Promoting the rights of Children with disabilities innocenti digest no

access to education
The child’s right to education is enshrined in human 
rights treaties, including articles 28 and 29 of the 
CRC. A critical implication is the requirement for 
primary education to be compulsory and available 
free to all; and secondary education to be available 
and accessible to every child, with the provision of 
financial assistance when needed. The CRPD builds 
upon this principle and makes recommendations 
about access to lifelong learning opportunities. In 
many parts of the world, however, the majority of 
children with disabilities and especially those with 
moderate, severe and profound impairments, are still 
far from enjoying access to any kind of school, let 
alone to regular education. 
In many Western countries and throughout Eastern 
and Central Europe, special schools have played an 
important part in providing education for children with 
disabilities. Some of these have been residential, 
especially in large countries with scattered 
populations, but many day special schools have been 
established with pupils living with their families. 
In recent decades, however, the role of special schools 
has come under critical scrutiny, the lead being taken 
by Italy when it closed most of its special schools in 
the 1970s, relocating the pupils to local schools and 
providing individualized support through the recruit-
ment of support staff (see box 6.6 on page 29). 
Experience in many countries has shown that 
many children who would previously have been 
automatically referred to special schools can be 
satisfactorily educated in mainstream schools, given 
support tailored to their individual needs, often 
through an individual educational programme. This 
includes children with intellectual disabilities such 
as Down’s syndrome, a number of whom have 
confounded expectations by completing secondary 
education and successfully passing the national 
school-leaving examinations.
44 
Successful inclusive education experiences in numer-
ous countries are also linked to the expansion of early 
intervention programmes – guaranteeing an early 

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Promoting the Rights of Children with Disabilities
Innocenti Digest No. 13
start for children and families. In addition, important 
steps are now being taken to initiate inclusive educa-
tion programmes at the preschool level. 
In reviewing the role of special schools in the future, 
some countries favouring inclusive education as a 
first choice and as a matter of principle have decided 
to retain special schools for children whose parents 
express a strong preference for such schools, and for 
pupils who would be particularly difficult to support 
in ordinary schools. Special schools are now more 
closely linked to mainstream schools in a variety of 
ways, sharing resources and training and sometimes 
located on the same site, a trend increasingly seen 
across North America and Europe. 
Apart from discriminatory legislative measures, hur-
dles to implementing inclusive education include: 
low priority for children with disabilities among 
• 
decision-makers;
lack of community awareness and support;
• 
reluctance to admit children with severe and 
• 
complex disabilities;
inaccessible buildings and curricula that are not 
• 
adapted to the special needs of children with dis-
abilities;
shortage and/or lack of appropriate training for 
• 
teachers, at all levels;
lack of support from special schools where these 
• 
exist;
lack of targeted funding.
• 
To some extent, income-rich nations with a relatively 
long history of segregated education for children 
with disabilities present different barriers to inclusive 
education than those found in income-poor countries. 
In the former, many ordinary primary and secondary 
schools are not physically accessible to pupils with 
limited mobility.
45
Access to the curriculum is even 
more problematic for children with intellectual impair-
ments and learning difficulties, though this is being 
addressed in a number of countries. Also, some of 
the most significant barriers result from the legacy of 
policies and structures that have influenced attitudes 
and mindsets and so created resistance to change.
Market forces may also encourage discrimination 
within the education system. Schools oriented on 
results generally publish formal assessments of pupil 
attainment that foster an educational culture where 
parents and students compete to attend the best 
schools. Children with disabilities may find them-
selves excluded if it is feared that they may compro-
mise overall results. In this and other contexts, there 
may be resistance to attendance by children with dis-
abilities by the parents of children without disabilities.
Families often face further obstacles in securing a 
place for their child in an ordinary school. For exam-
ple, children placed in ordinary schools may not be 
able to have access to speech or physiotherapy on 
the same basis as those in special schools, and their 
parents may be asked to pay for the child’s transport 
to and from school. Similar limitations often apply to 
the availability of services in children’s early educa-
tion. Such restrictive policies have the effect of steer-
ing parents to use special schools when this is not 
necessarily in the best interests of the child. 
In income-poor countries, resource shortages often 
represent the major constraint to inclusion: lack of 
schools or adequate learning environments, short-
age of teachers, lack of materials and an absence of 
support.
46
On the other hand, attitudes to children 
with disabilities sometimes favour their inclusion. A 
number of countries (such as Pakistan) have recorded 
examples of ’casual integration’, in which children 
with disabilities have been readily accepted in ordi-
nary schools ’because they are local children’. It has 
been reported that in Viet Nam there is widespread 
social acceptance of children with disabilities across 
the general population. A Child Disability Survey in 
1998 found that the majority of households consist-
ing of children with disabilities said that local people 
had positive attitudes towards them.
47
Additionally, 
systems of customary and non-formal education in 
income-poor countries are based much more on fam-
ily ties, coexistence and the value of the individual, 
making this education available to all community 
members without distinction.
48
While these tradition-
al systems have been weakened, they have not been 
entirely lost in the face of modernization.