“Like Other Children”: Only One Out of Every 10 Disabled Children Attends School
“Like Other Children” is the title of a joint report by Human Rights Watch and the Campaign for Human Rights in Iran released on Wednesday. The report addresses the condition of education for children with disabilities in Iran and criticizes the lack of adequate facilities in this area.
According to the report, attending school is an unattainable dream for many children with disabilities in Iran, a dream that should be part of their daily life.
Tara Sepahri-Far, a researcher on Iran affairs at Human Rights Watch, discusses the report:
“This report is about the absence of adequate facilities in Iranian schools for the education of children with disabilities, such as physical access routes in buildings, updated Braille books, hearing aid assistance and other facilities, and also points to the lack of resources and insufficient training for teachers to effectively help students with disabilities in Iran.”
“Physical inaccessibility of schools for children with disabilities, lack of appropriate teaching methods, and shortage of trained teachers and human resources to assist children with disabilities” are among the problems these children face in Iran. This is what Maryam says, the mother of Alireza, a 12-year-old visually impaired child in Kurdistan Province:
“My son has low vision problems, meaning one eye can see up to one meter and his other eye can see up to half a meter. We have had problems with education and school since first grade. Unfortunately, wherever we go, they pass us on to someone else. No proper classroom, no teachers, no suitable place, no recreation; these are four students who have been together since first grade until now and they spend all their break time and sports in one classroom, meaning they stay in the same classroom from morning until noon. They gave them one classroom in the special school, then told us that if we’re unhappy, take your child to a regular school. When we go to a regular school, they tell us they don’t accept such conditions at all, and whatever happens to your child, we take no responsibility.”
Human rights advocates say no child should be considered ineducable and, according to international laws, all children should have access to appropriate and adequate education. However, children with disabilities in Iran face “multiple obstacles.” This is what Arash, an experienced teacher of children with disabilities in Tehran, says:
“I work mostly with children who have physical and motor disabilities. There are transportation problems and unfortunately families cannot afford them. Facilities are very poor and if there are no public donations, the school has few facilities. One of the biggest problems for these children is access to toilets. In schools there are usually three or four toilets for 140 students with disabilities.”
Problems that extend beyond the educational space to include sports, cultural and artistic activities for children with disabilities. Children for whom art and sports are necessary for their development, health and flourishing, but due to shortages, they are deprived of them.
Fatima, a physical education teacher for students with disabilities, discusses these problems:
“In Iran there are no facilities. Equipment for disabled children does not reach us in Iran and if it does, it is very expensive. For example, families cannot afford to buy smart white canes for their blind children. Other educational aids are also very expensive. There really are no facilities or care, and in this economic situation, families don’t know whether to provide food for their children or their educational aids.”
Human Rights Watch and the Campaign for Human Rights in Iran estimate the number of school-age children with disabilities in Iran at approximately one and a half million children, but say that of this number, only 150,000 children were enrolled in schools in the last academic year and the rest were deprived of education. Hadi Ghaeimi, director of the Campaign for Human Rights in Iran, discusses these statistics:
“Unfortunately, the Iranian government does not publish statistics on children with disabilities or the reasons for their deprivation of education. However, according to our estimates, in the last academic year, only one out of every 10 children with disabilities in Iran went to school, and most of these children attend special schools. Children with disabilities have the right to enjoy inclusive education according to the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. Inclusive education means that children with disabilities should be able to study in schools near their place of residence and alongside other children.”
In Iran, “disability is the most common reason for children being deprived of education.” With this statement, Human Rights Watch and the Campaign for Human Rights in Iran have called on Iranian authorities to end what they called discrimination against children with disabilities.
The report states that there are 1,570 special schools in Iran, schools whose work is based on segregating students with disabilities from other students, a practice that Human Rights Watch and the Campaign for Human Rights in Iran criticize. Tara Sepahri-Far says that segregating children with disabilities has long-term consequences in their lives:
“The most important issue this report points to is the need to change the overall approach to the education of children with disabilities. In Iran, steps have been taken for these children to access education, but these steps have been within the framework of separating children with disabilities from regular schools and placing them in special schools. If these children are separated from society at the beginning of their entry into it, it will have serious consequences in their lives.”
Human Rights Watch and the Campaign for Human Rights in Iran say that in recent years the Iranian government has increased the education budget for children with disabilities. However, these two organizations emphasized in their report that unless the education system, teaching methods and school environment for children with disabilities in Iran are reformed, thousands of children will be deprived of education. Hadi Ghaeimi says that according to Iranian law, the right to free education is the right of all children:
“The justification the Iranian government uses for not meeting the needs of children with disabilities is the lack of sufficient budget and facilities. This is while the constitution of the Islamic Republic recognizes the right to free education for all members of society through secondary school. Therefore, the Iranian government cannot ignore the rights of 10 percent of children on the grounds of lacking budget and facilities. In some border and deprived areas of Iran, up to 90 percent of blind children with disabilities have never seen the color of a school.”
A year ago, Human Rights Watch and the Campaign for Human Rights in Iran also issued a report titled “I Am As Human As You Are” examining the situation of persons with disabilities in Iran and emphasized that Iran, based on its international obligations, should provide all the conditions for a decent life for these people. Obligations that Iran is bound to fulfill under the International Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, a convention Iran has been a party to for over a decade. Tara Sepahri-Far says that inclusive education is one of the principles of this global convention:
“This means that for all students with disabilities, there must be an opportunity for quality education along with meeting their needs for equal access to education alongside other students and in fact within the main education system of the country.”
Education that might be able to solve some of the problems of thousands of children with disabilities in Iran, children who, according to human rights advocates, have a long way to go to access standard and effective education.
Children who have the right to adequate education and a joyful childhood world, a right equal to all children in the world.
Source: Voice of America
