Promoting the Rights of Children with Disabilities, UNICEF

start for children and families. In addition, importantsteps are now being taken to initiate inclusive educationprogrammes at the preschool level.In reviewing the role of special schools in the future,some countries favouring inclusive education as afirst choice and as a matter of principle have decidedto retain special schools for children whose parentsexpress a strong preference for such schools, and forpupils who would be particularly difficult to supportin ordinary schools. Special schools are now moreclosely linked to mainstream schools in a variety ofways, sharing resources and training and sometimeslocated on the same site, a trend increasingly seenacross North America and Europe.Apart from discriminatory legislative measures, hurdlesto implementing inclusive education include:• low priority for children with disabilities amongdecision-makers;• lack of community awareness and support;• reluctance to admit children with severe andcomplex disabilities;• inaccessible buildings and curricula that are notadapted to the special needs of children with disabilities;• shortage and/or lack of appropriate training forteachers, at all levels;• lack of support from special schools where theseexist;• lack of targeted funding.To some extent, income-rich nations with a relativelylong history of segregated education for childrenwith disabilities present different barriers to inclusiveeducation than those found in income-poor countries.In the former, many ordinary primary and secondaryschools are not physically accessible to pupils withlimited mobility. 45 Access to the curriculum is evenmore problematic for children with intellectual impairmentsand learning difficulties, though this is beingaddressed in a number of countries. Also, some ofthe most significant barriers result from the legacy ofpolicies and structures that have influenced attitudesand mindsets and so created resistance to change.Market forces may also encourage discriminationwithin the education system. Schools oriented onresults generally publish formal assessments of pupilattainment that foster an educational culture whereparents and students compete to attend the bestschools. Children with disabilities may find themselvesexcluded if it is feared that they may compromiseoverall results. In this and other contexts, theremay be resistance to attendance by children with disabilitiesby the parents of children without disabilities.Families often face further obstacles in securing aplace for their child in an ordinary school. For example,children placed in ordinary schools may not beable to have access to speech or physiotherapy onthe same basis as those in special schools, and theirparents may be asked to pay for the child’s transportto and from school. Similar limitations often apply tothe availability of services in children’s early education.Such restrictive policies have the effect of steeringparents to use special schools when this is notnecessarily in the best interests of the child.In income-poor countries, resource shortages oftenrepresent the major constraint to inclusion: lack ofschools or adequate learning environments, shortageof teachers, lack of materials and an absence ofsupport. 46 On the other hand, attitudes to childrenwith disabilities sometimes favour their inclusion. Anumber of countries (such as Pakistan) have recordedexamples of ’casual integration’, in which childrenwith disabilities have been readily accepted in ordinaryschools ’because they are local children’. It hasbeen reported that in Viet Nam there is widespreadsocial acceptance of children with disabilities acrossthe general population. A Child Disability Survey in1998 found that the majority of households consistingof children with disabilities said that local peoplehad positive attitudes towards them. 47 Additionally,systems of customary and non-formal education inincome-poor countries are based much more on familyties, coexistence and the value of the individual,making this education available to all communitymembers without distinction. 48 While these traditionalsystems have been weakened, they have not beenentirely lost in the face of modernization.Institutionalization and lack of appropriate careFour decades of work to improve the livingconditions of children with disabilities ininstitutions have taught us one major lesson: thereis no such thing as a good institution. 49(Professor Gunnar Dybwad, founding father of themovement for inclusion, parent advocacy and selfadvocacyfor persons with disabilities)Placement of children in institutional care remains acommon response to disability in some parts of theworld. The ability of parents or caregivers to copewith a child with a disability may be compromisedfor different reasons. They may, for example, findthemselves isolated in a community that does notunderstand their child’s impairment; and they maylack the needed economic and social support, or therequired information, to be able to provide the neededcare and assistance for their children.However, it has become widely accepted thatinstitutional care for children whose needs cannot bemet within their own family is highly detrimental totheir well-being and development. Institutionalizationoften means that children are cut off from theirfamilies and the life in their communities. Researchhas demonstrated that children experiencedevelopmental delays and potentially irreversiblepsychological damage by growing up in such17 Promoting the Rights of Children with Disabilities Innocenti Digest No. 13