In Education in Uganda: High Dropout Rates it was indicated that there is a high dropout rate from education amongst children with disabilities (CWDs). This blog post will examine how many CWDs participate in school and give a more detailed dropout rate.
The 2012 paper Access to education for children with disabilities in Uganda: Implications for Education for All, is interesting reading. Inequalities, the paper says, are a major barrier to universal education for all:
Priority has been given to gender and income inequality; however, to achieve universal education we must focus on all marginalized groups. The disabled are among the least visible of the marginalized children. As the Ugandan government develops a policy on special needs children, it is essential to understand the current schooling status of disabled children in Uganda. Therefore, using 2006 Uganda Demographic and Health Survey data this study examines schooling patterns of disabled children in Uganda. The study finds that disabled children are significantly less likely to enroll, attend and complete Grade 5. The study also finds that the disadvantage disabled children face depend on the nature and extent of the impairment.The paper then describes the source of the data that is analysed and provides tables of the statistical analysis:
The sample used in the study consisted of 16,319 children aged 6 – 17 years. About 12% (1,864 children) of the sample reported some form of disability. Filmer (2008) found a strong association between poverty and disability; therefore, it is not surprising to find that 24% of the disabled resided in the poorest quintile and 16% in the wealthiest quintile. About 90% (1,717 children) of the disabled children reside in the rural areas; about 30% of the disabled children in the sample are from the Northern region, the poorest region in Uganda.
First we look at whether or not these children ever enroll and attend school. To determine whether or not a child had enrolled and attended school respondents were asked the following questions: Has (NAME) ever attended school? Did (NAME) attend school at any time during the 2006 school year? They were asked the second question if they reported they had ever enrolled in school.
Table 1: Child disability and school participation
6.61 8.80
Table 1 presents the child disability and school participation patterns of 6 – 17 year old children. Two issues are highlighted in Table 1. First, it shows that children with disabilities face obstacles to school participation, but the magnitude of the obstacles vary by the nature and extent of the impairment. For example, about 71% of children who reported facing a lot of difficulty seeing with glasses were attending school compared to about 36% of children who had a lot of difficulty with selfcare. UNESCO (2010) reports, “impairments that affect the capacity to communicate and interact in ways common in mainstream schools can impose particularly high practical and social obstacles to participation in education” (p.182).
Second, majority of the out-of-school disabled children had not yet enrolled in school. This is not surprising because many studies have found institutionalized discrimination, neglect and stigmatization in schools and society; this has created a cycle of low levels of schooling and subsequent poverty (UNESCO 2010; Filmer 2008; Kristensen et al 2006; UNESCO 2004). Disabled children face schools that are underfunded and lack educational materials, yet they had to pay high fees (Kristensen et al 2006). These institutional constraints may explain why some households are reluctant to enroll their children in schools.
Table 2: Disability and Grade 5 completion for 13 - 17 year old children
65.33 35.33 3.66
Table 1 showed that a large proportion of disabled children are out of school. For those who do enroll in school, how successful are they? Using household survey data Filmer (2008) found that grade progression was very poor for disabled children in developing countries. Table 2 presents the proportion of 13 – 17 year old children who reported they had completed Grade 5. Successful completion of Grade 5 is taken as the threshold for acquisition of literacy and numeracy (UNESCO 2005). All respondents who reported they had at some point enrolled in school were asked the following questions: What is the highest level of school (NAME) has attended? What is the highest grade (NAME) completed at that level? The official age of school entry in Uganda is 6. If they enrolled on time and progressed successfully, they should have completed Grade 5 by age 11.
