Education System and Access for Children with
Disabilities
People are born with different circumstances, some are born with all their organs and functions
intact and some are a little bit special . There are people that live with disabilities whether it’s
mental or physical one. These people are what we called the special one.
A disability is any condition of the body or mind (impairment) that makes it more difficult
for the person with the condition to do certain activities (activity limitation) and interact with
the world around them (participation restrictions)
When I was in elementary school, my elementary school was located in front of spesial need
schools, despite being face-to-face we really haven’t interacted as much, as far as I
remember there was only one time that students from their school came to ours, and the
reaction wasn’t very good, all eyes are staring , looking at them “weirdly” and they keep
staring that it makes them uncomfortable, some try to communicate with them but some
doesn’t even care. This just shows lack of awareness for disabilities in our societies are. And
one of the teacher from the SLB in my region says that the education system in SLB is very
different from those in other schools, they are way behind in learning, for example math,
we’re at the same fifth grade , but they learn 3rd grade math. It’s most likely that we’re not
using the right method to teach them since it’s harder for them to get quality education.
That’s why we should raise awareness about how important education is to children with
disabilities and we should improve the education system and widen the school access for
those with disabilities .
Why should we care about education for disabilities children? Children are the foundation of
the future generations, disabled or not. Even those with special needs are deserving of their
right to get proper quality education . According to the Central Statistics Agency (BPS) in
2017 shows that only 26% of 1.6 million children with disabilities have access to education ,
8% through special schools and 18% through inclusive schools this number does not include
those who have not been identified.
There’s a few main factors to this problem :
1. Lack of support from the government
The government had tried many ways to improve education access for disabilities
children for example promoting inclusive school as an alternative for education. It’s a
school where normal and special need students study together. But this solution is
not enough to solve the matter. In addition, it is also known that out of 514
regencies/cities in Indonesia, 58 do not have public special schools at all. Meanwhile,
the ones that already have only got one school per region (Tribunnews, 2019) .Even
the facilities in this school is not yet appropriate to support education for children
with disabilities. There are also factor inside of school that hinders the education
process like lack of financial support ,stigma about disabilities , teacher limitations,
building conditions, to the absence of therapy facilities. Therapy facilities includes
educational toys and therapy equipment which is essential to support learning
process in class. The type and arrangement of furniture, room temperature, air
circulation, room lighting, even the colour of the walls will also have an effect on the
children’s ability to be engaged in the class. In a special schools classroom normally
consist of 5 students, so that the teacher can manage them. But because the facility
is limited usually the teacher will teach double the amount of normal capacity.
Teaching students with different capabilities and disabilities is difficult and of course
need extra attention. Meanwhile not every teacher has the qualification to do so .
2. Lack of public awareness
Having children with disabilities come with many challenges. One of them are dealing
with the “stigma” that grows in our society. That says children with disabilities should
not be put into school and that it is futile to educate them. Lack of awareness in
parent is also a main factor in limiting education for children with disabilities, despite
frequent warnings many parents still gives sweets and sugary food to their children
which caused them to be aggressive. This is why education for parents in handling
children with special needs is also really important.
3. Economic problem
While there’s limited number of special school provided by the country, there are
alternative like private special school. But in fact not many people can afford to
spend money. Beside that, another factor is most parents can’t afford the
transportation cost from their home to the nearest special school in their area.
Beside the access being difficult, the education system for disabilities children really isn’t
simple. We need to create a nice and healthy environment in class to make them easily
engaged in lesson such as providing facilities, therapy, and capable teacher. The teaching
method also must differ from teaching students in normal school. For disabilities children,
teaching style must differ between on children with the others that have different learning
capabilities. And it has to be customized based on the children’s disabilities and
qualifications in order to achieve greater quality education. But of course we know that
special schools in our country is far away from that. Even though the government had
pushed the idea and promoting about inclusive school, It is not as simple as that. In order to
get the same result from students we need capable teachers and facilities, and we can’t just
teach them the same way like everyone. That’s why the government should care more about
special needs education and keep improving the system and increasing the amount of
schools for better education access. We also need to build awareness both for the parents
and the people that education for disabilities is important and that just like us they’re human
that’s worthy of education and have the same chance of success just like every other human
in the world
