Article 24: Education
While the education system for people with special needs is said to be mainstreamed from a previously institutionalized system and developing towards an inclusive education system, it still lacks sufficient support. There is social segregation and indirect discrimination within such an ‘inclusive’ environment, and students with disabilities are often excluded.
The government has to recognize and push for the implementation of an inclusive education, which depends on the efforts in execution across different departments. Different departments and organizations should follow the guidance of General Comments No 4 on the right to inclusive education, so as to rectify the current education environment, increase barrier-free facilities, and establish an effective mechanism for supervision and timeline for realization, in order to safeguard the right of students with disabilities to an inclusive education.
With regards to the issue of gender inequality in education for people with disabilities, refer to Paragraphs 31-33 of Article 6 in this Report.
Separate education systems for mainstream and special education resulting in exclusion and segregation (in response to Paragraphs 11(2), 175, 176, 178, 202 of the State Report)
Public education (below pre-university level) - there are three main avenues for the placement of students in schools for normal education in accordance with the severity of the disability suffered by the student: normal classes (with additional classes in resources rooms at specific timings, according to capability and needs), dedicated special education classes and scattered classes of counselling on tour (including home education service provided once or twice a week by touring special education teachers doing counselling on tour). Some people with severe disabilities would be placed in special education schools. Speaking at parliamentary hearings in the past, principals from schools providing special education would reject students with severe disabilities who are using respirators and have no family member or caregiver to accompany them from attending school, citing lack of relevant professionals in place to provide the necessary support.
Higher education (tertiary institutions level): Apart from the usual avenues for entering higher education, the government is to conduct ‘admission examinations for enrolment of students with disabilities to tertiary institutions’, by providing additional places. However, individual institutions still decide on their own whether to open up enrolment, the number of additional places and target groups (with disabilities or not); they are not completely open and also restricted by several conditions. For example, the enrolment regulations would clearly write: “Those who wish to engage in teaching work upon graduation, should apply to study professional education courses in accordance with regulations of our school, and should consider factors relating to teaching: being able to move freely in the classroom, being able to operate teaching equipment or devices required for assessment, as well as possessing effective two-way communication abilities in listening and speaking”; “courses in our department is based mainly on verbal teaching, and places emphasis on communication, comprehension and expression skills, please consider carefully”; or they may stress that “courses in this faculty in performance, directing and movements, also often involve physical movements, hence students who have problems in mobility are advised to consider carefully”; “this faculty is situated on a slope, please take into consideration any problem in accommodation”. All this would constitute what Paragraph 18 in General Comments No 4 of the Convention terms as ‘indirect exclusion’.
In accordance with Paragraphs 37, 38, 40, and 41 of the CRPD General Comment No 4, we recommend：
The State should not maintain separate education systems for mainstream and special or segregated education. It should instead consolidate the overall aims of the Convention, to reexamine and set out a timeline, in order to continuously, gradually and fully realize the various rights of all students under the education system including those students with disabilities.
Abolish direct or indirect exclusion in admission: The State should take measures immediately, to amend Item 1 of Article 25 in the University Act, to include students with disabilities under a special category of students; or to ban any direct or indirect articles of exclusion in ‘admission examinations for enrolment of students with disabilities to tertiary institutions’ or in any regulation for admission at any faculty, so as to fulfil the three core rights in Paragraph 41.
Measures for equal rights of teachers and students with disabilities: In order to fulfil the equal rights of teachers with disabilities in employment, the government should provide statistics of teachers with disabilities among various education levels, for the purpose of providing investment and support in their employment and training, and for the removal of obstacles in the education sector, so as to effect a positive example. The government should take actionable measures that would be positive in promoting equal rights of students with disabilities at the level of higher education.
Legal basis for the participation of students with disabilities in an individualized education planning conference (in response to Paragraph 180 of the State Report)
It is recommended that the State should immediately amend Article 28 of ‘Special Education Act’ and relevant sub-laws, so as to give legal status and make implementations for students with disabilities to take part and discuss the legal status of the IEP conference.
Although every student receiving special education at higher and intermediate level or below would already have his or her own Individualized Education Plan (IEP), they are often excluded from participating in the formulating of their own IEP. Article 28 of Special Education Act and Article 9 of Special Education Act Implementation Guidelines includes the participation of parents, school administrators, and special education and general education teachers in the formulation of the IEP; however, the students themselves, who would be the subject of the IEP could only participate upon invitation when deemed necessary. In fact, at classroom sites for education at pre-university levels or lower, participation in discussion by students with disabilities at IEP meetings is very rare. This completely contravenes General Comments No 4 of the Convention with regards to Paragraphs 7, 29 and 45 on the safeguarding of the rights of children to participate in drafting Individualized Education Plans.
Paragraphs 8 and 9 in CRPD General Comments No 1 more explicitly point out that people with disabilities remain a group whose legal power has most often been deprived of, or placed under a system of proxy decision-making in legal systems worldwide. Paragraph 12 reiterates that legal power refers to the possession of power and obligation (legal status), as well as the ability to exercise such power and obligation (execution of legal power). Such ability is the key to meaningful participation in social life. Our children should not be deprived of the opportunity to learn to exercise such legal powers from the early stages of their education.
