MEZIESBLOG

“Disability is one of the most serious barriers to education across the globe” – UNICEF (https://www.unicef.org/)

Introduction

With each passing day, the composition of students in higher education institutions is becoming diverse (Fabricius et al., 2017). Students from various socio-economic backgrounds, physical disabilities and ethnicity are joining mainstream education (Betancourt et al., 2000; Burkhardt and Bennett, 2015). Based on UNICEF for “Education for All” and “inclusive education” policies, equal opportunities for all students have increased. And there are vast chances that these demographic changes will increase proportionately, with acknowledgement of individual differences and more awareness of the relevance of education in individual and nations’ growth. This forecast calls for an education system that serves all students with the same level of knowledge and skills deliveries and requires policymakers and practitioners with stakeholders (teachers, staff) to contribute towards the effective implementation of inclusive education (Jayakumar, 2008).

According to UNICEF, inclusive education is “the most effective way to give all children a fair chance to go to school, learn and develop the skills they need to thrive” (Inclusive education, n.d.). An inclusive environment in educational institutions protects children with special needs from being robbed of their right to learn. An inclusive setting enables the effective participation of such children in their communities, workforce and decisions (Opoku et al., 2017). In other words, inclusive education refers to all children studying in the mainstream education system surpassing their difference, all in the same classrooms and the same educational institutions (UNICEF, 2011). Such an educational shift aims to provide authentic learning opportunities for special needs students who were traditionally excluded based on differences like colour, language, disabilities and like reasons (Srivastava et al., 2015).

In research, inclusive education is studied with varied education contexts. Some emphasized understanding of inclusive practices, while some highlighted the factors predicting and consequence of inclusive education (Björnsdóttir, 2017; Messiou, 2019). In the latter focus, Daniels and Garner (2013) provided an elaborative understanding of the philosophical, political, educational and social implications of “inclusion”. Mittler (2012) provided more comprehensive frameworks of current policies to avail adequate provisions to reduce poverty, eliminate social exclusion and develop policies to support the United Nations’ Education for All. In line with this, Göransson and Nilholm (2014) highlighted the need to define inclusive education more cautiously. They presented different understandings of inclusive education – inclusion as placement of special needs students in mainstream classrooms, inclusion through meeting their social/academic needs both for special needs students and all, and inclusion through the creation of communities. These review-based elaborations indicated different views of what educational institutions need to accomplish to attain inclusive education. Scholars also proposed other theories or approaches towards understanding the concept of inclusive education (Al-Shammari et al., 2019). Some highlighted the relevance of behaviourism-based inclusive education practices (Doolittle, 2014; Li, 2018), which refers to the application of behaviourism in inclusive education settings. This approach is concerned with student behaviour and performance in employing stimulus materials (Ertmer and Newby, 2013). Cognitivism-based inclusive education practices emphasized on applications of cognitivism in inclusive education settings (Evgeniou and Loizou, 2012). This approach underlines mental information processing and interactions in guiding student learning (Ertmer and Newby, 2013). Apart from these theories, constructivism-based inclusive education practices were another theory considered in inclusive education. In this theory, “constructivism focuses on creating cognitive tools that reflect the wisdom of the culture in which they are used as well as the insights and experiences of learning” (Al-Shammari et al., 2019, p. 411).

Inline, teacher’s role towards inclusive education explored its theoretical and practical perspectives in different contexts – ranging from primary schools (Andrienko et al., 2017; Štemberger and Kiswarday, 2018; Schwab et al., 2021) to secondary (Paseka and Schwab, 2020; Saloviita, 2020) to higher educational institutions (Moriña, 2017; Srivastava and Shree, 2019). The studies indicated teachers as the critical asset towards effective implementation of inclusive education. Teachers and the faculty team are responsible for executing inclusive practices and establishing an inclusive environment (Meyer and Keenan, 2018). A class comprising students from diverse socio-economic backgrounds, beliefs, and physical and mental competency (Srivastava and Dhar, 2016) poses significant challenges before the teachers and administration. Increasing the learning tendencies of such a combined nature of students requires more involvement of teachers. When students’ differences are extreme and require significant attention, inclusive mindset is required (Lambe and Bones, 2006; Soodak, 2003). The development of inclusive classrooms calls for rigorous efforts on the part of teachers (Haines and Mueller, 2013). While making children learn lies in teachers, they also have this additional responsibility to manage diversity. Srivastava and Shree (2019) also mentioned the role of leaders in developing an environment for an inclusive classroom set-up.

Although these studies emphasized the importance of adopting inclusive education to bring all students to mainstream education and reduce discrimination, the gap in steps to implement inclusive education in higher education still exists. Similarly, studies considering the changing compositions of students in higher education, cross-cultural perspectives and student exchange program-based analysis require more emphasis. Also, these studies grounded on their limitations of generalizability and context specificity paved the way for more studies to explore factors connected to inclusive education. Thus, addressing the concerns concerning the implementation of inclusive education in the higher education context, this special issue combined studies conducted by authors from different cultures and countries.

Thus, the special issue aims to

1. Know the factors that affect inclusiveness in higher education institutions.
2. Understand the possible impact of various predictors on inclusive practices in higher education institutions.