'm a ball pushed.
Yeah joe Federico says starting kindergarten was the best day
ever. Do you love school? Yeah.
Anyway, what do you love the most?
My friend joe and his friends are in class together at the Mount
Pleasant Lightsail school,
the only public school in a hospital in all of new york.
Just before his fourth birthday,
joe suffered a brain aneurysm and was paralyzed on his left side.
He was hospitalized for months with multiple surgeries to save
his life for 17 months ago. Now he he was in a coma.
You know, we didn't know what would happen.
We didn't know if he would live or not.
So the fact that in such a short period of time now we're
talking about school and kindergarten.
Having his first day is it's I don't have the words for it.
Not only is joe walking, he's biking. Yes.
Oh yes and bowling getting the therapy.
He needs to gain strength on his left side but much of his day
is spent like most kindergartners sing songs,
do math and learning much more than reading and writing,
according to the superintendent.
They learn that there is more to a person than just a number.
Yeah.
Uh huh. They learn how to tolerate differences,
they learn how to Respect one another have empathy and I think
that's the greatest gift that we give to kids.