This photographer sucks..

Nah, but him dead center and have the kids wrap around. Easy.
This was the "solution" proposed by countless respondants to the Province's article, and IMO is not the answer. That makes him the centre of attention, and would give him a compositionally superior position in the photograph which is just as wrong as the compositionally inferior one he has in the first image.

I agree.. seems like that would just make him the center of attention and be this over the top "we love our handicap classmate!" thing.

Man, how horrible that would of been.
 
When I did classroom teaching school picture day was an assembly line all day long, whether the kids were developing typically or had developmental delays - we were on a tight schedule and before my class was done the next group was usually at the door waiting to come in. I doubt in this case that anyone realized how it looked on camera except the photographer who probably just did whatever was the standard procedure. If this class had been bigger they might have filled the bleachers and wouldn't have even had this situation so obviously they just needed to set up differently for a class this size.

How schools are set up and run varies state to state in the US; where I live as a teacher I was able to get kids in and out of chairs and equipment (we also had assistants, therapists, etc.); training on how to get children positioned properly was done on an ongoing basis. This situation would have just been a matter of realizing how the photographer was going to be set up so staff could adapt as needed (which now it seems like they'll be aware of doing).

Kids who use a wheelchair wouldn't be in the chair all day, they might use it just to go from the bus to the classroom, the classroom to the gym, etc., and it depends on the child how much support is needed or what type chair he/she would use. Since bleachers don't have a back, some kids who use a wheelchair might be able to sit with assistance and others might need the support of their chair for school events (like picture day) where the bleachers are used.

The equipment has changed in more recent years, kids who need a brace or helmet usually can pick out the color and design they want, etc. so it's become more child-friendly. It is still a wheelchair or equipment but is considered to be more as a tool they'll be using however they need it.
 
The teacher could have helped him out of the chair and put him on the end of the bench while kneeling down to support him from a fall and removing the chair from the picture.I would have never stuck him in the back and off to the side.
Is the teacher allowed to do that? Is the teacher authorized to do that? Does the teach know how or have the physical strength to do that?

Absolutely not! Why wasn't this mother there on picture day to assist her son in this situation? Surely she didn't expect the photographer to scoop the child out of his chair on plop him on the bench? She couldn't have expected the teacher to do the same? Much like all schools, I assume this photo was taken in the gym - a big square room with nothing other than perhaps a set of bleachers to sit on? Without the aide of the boy's mother (or somebody authorized to remove the child from his chair), this photographer had few options at making this composition less alienating. Putting the teacher between the boy and the bleachers would have been a good option in this case... To say the photographer did this intentionally is slanderous at the very least. To say he may have erred would be more accurate I believe. We all make mistakes. How we rectify those mistakes is what defines our character. The photographer shouldn't be hung for this and the mother shouldn't be so quick to point fingers. In my opinion, she should have been there to assist in this situation or at the VERY LEAST she should have had her wishes known prior to photo day so that arrangements could have been made. My $0.02. Cheers!
 
This isn't about fighting stigmas or historic implications. It is about a young boy, sitting amongst his peer for a class photo. No more, no less. I do understand where you are coming from though.

Any time you're dealing with something like this the political baggage comes along with it, and cannot be separated from it.
 
The Problem:
Miles appears to be separated from his classmates.

The Solution:
Many, many solutions. The simplest being simply aligning everyone to the right side of the risers. Perhaps maneuvering him in front of the risers and going for a tighter shot.

The Cause:
It all boils down to training. School-hired photography companies almost exclusively hire highly inexperienced photographers. These guys have little to no experience and are sadly mistaken if they think they will be getting much more. They usually have to go by strict formulas as well. Sometimes it's as strict as having a mat with the locations of the lights and camera marked on it. This is tolerable if you consider that these companies sometimes need to take hundreds of identical pictures per day, but it has an added consequence: the photographer a) does not expect any variation, b) is not trained to handle any variation, c) does not have the experience to handle the variation themselves.

Let's be fair with this guy. Yes, he's a crappy photographer, but he's also probably very inexperienced. He followed his training to the best of his ability. Trying something crazy and unexpected is unheard of for him, and it would possibly mean abandoning protocol

The solution that was provided was actually one that the photographer never could have done, even if he were more experienced. "In the new photo, which his parents have not yet seen, Miles was taken out of his wheelchair and supported by a caregiver on a bench beside his classmates." Supported by a caregiver. Was the photographer supposed to not only abandon all of his training, think outside the box for the first time, come up with a solution to a problem which he had never experienced in any form, AND pull a certified caregiver out of his butt in order to make this photo the best it could be?

This is a picture of a happy kid. He is further from the group than he could have been. He probably considers himself a normal kid, but his mother has singlehandedly drawn much more attention to his condition in one day than a lifetime of slightly separated school pictures.
 

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