The Grade 5 completion rates in Uganda for children 13 – 17 years are very low; about 35% of children reported they had completed Grade 5. The Grade 5 completion rates are even lower for disabled children; about 10% of children who had difficulty hearing even with hearing aids had completed Grade 5. Since disabled children face greater obstacles, it is not surprising that many have not yet completed Grade 5. As was the case in Table 1, the magnitude of the obstacles vary by the nature and extent of the impairment. About 12% of children who reported facing a lot of difficulty remembering or concentrating had completed Grade 5 compared to about 4% and 0% of children who had a lot of difficulty communicating and selfcare, respectively.The paper continues with further multivariate analyses. Then discusses the analyses of Table 1 and Table 2 and offers a conclusion:
Tables 1 and 2 highlight the markedly different consequences of impairment on education in Uganda. Fewer disabled children enroll in school on time and when they do enroll, very few successfully progress through school. These descriptive statistics highlight the magnitude of the challenge facing Uganda as it seeks to provide universal education.
The international community pledged to achieve universal primary education by 2015. Despite recent progress, UNESCO (2011) has warned that unless countries redouble their efforts there will be an increase in the number of out-of-school children from the 2008 estimate of 67 million. Some of the most significant obstacles to universal education in sub-Saharan Africa can be found outside the immediate reach of the education sector; these obstacles include extreme poverty, HIV and AIDS, corruption and ineffective use of resources, and conflict (Caillods et al 2006). Poverty and conflict have been linked to physical and mental disabilities (UNICEF 2008; UNESCO 2010).
Disabilities make it difficult for children to acquire academic competence. Disabled children require extra attention to comprehend. This extra attention requires more resources that may not be available in countries with limited resources, like Uganda. Uganda recognizes the need to reach all children, especially those with disabilities. Therefore, access to education for children with disabilities is a key objective of the Ministry of Education and Sports (2005). As the government embarks on its Education Sector Strategic Plan 2004-2015, it is essential to understand the current schooling status of children with disabilities in Uganda.
Before we discuss the findings of the study, it is important to acknowledge some limitations of the UDHS data used in this study. First, the data may be unreliable because disability was self-reported. Given the stigma associated with disability (Kristensen et al 2006; UNICEF 2008), it is likely that some households may be ashamed of their disabled children and may not have acknowledged them. Second, there were not enough cases to conduct multivariate analysis of schooling patterns controlling for the nature and severity of the disability... Despite the data limitations, we can learn important things than may inform policy.
The findings of this study indicate children with disabilities face significant obstacles to schooling. These children are significantly less likely to enroll in school, attend school, and complete Grade 5. Many disabled children do not enroll in school. The social stigma and prejudice may discourage parents from sending their children to school (Kristensen et al 2006; UNICEF 2008; UNESCO 2010). This limited enrollment may also be due to the lack of resources in special and regular schools and the prejudice that attend regular schools (UNESCO 2010). UNESCO (2010) also found that many schools, especially in rural and slum areas, are physically inaccessible to some children with disabilities.
For those disabled children who do enroll in school grade progression is very poor. The lack of enrollment and progression suggest obstacles in school and in the households. Overall Grade 5 completion is low for all children in Uganda, but it is significantly lower for children with disabilities. The poor progression may be due to limited resources, lack of proper assessment, poorly trained teachers, and limited parental support (Kristensen et al 2006). Kristensen at al (2006) found that, “many parents did not visit their children once they had been admitted to a special school, neither did they take the children home on school vacations.” (p. 145). Without parental support these children are unlikely to succeed in school.
It is clear from the findings that disability is experienced differently depending on the nature if the disability. Vision and some forms of physical disabilities carry less stigma and require fewer extra resources in school. Consequently, children with disabilities are more likely to be found in schools. Other disabilities, such as difficulty with selfcare, require more resources and carry greater stigma. Given this differential experience of disabled children, the Ugandan government need to enact polices that take into consideration the nature and severity of the disability. This will probably be the greatest challenge for the Ugandan government. Providing resources and materials to serve all the disabled children will require increased financing to train teachers, provide educational materials and assistive devices like hearing aids, and financial support for families.
It is clear from this study that disabled children in Uganda face significant challenges in society and school; their enrollment, attendance, and Grade 5 completion rates are very low. If the Uganda government is to reach disabled children they will need to develop procedures for proper assessment of the disabilities, collect more accurate and reliable data, train teachers for the different forms of disability, and provide all schools with educational resources to serve these children.
