UNIVERSAL SECONDARY EDUCATION (USE) CAN BE A BLESSING TO LEARNERS WITH SPECIAL NEEDS IN UGANDA By Walubo Jude Tadeo Makerere University Kampala Uganda - East Africa

Essay by Judea June 2005

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As government makes a shift to Universal Secondary with priority to students with disabilities, policy makes including educational institutions, in the cabinet and at parliamentary level should focus on some of the following suggestions to make the policy a success.

They should account for the training of secondary education teachers in Special education especially in areas such as Deaf education, Sign Language, visual and mental impairment. This can be done through availing teachers with time and resources for training, workshops and seminars. A focus on human resources development, through various training and support programmes for all relevant role players (particularly educators) should be accounted for.

There is need for sensitisation to do away with the negative attitudes of most teachers and students towards children with disabilities are in many respects still a hindrance to the success. This reduces the stigma and other negative attitudes toward children disabilities resulting into excellency in academics.

Policy makers should also put in place infrastructure development packages for example the construction of more buildings to avoid congestion as the case is for UPE. The situation in rural schools as per the state of buildings is even worse because many students study under trees and the situation is awful when it comes to time for rainy seasons or extreme sunshine. The disabled students are mostly affected in this and should be helped.

Coupled with the above is the need for more teachers to reduce the teacher- student ratio. Like Primary Education with UPE, Secondary Education population is likely to explode increasing the disparity of the teacher student ration. Such is not conducive to proper learning and good standards and the children with disabilities who need special attention simply get "swallowed" in the congested classrooms, a situation policy makers need to avert.

The policy should be designed...