Texas’ largest public charter school holder, Responsive Education Solutions (ResponsiveEd), and the Autism Community Network (CAN) recently announced the first charter school focused on serving children with autism in Texas. The school will be called the Foundation School for Autism and will be tuition-free in San Antonio, Texas.

The school will provide parents of autistic children an alternative to expensive private schools. Every child with autism will be able to receive high quality, evidence-based autism intervention and education despite their parent’s income.

The Foundation School provides parents of children with autism an alternative to expensive private schools. The Executive Director of Autism Community Network, Jesse Franco said, “Autism knows no boundaries. Rich or poor, white collar or blue collar, families face a huge financial burden when confronted by autism.”

The school opened its doors officially in August of 2010 with three classrooms. There are currently 21 children with autism spectrum disorders that are receiving intensive early invention therapy. According to research, if a child receives early intervention therapies, appropriate and intensive therapy before the age of six then their chance of leading a self-supporting life nearly doubles.

The Foundation School students will receive one-to-one and group instruction which will include Speech Therapy, Occupational Therapy, Applied Behavior Analysis and other special sessions such as music therapy. Each child is given a customized plan in order to develop and improve areas such as verbal behavior, learning readiness, social communication, play, adaptive skills, classroom skills and academics.

ResponsiveEd is providing the infrastructure and the teachers for the school. Charter schools under ResponsiveEd are high quality, free schools that serve at risk students in grades 6 to 12 and students on college preparatory tracks from Kindergarten to grade 12.