Inadequacy in professional knowledge and skills for special education among teachers in general education and special subjects under an inclusive education system (in response to Paragraphs 176, 178, 182 and 184 of the State Report)
The government should take prompt and concrete steps in revamping the course syllabus for on-the-job training among general education teachers, and establishing a database on the training of teachers: From the allocation of budget for education, the training of teachers, the recognition of teachers’ qualification to the operation of the schools, the education system in Taiwan has not provided teachers of general education and special subjects with sufficient knowledge and skills in actual operation for special education. This leads to many teachers having a very negative attitude in the push for inclusive education. General education teachers are only required to study 3 credits of an introductory course on special education during their training. After their appointment as teachers, each education unit may provide its own on-the-job continued study (including conferences on administration, teaching and academic research in relation to special education), but general education teachers are only required to fulfil three hours of learning per year. The lack of an on-the-job education training course that is comprehensively and systematically designed makes it difficult for teachers of general education and special subjects to identify the uniqueness and differentiation among different students of disabilities in their capacity, demands, forms of learning and acquisition of knowledge. This affects their ability to implement an inclusive education in terms of management of classes, classroom planning, course design and customization, and teaching assessments.
Adapted physical education has not been pushed for implementation: Whether it is the design of course material, strategies in teaching pedagogy or adjustments in teaching facilities, the professionalism and capacity in teaching among adapted physical education teachers are severely inadequate; teachers of health and physical education courses often cite safety and protection as a reason to request students with disabilities to proceed to special classrooms, offices or libraries and substitute it with unrelated activities. Special education schools would also request parents to accompany them in class, or students with disabilities would not be allowed to take part in water adaptation courses. Although the State Report has cited the number of adaptive physical education upgrading seminars, teaching demonstrations and teaching workshops as well as number of participants, it is still unable to provide enough teaching staff in adaptive physical education, and to upgrade teaching quality and capacity, in order to meet the demand of multi-faceted learning for as many as 4,000 classes of pre-university level or lower, or nearly 90,000 students with disabilities.
Professional subject teaching environment full of learning obstacles: Many subject classrooms in schools are not conducive for usage by students with disabilities in terms of traffic flow, desks and chairs, as well as facilities or operational platforms (such as microscopes, cooking utensils, art equipment and so on), affecting their opportunity in equal participation and practice. Furthermore, in special education schools which admit students with severe and multiple disabilities, warm-water swimming pools are usually set at a temperature of 28℃ according to usual regulation, but this temperature is too low for students with severe disabilities who exercise less, leading to hesitation among parents in allowing students with disabilities to participate in water adaptation classes. If one were to refer to the experience of Prof. Lin Man-hui from adaptive physical education department, Taiwan Normal University, the water temperature for training swimming pools was set between 30 and 32℃ during a one-year course in 2005 on ‘water adaptation physical education class for people with severe disabilities’, which goes to show the importance of adjustments in the physical environment as part of inclusive education.
Inadequate cooperation in teaching among general/subject teachers and special education teachers
An invisible form of segregation in inclusive education system: Schools at pre-university level or below have all instituted meetings by course development committees and in subject teaching research/focus areas, in order to facilitate professional dialogue among subject teachers of seven areas (language, health and physical education, social studies, arts and humanities, mathematics, natural and living technology, and combined activities), to implement development of basic courses in schools. However, in terms of operation, while these organizations may include school administrative representatives, teachers’ representatives of various levels and various areas, representatives among parents and districts, however, they often lack participation by special education teachers and representatives among parents of special education students. Special education professionals find it difficult to enter a dialogue on such platforms, which makes the situation more unfavorable structurally speaking for students with disabilities under an inclusive education system.
Hence, the State should follow Paragraph 71 of General Comments No 4 of the Convention, to initiate immediately training courses in education at various levels for all teachers (including teachers of general education, teachers of special education and administrators), in order to equip them with core capabilities and value systems as necessary for work under an inclusive education environment, to establish a common teaching plan, to determine the division of labor and responsibility in teaching and to conduct cooperative teaching, so as to push for a transformation in the inclusive education system.
Difficulty in providing stable and appropriate support services among assistant personnel for special education students (in response to Paragraph 183 of the State Report)
Schools at pre-university level or below in our state may have provided teachers’ assistants and assistants for special education students, in order to help students with disabilities in learning to cope with life in school, but the following problems remain:
Service of assistant personnel is based on degree of students’ disabilities instead of demand: Teachers’ assistants provide services to students with moderate disabilities, whereas assistants for special education students are targeted at students of severe and multiple disabilities. Service is therefore provided based on the severity of students’ disabilities instead of based on actual needs in accordance with Individualized Education Program (IEP).
