Includ-ed, red europea de educación inclusiva

“SAME SCHOOL FOR ALL? - EQUALITY FOR CHILDREN AND YOUNG PERSONS WITH SPECIAL NEEDS AND FOR THEIR LEARNING PATH”
 
SUMMARY ABOUT THE SEMINAR
 
Regional State Administrative Agency for Western and Inland Finland JAMK University of Applied Sciences were arranging together with the Threshold Association and JAMK University of Applied Sciences a seminar under the theme “Same school for all? - equality for children and young persons with special needs and for their learning path”. The event was held on 10th October 2012 in Jyväskylä, in JAMK Dynamo building. In this seminar was discusses about the educational equality from the pupils’, students and parents' point of view, and from the perspective of regulations. The purpose of this event was to be interactional and communicative.
 
Some background information about Finnish Education system (three-step-model support, grades 1 – 9 or 10):
In the year 2010, The Finnish national core curriculum for basic education went through some amendments and additions when it comes to support for learning and schooling. A new three-step support model was introduced. The new support model contained general, intensified and special support (grades 1 – 9). Every pupil has a right to high-quality education as well as an opportunity to receive guidance and support such as tutoring, differentiating, etc., even before this support model.
 
Also general support means support for all pupils. It’s based on a pedagogical assessment, where the teacher is describing the concrete support pupil or student gets during the period, approximately two months. Then will be evaluated whether the level of support is sufficient. Schools may make use of remedial teaching, learning plans, part-time special-needs education and assistants’ contributions as means to meet the support needs of teaching groups or individual pupils even before transition to the intensified support stage.
 
Intensified support is provided when general support is not sufficient. Pupils in need of regular support for their learning or schooling or in need of several forms of support at the same time must be provided with intensified support that is based on a pedagogical assessment in accordance with a learning plan prepared for them. It is by nature more intense and persistent than general support.
 
Special support may be made prior to or during pre-primary or basic education without a prior pedagogical statement and provision of intensified support for learning, if a psychological or medical evaluation indicates that the pupil in question cannot otherwise be provided with education due to disability, illness, developmental delay or an emotional disorder, or for some other equivalent special reason. The education provider must consult the pupil and his or her parents, guardians or legal representatives and prepare a pedagogical statement on the pupil. The need for aid is assessed annually and in particular 2th class in the spring, and before the 7th class.
 
Opening of the seminar Same school for all? – equality for children young persons with special needs and for their learning path:
 
The seminar was opened by Mrs., M.A., speech therapist Arja-Liisa Linnasalo, The Threshold Association. Mrs. Linnasalo said that disabled people need to be involved in our society and that we shall listen to even the most severely disabled ones. Finland has a new Basic Education Act, a new support model and a principle of neighbourhood school. Education shall be arranged in municipalities so as to make pupils' travel to and from school as safe and short as possible in view of the habitation, the location of schools. Finland has Non-Discrimination Act, too, which purpose is to foster and safeguard equality and enhance the protection. This Act applies to both public and private activities in the for example access to training, including advanced training and retraining, and vocational guidance. Teachers often see the extra work caused by pupils with disabilities different than the work caused by others. They should remember that children are not so different, they are all individuals. The special needs of pupils with disabilities shall not stigmatize them.
 
Mrs., designer Marjut Mikkola, Regional State Administrative Agency for Western and Inland Finland, and the principal lecturer Mrs. Maija Hirvonen, University of Applied Sciences, also welcomed the participants to the seminar. All three persons pointed out that this event is a result of cooperation, which began thanks to the European IncluD-ed project.
 
The reality of everyday life through personal experiences
 
Four persons told about the reality of everyday life, through their personal experiences: Three of them are parents of disabled children or young persons, one is disabled person her/himself. Their experiences were very different. One thought that at special school there is good atmosphere and it is functional, other said that at a mainstream school it seems easier to become bullied. Third person preferred mainstream schools, because at mainstream school he/she could study with an assistant and because at special school educational level was lower.
 
Parents highlighted the need for cooperation between parents or guardians and other actors, because decision-makers will not listen to them and take their expertise sufficiently into account. When they make decisions about education and special support for a pupil or student, decisions must be individual, not categorical.
 
