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TAIWAN ARCHITECT|No.539 Bethlehem Early Treatment & Integration Education Center

2019-11-01

Bio – Architecture Formosana+ Gong Shuzhang

Now nearly 90 years old, American priest Brendan O’Connell, who has dedicated more than half a century to early treatment education services in Taiwan, is an important promoter of early promotion of disabled children and early treatment education in Taiwan. He came to Taiwan in the 1960s and found that because of the lack of medical knowledge, many parents were worried about the strange outlook of special youths, so that the slow children and special youths in the family reduced their contact with the outside world. There was no treatment, no rehabilitation, and no education. Therefore, he returned to the United States to study special education. After returning to Taiwan, he took over as the director of the Raphael Puzzle Center. He was registered as the earliest day care institution for children with mental disabilities in Taiwan, and then he founded the “Bethlehem Cultural and Educational Foundation” and so on. In the early treatment education he promotes, the traditional institutional isolation education method is firmly eliminated, and the day care is used to provide preschool education and rehabilitation courses for children aged 0-6. At the same time, through the mechanism of integrated education, allow the slow children go to class with ordinary children, so that every child can have the opportunity to see the world and embrace the world.
Why do it? The answer from the firm is to ‘’Integrate with education and the community’’
Today, Father Gan Huizhong’s greatest wish is to establish the “Bethlehem Early Treatment and Inclusive Education Center” in the school district of Tainan rural area, with educational purpose as the core, linking the relationship between the environment, medical care and society; improving the current simple learning space and providing A more comfortable learning environment for children.

Story extension // Architect Magazine