Modeling the Development Process of Inclusive Education in Ukraine

Abstract

The article presents the results of research on the implementation of the principles of inclusive education in Ukraine, substantiates its relevance in the development of a democratic society and European integration policy. The principles of the state policy in the field of inclusive education, its normative-legal support and international practice of providing educational services to citizens with special needs are described. Advanced experience of inclusion introduction in the educational process of preschool, general secondary, vocational and higher education institutions is analyzed. Official statistics on the total number of people with disabilities in Ukraine; availability of special secondary education institutions (boarding schools) and their contingent; the number of children with disabilities in preschool education institutions, students with disabilities in full-time secondary education institutions, persons with disabilities in vocational education institutions, persons with disabilities among students of higher education institutions etc., have been handled. The importance and expediency of the scientific development of the principles of inclusive education, its practical implementation and study of socio-economic effect are substantiated. Graphic visualization of the correlation between the employed persons with disabilities and persons without disabilities, number of children, pupils, students with special educational needs in education establishments of Ukraine is presented.

Inclusive education in higher education institution: Are Ukrainian faculty members’ ready for it?

“…Currently, faculty members lack developed competencies to work with students with disabilities. And ‘Studying in a group of students with disabilities is a separate case and the faculty member should adapt to the individual needs of the student with disabilities’ (Kovtoniuk et al, 2022; McConkey et al, 2013; Raver, 2007; Shevchuk, 2021).…”

“…The approach to inclusive education in HEI differs from that implemented in secondary schools, where inclusive education is quite successfully implemented in the educational process (Bielik et al, 2022;Kolupayeva et al, 2014;Lutsan et al, 2020). The differences between the implementation of inclusive education in secondary schools and higher education institutions can be explained by a certain set of factors (Bilavych et al, 2022;Kovtoniuk et al, 2022). In general, it can be represented as:…”

“…Despite the importance of this problem, there are only few researches in Ukraine that have focused on studying the readiness of HEI to implement inclusive education and understand its real situation (Bilavych et al 2022; Kovtoniuk et al, 2022; Lutsan et al, 2020; Shevchuk, 2021). In this article, which is based on an analysis of the main ideas regarding the implementation of inclusive education in Ukrainian HEIs, we focus on human capital, namely the faculty members.…”

“…The approach to inclusive education in HEI differs from that implemented in secondary schools, where inclusive education is quite successfully implemented in the educational process (Bielik et al, 2022; Kolupayeva et al, 2014; Lutsan et al, 2020). The differences between the implementation of inclusive education in secondary schools and higher education institutions can be explained by a certain set of factors (Bilavych et al, 2022; Kovtoniuk et al, 2022). In general, it can be represented as:• Time: The introduction of inclusive education in secondary schools began in 2010-2011, while in higher education institutions, this experience was only centrally implemented from 2019.• Legislative: Over 10 years of piloting and actual implementation of inclusive education in secondary schools, a legislative and regulatory framework has been developed.…”