Disparity between service of assistants and actual needs: The types of assistant personnel as well as service period and frequency as required by each school is currently decided by the education departments of various local governments. There is no uniform standard to make that decision. The service that assistant personnel may provide is often incompatible with the actual needs, such that even the daily needs of students with disabilities may not be met, not to mention their specific needs in studies. Some parents of students with disabilities are even requested to make trips to the school just to assist students to go to the toilet.
Low remuneration of assistant personnel and unstable service quality: Apart from professional teachers’ assistants as provided according to ‘Guidelines on the establishment of special education classes in schools of pre-university level and below, of responsible units and the employment of personnel’, who are relatively stable in number and in service quality, other teachers’ assistants and all assistant personnel for special education students are all selected and employed by the schools themselves. These part-time personnel receive very low hourly wages. Their working hours are also fragmented, with no work available during winter and summer vacations, and they lack year-end bonus and other welfare or forms of security, which naturally affects the stability in the number and service quality of assistants.
Doubts on the professional capabilities of assistant personnel: Although all assistant personnel are required to undergo 36 hours of pre-employment training, and 9 hours per year of on-the-job training, given the overall instability of the sources of assistant personnel, can the content of these courses really help develop professional capability to support students with disabilities of various types, degrees and different needs in special learning? Students with disabilities, parents as well as teachers often have doubts with regards to this.
It is recommended that the government establishes a system of professional specialization with different service items, and also a talent database to reassess the allocation of assistant personnel.
Barrier-free environment and accessibility of places for learning and activities (in response to Paragraphs 46, 58, 180 of the State Report)
The barrier-free environment in school campuses remain to be enhanced, as it is still difficult for students with difficulty in mobility to use: refer to Paragraphs 62-66 of Article 9 in this Report.
Issue of urban-rural divide and barrier-free traffic environment: At the level of national education, although the government has made traffic subsidies available, it still does not resolve the difficulty in reality for students with special needs in going to and from school. At the level of higher education, as there is a great disparity between the geographical locations of various colleges and barrier-free traffic environment, it is affecting the right of students with disabilities in the freedom of enrolling in colleges and faculties of their choice.
Barriers and segregation during participation of excursion activities: As administrative personnel in schools do not have adequate professional knowledge and skills for special education, and do not hold discussion together with students with disabilities, parents, special education teachers and instructors in the planning of learning activities outside school, including camping, graduation travel and other activities. This may lead to barriers and segregation during the journey and at the venue of these activities. On the transport, if the school does not hire large tour buses with elevation facilities, students with disabilities would have to apply for rehabilitation buses or arrange for parents to drive, hence rendering them unable to travel with the class throughout the journey. Some schools lacking in funding would even refuse to make arrangements for assistant personnel to accompany special education students, and also cite safety in order to request parents to accompany in the activity. This hinders the wish of students with disabilities in participation, and some are even forced to give up on excursion activities.
The right to education through bedside learning or homeschooling for students with disabilities yet to protected
Even though children with disabilities who are physically ill or weak have to receive treatment and recuperate in a hospital or a special safe environment, therefore unable to receive education with students of the same age in school for a short period of time, and can only attend touring counselling classes, they should still be equally respected with regards to their learning ability and motives. Currently, most children with disabilities receiving homeschooling can only attend classes by touring teachers of 2 to 4 periods, once or twice a week, which hardly satisfies their needs in learning. However, when the children with disabilities recover and are able to return to the education system in school, they would face problems of falling behind in competence, gaps in the courses and psychological adaptation, due to lack of resources in learning during homeschooling.
Distance learning through video conferencing should be fully promoted and realized: Although ‘Implementation guidelines for course syllabus and teaching methods in special education’ has explicitly included ‘distance learning’ legally, our State is yet to fully install a system for distance learning through video conferencing. Beitou National High School of Taipei city conducted a study on professional knowledge and skills for special education during the 2010-2011 academic year, where the topic on ‘Clarification on practical implementation of distance learning through video conferencing for students with illnesses’ was included, but only one success example was presented, with no widespread implementation ever adopted. Considering the hardware facilities available in our state, it is not impossible for the government to install a distance learning system through video conferencing for homeschooling of students with disabilities, it is really a matter of lacking in will!
Vocational training, adult education and lifelong learning for persons with disabilities (in response to Paragraph 188 of the State Report)
Provision of adult education and lifelong learning for persons of disabilities lack comprehensive planning: current law only stipulates that local governments in conducting adult education should reserve at least 5% of the available quota for persons with disabilities. It does not emphasize that this should cater to their learning needs, or address the accessibility of courses, teaching staff, activity venues and traffic, comprehensive planning for barrier-free access and budget allocation.
Promoting cultures of sign language and mother tongue as official languages of the State
Sign language is not only a language of communication, but also an important cultural capital and basis of respect for the hearing impaired as a unique community. However, the formal education system at the moment does not provide students with the chance to learn sign language. It is recommended that sign language be listed as an official language of the State, and ‘local education courses’ should incorporate sign language as an elective alongside Taiyu, Hakka and aboriginal languages, to enable hearing impaired and hearing students alike to study it.