by Agbo Chris,
One of the groups championing the cause of Persons with disabilities in Nigeria, Voice of Disability Initiative (VDI) on Friday in Abuja organized a press conference on Promoting effective Inclusive Education Practice in FCT which was held to mark the annual International Day of Persons with disabilities (IDPD).
It is part of the project that VDI is carrying out being supported by Disability Rights Fund.
The Executive Director of Voice of Disability Initiative, Barrister Catherine Edeh while speaking to the press said that segregations in the schooling system is a gross discrimination against children with disabilities, calling for a more inclusive educational model in Nigeria.
She said that inclusive education is all about all students attending and are welcome by their neighborhood schools in age-appropriate, regular classes and are supposed to learn, contribute and participate in all aspects of the life of the school.
“We are not talking about ‘segregation’ school system where special schools for different clusters of learners with disabilities are situated at remote places, thereby exposing them to see themselves differently.
“In Nigeria, the educational model mostly practised is segregation, where children with disabilities are educated in special schools. Segregation can often reinforce discrimination against children with disabilities, exclude them from socialisation in a diverse society and make them vulnerable to a range of human rights abuses,” she said.
“When we talk about ‘inclusive education’ our message is clear and precise, how do we develop and design our schools, classrooms, programs and activities so that all students learn and participate together with segregation?”
“Inclusive education is about ensuring access to quality education for all students by effectively meeting their diverse needs in a way that is responsive, accepting, respectful and supportive. Students participate in the education program in a common learning environment with support tp diminish and remove barriers and obstacles that may lead to exclusion”
She also said that inclusive education is back with commitments of the United Nations Convention on the rights of Persons with disabilities (UNCRPD), Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and World Bank Group 10 commitments to Disability Inclusive Development, member countries are bound by this which Nigeria is part of. Article 24 of UNCRPD encourages inclusive education and quality and free education for PWDs in Primary and Secondary Schools in equal basis with others, SDG Goal 4, emphasized on ensuring inclusive and equitable quality education and promote lifelong learning opportunities for all including PWDs. World bank group 10 Commitments to Disability Inclusive Development( Commitment 1) ensures that all world bank group finance education programs and projects with disability inclusiveness by 2025.
Despite the local and international laws and commitments, many children with disabilities remain excluded from the educational system. For some of those within the educational system, they continue to face various forms of violence and disability-based discrimination, she added.
According to UNICEF, an estimated 93 million children worldwide live with disabilities. Nearly 50 per cent of such children are not in school, especially in developing countries like Nigeria.
A 2017 report on inclusive education by the World Bank and the Global Partnership for Education found that though literacy among children with learning disabilities has increased globally, these children remain severely excluded from educational policies and still lag far behind their peers.
In Nigeria, which has the highest number of out-of-school children in the world, ascertaining the percentage of those with learning disabilities is next to impossible as official data is non-existent, an investigation by Devex showed.
As such, any educational plan will most likely not address the needs of those with disabilities, pushing them further to the margins of society.
She stated that in the FCT, implementation of inclusive education are faced with numerous challenges, the awareness level is still very low, no much advocacy in the area of inclusive education, so people do not clearly understand the importance of inclusive education to development. Most schools both public and private do not accommodate learners with disabilities. There is general segregation of special schools designed for learners with disabilities and that should be their best system of learning.
SEE THE VIDEOS OF THE PRESS CONFERENCE
“How can a parent with a bright deaf child who live at Masaka for instance send his/ her five years old deaf child for a school for the deaf at Lafia or Kuje daily as a day student, noting that a child of such age range cannot cope a boarding pupils? No responsible parent would love to send a child below 7 years old to a boarding school. The proximity issues associated with special schools and the way they are always cited at remote places and they are few, it is the situation in FCT and all over Nigeria”.
“FCT administration has made considerable efforts to incorporate inclusive education at Primary and Secondary Schools level by selecting Government School for the Deaf Dutse and some other schools to test run the implementation of inclusive education in the FCT but the process have not yielded the desired result and as such more effort and attention is needed to make more effective and visible in FCT” In order to ensure effective common learning environment, She proposed certain roles and responsibilities that will help to change the narratives, modification of the education curriculum to ensure the adaptation and enabling of each child with disabilities to fully participate in the learning environment that is designed for all students and is shared with peers in the chosen educational setting, develop positive attitude and providing positive climate, promote a sense of belonging and ensure student progress towards appropriate personal, social, emotional and academic goals,
Also Accessible Communication mediums, Advocacies and awareness of rights, being responsive to individual learning needs, Resource mobilization and giving support beyond school or classrooms, implementation of the schemes, providing legal action and legislation to ensure enforcement, involvement of Civil society organizations (CSOs) to create more awareness and carry out more advocacy, introduce innovative practice through research, identifying children in need and ensuring their placement, keep track on the identified children and provide resources, create a collaboration with government agencies and other stakeholder to achieve the set objectives.
Again, engaging owners of private schools to make them inclusive, share knowledge and skills such as leadership management and teachers training, capacity building and organizational and leadership skills for improved quality inclusive education.
She also stated that Inclusive Education would be beneficial in ways that it would enhance friendship, understanding and acceptance of diversity, increased social initiation, acceptance, relationship, appreciation and acceptance of individual differences, increased academic performance, increase inclusion, greater opportunities for interactions and respect for all people, peer role model for academic, social and behavioural skills.
She called for more attention and commitments of the major stakeholders in education towards the implementation of inclusive education because effective inclusive education practice is achievable in Nigeria and it is important no child with disability is left out of school.
More pictures
