News

Volume 3 Issue 10 - May 15, 2005

Pakistan to host regional seminar on Inclusive Education; Javed Abidi to recount Indian experience

DNIS News Network - Experts and activists from civil society organisations in South Asia will brainstorm and initiate dialogue on how to bring children and youth with special needs and disabilities into the mainstream, for cohesive social inclusion.

A two-day regional seminar on Inclusive Education will be held in Lahore from 16-17 May at University of Punjab’s Quaid-e-Azam Campus. The seminar is being organised by the university’s Department of Special Education and is expected to generate fresh ideas with the confluence of stakeholders of the region, which shares a similar social and political milieu. Since the 1990s, the disability sector has striven for inclusive education, as segregation in name of special schools has not only failed in social inclusion, but also has alienated children with disabilities.

Javed Abidi, Executive Director, National Centre for Promotion of Employment for Disabled People (N. C. P. E. D. P.), will be attending the seminar. Abidi will present a paper, ‘Advocacy initiatives for inclusive education leading a policy to make education in India disabled friendly’, to share the Indian experience and N. C. P. E. D. P.’s strategic advocacy campaign to successfully draw the government’s attention towards an inclusive education. The campaign had paved the way for the announcement of a comprehensive policy by the Ministry for Human Resource Development.

The seminar, which will have 14 exhaustive sessions, will see discussions not only on policy aspects, but also a sharing of success stories of inclusive schools.