Inclusive Education In Malaysia
Inclusive education was introduced in the education act 1996 as part of the continuum of services available for children with special needs.
Inclusive education in malaysia. The discussion begins with an introduction to the development of special needs education as a discipline and as a profession in malaysia and its influence on the development of policy and practice toward inclusive education. Inclusive education experiences of parents in malaysia inclusive education of children with disabilities is accepted internationally as a standard and right for all children. While malaysia appears to subscribe to this opinion in principle the reality on the ground appears to be challenging and many parents and children face difficulties obtaining full inclusion.
The purpose of this paper is to discuss the interpretation of policy pertaining to inclusion its contradictions and its translation into practice within the malaysian context. Despite national kpis and targets for inclusions the education for children with disabilities in the education ministry facilities is still largely in a segregated fashion. And to share experiences on how the national context explains and constrains inclusive practices.
Inclusive education in malaysia originated from the special education agenda as defined in the education act 1996 1998 and its approach is referred to this tradition. Stated that inclusive means creating schools which welcome all learners regardless of their characteristic disadvantages or difficulties it is including the traditionally excluded or marginalized groups. In malaysia the ministry of education provides children with disabilities with three schooling options under the national special needs education system.
One obstacle is parents. The ministry of education malaysia in its report entitled the development of education for the international conference on education in geneva on november 2008. Although the education ministry reports that in 2017 quick facts 2017 malaysia education statistics p 23 25 396 students with special needs were being educated in inclusive mainstream.
Enrolment of children in such programmes however is low. Following are some quick facts and figures from a unicef report titled inclusive education malaysia dated june 2014 with data from malaysia educational statistics 2012 quick facts. In malaysia the inclusive education program is an education program for students with special needs who are educated in a regular class at government schools or non government schools for nearly all of the day or at least for more than half of the day malaysia 2013.