Presentation of the theme groups’ core ideas:
 
Next there was group working with four themes: 1) The perspective of parents, who have children or youngsters with special needs; 2) The perspective of disabled people; 3) The perspective of basic education; 4) The perspective of secondary education. In the afternoon the groups presented their core ideas. Here a summary of the group work results:
- Parents and guardians shall be active and they need especially peer support (for example, during transition phases). Policy-makers need to hear them before making decisions. Cooperation between home and school should become more comprehensive.
- It’s very important phase to start and to choose the school and how to the services and support you need. Different groups of disabled pupils and individuals shall be equal. Know-how and support must be available to all pupils and students at neighborhood schools.
- How do students with need for special support get information about choices they make in their life and influences of them, how do parents and guardians? Guidebooks, brochures and other information are necessary, (including learning plans for children with special needs), but there are differences between schools and families in communication and exchanging information
- Where to find main information, who updates it, can transfer become more automated process? Transferring information forward to another education provider would be essential in transition periods and points (for example, when pupil/student moves to another location or goes to vocational institution)
- In vocational upper secondary education may education providers ignore the order of scores in student admission for individual student-related reasons, e.g. learning difficulties and other reasons. ("flexible selection"). Ministry of Education and Culture has planned to discontinue flexible selection, which will cause many troubles for student with learning difficulties.
- Teacher training should pay more attention to themes like special support.
- How do disabled pupils/students feel themselves accepted during school years. Is there courage to face the pupil’s problems, will those problems become solved at school. Collaboration and reflection helps to find solutions, e.g. remove physical and non-physical barriers.
- All parties together can find good practices based on the experience of people with disabilities. Important are multi-professionality, combination of knowledge, skills and experience and to take those students and their parents involved in planning.
- When teachers meet pupils with disabilities, they might feel emotions like fear, but the goal is to learn together. Disabled people should share with others their know-how and experiences, those experiences are unique and different. We should collect disabled peoples’ but also teachers’ experiences about school to make a publication.
- The curriculum determines the process of making a decision on special support, initiation of support and transition back to intensified support. Possibilities to discussions in everyday life are quite rare, but students should be the main thing in school education.
- The need for special support may vary in different phases of life. There are physical structures (facilities, equipment, infrastructure), there is action (pedagogy, activities), but where are the limits between general, intensified and special support?
- At primary schools (grades 1 – 5) support is for wide-scale, school structures create security and stability. There is different pedagogical culture in secondary school (grades 6 – 9/10), (such as independence and self-directness of students), and support isn’t at the same level anymore. Besides that management culture is changing, it is utilizing teams and simultaneous leadership, but is there know-how in teacher education to this change?
- In inclusion debate we should abandon the strong confrontation between different groups. We should discuss not only education but everyday life. How the levels of support are affecting throughout the course of life?
- In special institutions there are more excursions and training experiments, which are useful for both sides.
- In smaller institutions it’s probably easier to face and know other students, but even bigger institutions are divided into smaller units. The number of special teachers varies in different areas of education in mainstream institutions, as well as their number on different levels of education. Teaching at vocational education institutions, especially, consist of vocational subjects – but what kind are their inclusional practices?
 
Assessment together with the experts
The assessment of the group work and the whole seminar day was carried out together with counselor for education, Juhani Kulmala, The Finnish National Board of Education, and jurist Thomas Sundell, Regional State Administrative Agency for Western and Inland Finland. They told that Basic Education Act and the new support model are difficult things to know and understand. Large part of questions they are related to these issues. Furthermore, student welfare and welfare service availability does not occur equally, but Finnish munipalities are not nearly at the same level in this issue.
Some comments during the discussion:
- There are differences in forms and levels between municipalities how support for special and students are working.
- Cooperation with parents and guardians teachers, staff members and different experts is very important, but there isn’t enough cooperation between schools and homes. There is even some lack of confidence.
- The system has some problems, such as The general upper secondary schools act (21.8.1998/629) is partially out of date
- Teacher without special education can manage with a student who has special needs, if he/she meets the student as a person
- Certain family can get reputation as a "difficult family"(for example, when family is driving for its own rights)
- There are difficulties in exchanging information between health and other organization. Why shall the confidentiality be a problem, if two officials under the same kind of confidentiality are discussing about same person’s special education issues?