A/HRC/25/29
their roles and responsibilities in providing quality education services for children with
disabilities, the improvement of data collection and the amendment of domestic legislation
and regulations in conformity with the provisions of the Convention. The Government of
Japan also allocated 2.86 million United States dollars to support inclusive education in the
Republic of Moldova by addressing school infrastructure needs and adequate teacher
training.
67.
The outcome document of the 2013 General Assembly’s High-level Meeting on
Disability and Development (General Assembly resolution 68/3), which reaffirmed the
international community’s commitment to advance the rights of all persons with disabilities
and work together for a disability-inclusive development agenda, also embraced inclusive
education as one of the priorities for the post-2015 agenda (para. 4 (d)).
VI.
Conclusions and recommendations
68.
Inclusive education is essential to achieving universality of the right to
education, including for persons with disabilities. Only inclusive education systems
can provide both quality of education and social development for persons with
disabilities. Inclusive education implies more than placing students with disabilities in
mainstream schools; it means making them feel welcome, respected and valued.
Inclusive education is built on values that enhance a person’s ability to achieve their
goals and embrace diversity as an opportunity to learn. Students with disabilities need
adequate support to participate on equal terms with others in the education system.
Mainstream schools must provide for an environment that maximizes academic and
social development.
69.
Persons with disabilities face various forms of discrimination in educational
settings. The most serious barriers to participation in schools arise from prejudice and
misconceptions that lead to deliberate exclusion and segregation. Students with
disabilities are stigmatized as people who cannot be educated in regular schools, or at
all. This results in education systems in which persons with disabilities are denied the
right to education as enshrined in article 24 of the Convention on the Rights of
Persons with Disabilities.
70.
The Convention provides for two-pronged implementation of that right: firstly,
non-discrimination in mainstream schools for students with disabilities, reinforcing
this right with reasonable accommodation; secondly, a systemic change that requires
progressive realization and a transformation plan to counter exclusion and
segregation. Meaningful implementation is based upon a complex change process that
requires a transformation of the existing legislative and policy framework and the full
involvement of all relevant stakeholders, particularly persons with disabilities and
their representative organizations.
71.
Through inclusive education laws, States should establish an inclusive
education system under the aegis of their respective ministries of education that
prohibits rejection from mainstream schools on the basis of disability and provides for
reasonable accommodation. A transformation plan should provide the framework for
the implementation of an inclusive education system with measurable goals. States
should put in place training programmes for teachers, create reasonable
accommodation funds, provide for accessible materials, promote inclusive
environments, improve testing methods, promote the transfer from special schools to
mainstream schools, promote monitoring through indicators on inclusive education,
provide adequate support to students, and use appropriate communication means and
formats. Schools need to be properly funded, while at the same time availability of
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