Special Educational Needs and Inclusion Essay

It is arguable that, during the past two decades, there has been fundamental increase across the world of policies and legislation pertaining inclusion and provision for student with special educational needs (SEN) in mainstream education settings (Hodkinson and Vickerman, 2009).This papers seeks to find out if there is a global vision on provision for SEN and whether UK policies have been influenced by international SEN policies before drawing up a conclusion.

The UNCRC (1989) with its international credentials whose Article 23 showcases a global vision for provision for SEN by clearly requiring all countries that have ratified to the Convention to comply with it and educate disabled children in mainstream settings (UN, 1989). UK ratified the convention in 1991. UNCRC mandates children to be educated in a way that permit them to achieve their optimal individual and social integration whenever possible. All children are covered by the articles of UNCRC 1989 without discrimination and Article 2 actually mentions disability. Other Articles that emphasize the need to include disabled children are 3, 6, 12, 28 and 29 (See Appendix A). However, in most countries, special schools still operate because it is not possible to have all children with SEN in mainstream as evidenced by EADSNE (2003) statement that, a high number of children are still being educated in separate settings. But, this does not mean the global vision is not there.

The UN Standards Rules on Equalisation of Opportunities for Persons with Disabilities (1993) looked at how the environment affects individuals and called on Governments to look at both Curriculum and teacher training.(Puri and Abraham, 2004).The Standard Rules did not rule out special schools but stated that, the ultimate goal should be inclusion. Although this was not a legally binding device, it still shows a global vision by