CHALLENGES V/S ACHIEVEMENTS OF INCLUSIVE EDUCATION IN KARACHI

Inclusive Education (IE) of children with atypical development is a great challenge, as schools here, predominantly do not grant them admission, on grounds of having negligible infrastructure to cater to their needs. This is usually based upon inaccurate presumptions about the children's (impoverished) physical, social, communicative, intellectual and literacy skills, and creates more obstacles towards achieving IE. The UN establishes education as every child's right and proposes that, all children regardless of their abilities must go to the same school, making it incumbent on the school system to fulfill the requirements of every child. Today, the developed countries have a well established IE system, and have nearly shelved the ‘special school' methodology. To ascertain, this realm in Karachi the speech language therapists and students of College of Speech Language & Hearing Sciences(CSLHS), Ziauddin University, indulged with five parents, whose children, despite having speech-language impediments, found a way into mainstream schools, in here. The aim was to gain an insight towards achieving IE for all children deserving to be integrated into mainstream schools in Pakistan. The results of this study although not very encouraging, pointed towards establishing early intervention, and training school personnel in identifying and working with differently-abled children in their classroom.