DUSHANBE, July 4, 2011, Asia-Plus — An Inclusive Summer School, We Are All Different but Equal, has opened at the Jahongir camp in Varzob district.
Organized under support of the Public Health Program of the Tajik Branch of Open Society Institute/Assistance Foundation (OSI/AF-Tajikistan), the event started on July 3 and will last till July 10. It is the third inclusive summer school, We Are All Different but Equal, organized by OSCE/AF-Tajikistan for children with different opportunities and abilities between the ages of 10-12.
The Public Health Program coordinator Zarrina Qurbonbekova says this year inclusive summer school involves 30 children, including 15 children with disabilities.
Ms. Qurbonbekova noted that the main objective of that summer school was in organizing joint stay and the rest of children with disabilities and children without disabilities.
According to her, the inclusive summer school schedule includes cultural-educational and health programs. “The inclusive summer school gives an opportunity for not only the joint rest and improvement of health of the children, it also gives an opportunity for co-education and communication of them,” she noted.
Inclusion in the context of education is the practice, in which students with special educational needs spend most or all of their time with non-disabled students. Implementation of this practice varies; schools can use it for selected students with mild to severe special needs. Inclusive education differs from previously held notions of ‘integration’ and ‘mainstreaming’, which tended to be concerned principally with disability and ‘special educational needs’ and implied learners changing or becoming ‘ready for’ accommodation by the mainstream. By contrast, inclusion is about the child’s right to participate and the school’s duty to accept the child. Inclusion rejects the use of special schools or classrooms to separate students with disabilities from students without disabilities. A premium is placed upon full participation by students with disabilities and upon respect for their social, civil, and educational rights.
Fully inclusive schools, which are rare, no longer distinguish between “general education” and “special education” programs; instead, the school is restructured so that all students learn together.
