In line with Government policy, Local Education Authorities continued to announce proposals for developing inclusion.
LEAs announcing special needs restructuring plans in 2001 included North Tyneside, Waltham Forest, Blackpool, Greenwich, Knowsley, Dundee, Leicester, Liverpool, Sheffield, Bradford, York, Knowsley and Leeds. It was made clear that reorganisation would involve closure of some special schools but, at the same time, a continuing role for special schools was acknowledged by many.
Plans for greater inclusion aroused concerns from parents and teaching staff in some areas. However, there were strong reassurances that more pupils learning together would benefit everybody. In Leeds it was said ‘there was nothing to be afraid of ‘ regarding proposals to close some special schools in the city and in Liverpool the Assistant Director of Education spoke of inclusion being in the ‘long term interests of all’.
The Prime Minister, Tony Blair, provided support for the ongoing campaign to stop special school closures in Gloucestershire by praising their role. And in Blackpool councillors promised that there would be no forced inclusion. Parents would be able to choose another special school if the one their child attended faced closure.
Mainstream developments
Developments in mainstream schools during 2001 represented good news and bad news in the struggle for inclusion.
A new report from the Department of Education and Employment, the National Union of Teachers and Scope showed that all pupils, not just those with disabilities, were benefiting from making schools accessible.
However, another report from Scope revealed that young people with high levels of support needs were still being excluded from society and a survey conduced by Rathbone and Manchester Metropolitan University found that, although there were pockets of good practice for children with ‘special needs’ in mainstream schools, the general picture was disturbing.
Government funding for access during the year included £10 million for communication technology such as voice recognition systems, hand-held spell checkers, speech synthesisers and simple eye or mouth-operated devices.
More links between special and mainstream schools and groups of mainstream schools were reported during the year including schemes to share specialist resources, information, and technology as well as classrooms and lessons.
In Birmingham a primary and special school went all the way by announcing merger plans which were supported by both school heads and hailed as ‘exciting and logical’ by the local MP.
Cheshire union officials welcomed the introduction of teaching assistants in schools, saying they would help pupils learn and boost classroom achievement.
The introduction of sign language skills in more mainstream schools was also welcomed as a useful contribution to developing inclusion.
The All Party Parliamentary Group on Autism criticised education authorities for failing to face up to the challenge of supporting pupils with autism. A survey of education authorities organised by the group found that almost all of them reported that, while numbers of children with autism were increasing, they did not know how many children were affected or how to respond to them.
At the NASUWT Conference in Jersey in April there were calls for school nurses to be returned to schools to help teachers cope with a growing number of sick children. Teachers claimed that they were being ’emotionally blackmailed’ into giving out medicines – leaving them open to allegations of abuse.
Children experiencing difficulties with behaviour in Northumberland benefited from the introduction of a new type of study centre – the first of its kind in the area. The design for the new centre was based on a modern, commercial office rather than a classroom. A full-time learning support teacher and four assistants were appointed to manage it.
The year ended with the results of a poll by the Disability Rights Commission which reflected the mixed progress towards inclusion of the previous months. The poll found that most people did not want children with learning difficulties or mental health problems taught alongside their sons and daughters. However, two thirds were happy to see disabled children taught in the mainstream and only 12 per cent. said disabled children should be confined to special schools.
Legislative moves
The Special Educational Needs and Disability Bill which strengthens pupils’ rights to mainstream education and provides protection against disability discrimination in education received Royal Assent during 2001 . The major provisions were due to be introduced in September 2002 accompanied by Codes of Practice from the Disability Rights Commission explaining the new duties.
The new law was described as an historic provision which tackled weaknesses in the Disability Discrimination Act and ended decades of exclusion in education for disabled people. It was backed by 247 organisations representing disabled people, parents, children and local councils. However, there were also concerns that the effect of the new law would be considerably weakened by remaining conditions which prevented disabled pupils attending mainstream if their presence affected the education of other children.
It was estimated that the new law would require many schools to reassess their attitudes to disabled children. Instead of thinking of disabled pupils as problems to be coped with, schools were now required to acknowledge children’s rights to a mainstream education and work out how to remove barriers within schools which themselves prevented disabled children attending. As few as one or two per cent of the 24,000 schools in England were thought to be ready for the big changes involved.
Family struggles and successes
Families were at the centre of trailblazing efforts to develop inclusion in schools and other settings.
Four-year-old Holly Goodwyn, who has cerebral palsy, became the first youngster in Suffolk to be placed in a mainstream school using an electronic communication aid, and 16-year-old Maresa MacKeith, who uses a message board and facilitator to communicate, achieved a string of GCSE successes. Adele Waterfall-Brown, the first youngster with severe sight problems to attend a mainstream school in Darlington, was congratulated on her ‘remarkable achievement’ after sitting GCSEs in nine subjects.
Simone Aspis became the first person with learning difficulties to be appointed as a spokesperson on disability for a British political party, as well as the first prospective parliamentary candidate with a learning difficulty. Simone is a member of the Green Party. Jamie Sinnott, a 23-year-old autistic man who was denied the right to education in the courts, turned failure into victory by using his case to convince education officials in Dublin they must improve provision for students with disabilities.
In Bradford a mother said she ‘pushed and pushed and pushed’ to get support for her daughter who has autism and was pleased with her progress in mainstream. However, others in her parent support group who wanted their children to transfer from special schools to mainstream with full support were ‘left in limbo’.
Access remained the main barrier to full inclusion. Hayriye Mehmet’s college course was postponed because of building delays and 11-year-old Asemah Samad was still waiting to take up her school place in Leeds while staff received training to support her. Mark Powell, who is visually impaired, was unable to get on with his schoolwork because support workers refused to carry his equipment and two Belfast mothers said their sons were refused places at summer holiday schemes in the city because they were autistic.
Comments and criticisms
The cautious progress towards inclusion which was achieved during 2001 did not go unchallenged with many critics relying on old medical models of disability to make their points.
A former Government education adviser, Dr. John Marks, criticised what he called ‘the inclusion or else message’. He claimed that disabled children could be harmed by an overemphasis on mainstream education and called for disabilities to be put into different categories with recommendations for the most suitable types of education for each.
According to one special school head teacher, there is no such thing as a human right to be included in mainstream education. He claimed that the human right that mattered was the human right to be included in mainstream society and adult life and that there were many different routes to get there including attending special schools.
A scathing leader article in the Gloucestershire Echo hit out at the county’s inclusion plans, saying they were a ‘trendy experiment’ which would not work because mainstream schools were not best for everyone. No evidence for the paper’s claims were given.
Special school head, Meg Taylor, said special school staff sometimes felt they were treated as ‘naughty schoolchildren’ by education officials who wanted to rush through inclusion plans. And the new president of the NUT in Sheffield, Susan Devlin, said that in many cases special school provision was still needed. Special schools should not be made to feel excluded as unsuitable places for education.