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Disabled Africans cheered a new hero last month when South Africa’s wheelchair tennis powerhouse Lucas Sithole defeated world No. 1 quadriplegic tennis player David Wagner of the United States at a Johannesburg tournament — demonstrating that in Africa, as elsewhere, physical disability is no bar to world greatness.
But the sad truth for many disabled young Africans is that the barriers to development start much closer to home, beginning in schools that do little to serve students with special needs. Deprived of education, these young people are at a disadvantage for life and often end up among the poorest of the poor.
It doesn’t have to be this way. Simple changes in teaching techniques, coupled with new, locally produced teaching materials and improved school design, can open the doors of education to all students regardless of physical disability. But African governments and international donors need to make this a priority, or risk leaving generations of disabled Africans behind.
Of the estimated 500 million persons with disabilities worldwide, 120 million to 150 million are children. Eighty percent of these children live in lower to lower-middle-income countries. Furthermore, recent research indicates that this number of disabled children is growing due to increasing poverty, armed conflict, poor child labor practices, violence and HIV and AIDS.
In Uganda, where I work, the number of people officially classified as disabled has been steadily rising from 4 percent in 2002 to 16 percent in 2011. Whether this rise is due to improved statistical data or to people incurring new disabilities is unclear, but what is clear is that this population — roughly 6 million people — is poorly served by public programs and particularly by schools.In the developing world, many disabled people drop out of school and pay the economic consequences for life. In Bangladesh, reductions in wage earnings attributed to lower levels of education among people with disabilities and their child caregivers were estimated to cost the economy $54 million per year. In Morocco, lost income due to exclusion from work was estimated to result in national level losses of 9.2 billion dirhams ($1.1 billion).
Many Ugandan schools feature only the most basic amenities, and do not have ramps or wide doorways that could enable a student in a wheelchair to get to class, while in the classroom desks are not configured to accommodate wheelchair users. School latrines, libraries and playgrounds are also usually inaccessible.
School instruction is also a formidable barrier. In Uganda, as in many African countries, the student teacher ratio is high, at almost 50 to 1. Teachers lecture from the head of the class and use a blackboard — no matter whether some students may have vision or hearing problems, or physical problems copying notes.
Pilot programs have shown that there is a better way. At my organization, the Youth with Physical Disability Development Forum, we have pioneered new, locally produced teaching materials that can help. A simple abacus, constructed out of poles set into a plywood box with rubber rings for counters, can bring basic math alive for students who cannot use a pen. A large card embossed with basic geometric shapes can help students with vision problems understand spatial relationships.Unsurprisingly, the available statistical information indicates an extremely low enrollment and completion rate of primary and secondary schools by children with disabilities. As few as 9 percent of children with disabilities of school age attend primary school, compared with a national average of 92 percent, and only 6 percent of these continue studying in secondary schools, according to a 2014 report by Uganda’s Ministry of Gender and Social Development.
Basic teacher training can also help. In our partner schools we are working with 60 individual teachers to explain the best ways to reach their students with disabilities. This has resulted in more one-on-one attention for these students, and has seen the dropout rate for students with disabilities fall by almost half.
This can make a real difference. In this year’s national examinations for children in primary school, 85 of the 135 students with special needs in our partner schools passed with top honors and the rest passed with secondary honors. These are students who now have the chance to continue their education and to realize their full potential. With a little work, we could guarantee that all disabled students in Uganda, and across Africa, share the same possibility.
The figures presented in Table 1 and 2 above offer a bleak picture of education for CWDs in Uganda. Table 1 presented the percentage of CWDs attending school. Table 2 asked what percentage of the pupils that are attending school will pass Grade 5. Only 35% of non disabled children achieve grade 5, for CWDs the figures are substantially lower. For instance only around 10% of pupils that have difficulty hearing will attain Grade 5. The figures presented in the Tables also show how barriers affect performance at school.
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