On an easygoing August evening, high school students from The Columbus School, witnessed a conference managed and dictated by Enrique Macia in which they were incorporated into the most recent school news. Through the conference, Macia educated pre-adolescents and adolescents from ninth grade to twelfth grade on how an understudy with a autism named Piero Cataldo was entering Columbus School’s grounds. He altogether secured on who was Cataldo as a person and how a complete new curriculum would be created for the needs of Cataldo. Macia completed his introduction by saying that he needed from everyone of us to regard Piero as somebody ordinary and common, lead by communicating that the circumstance the school had quite recently acknowledged must be fruitful with the collaboration of all. TCS is a school to respect with pride, as they chose to acknowledge a situation that removed them from their comfort range of familiarity, and made them part of the exclusive 0.7% of private schools who accept children with autism.

“After analyzing the situation a thousand times, we came to the conclusion that having Piero as a student in TCS would give us and him more pros than cons. We believed this new situation would benefit the growth and matureness in the mind and body of each TCS student,” explained Roger Arbabi, TCS’ High School’s Principal. The school had never encountered with a situation this complicated. Complex, in the terms that it made the school change a lot of things and hire a whole staff to work by the hand with Cataldo, but instead of running away from the plight they decided to explore and decifrate the circumstance with the help of experts. After accepting Piero, TCS staff hired two experts in order for the success of the picture. Daniela Correa was hired to be Cataldo’s shadow, in other words Correa would be the person that accompanies him throughout the entire day, and Macia would be his teacher.

Accepting Piero implicated changing various things, however for the most part it implied a making another  educational curriculum for him. “The idea was to create a special curriculum, to evaluate Piero and his skills in the academical part, also we had to work the social interaction too and in someway connect everything together. My job is to link the academic issues in the school with the social needs and capacities of Piero,” said Macia. This curriculum is combined with TCS’ high school standards and a special curriculum from USA called “Basic Trees.” With the help of this tools, Macia adjusts the high school standards to Cataldo cognitive skills and merges them with this US program to create a unique curriculum for him to be constantly challenged.

“I’m very happy in the school,” said Cataldo. The entrance of Cataldo not only has it been a challenge for the directors of the school, but for every single student. In reality, TCS doesn’t really defines the word diversity, and it could be said that about the 90% of the school is “Paisa,” meaning we don’t get to interact a lot with other cultures, leading us to grow in a bubble. “We were surprised with Piero’s accomodation in the school and everyone’s acceptance, because it was very fast. Piero, has told us that he is very happy here and that the students are really special with him. Constantly he is surrounded by his peers that treat him just as a normal person,” said Macia. Even though the school and everyone who surrounds it believed this situation would turn out to be a complete disaster, because everyone feared we wouldn’t be able to pop that bubble. Instead it turned out to be a complete success and both the students and Cataldo are very joyful for change.

Many confuse the meaning of the diversity by limiting it’s content only to race and sex, however, diversity is a word that transcends these boundaries. By having people who are different than us in more ways than physical we truly achieve the meaning of this word. Piero is undoubtedly an exceptional being that, with his presence, enlightens the light in The Columbus School’s lighthouse.