Lecturers’ perspective of inclusive education at further and higher education

Abstract

This paper focuses on the lecturers’ experiences and reflections on the environmental, educational and social enabling and disabling factors of inclusive education faced by students with physical and sensorial disabilities at Further and Higher Education levels in Malta. Critical disability theory was utilised in conceptualising the social disabling barriers that emerge from the lived experience of individuals while the social model of disability was employed in getting an insight from different lecturers about the oppression created by the socially constructed disabling barriers. In accordance with Bronfenbrenner’s Ecological Systems Theory (Bronfenbrenner 1994), this research revealed that over time, social relationship between different stakeholders, namely, the individual, family, friends, school community and society at large affect the lived experiences of diverse learners in educational institutions whether they are enabled or disabled. This shift is influenced by the extent to which a rights-based approach is adopted. The significance of this paper is to show the salient role of lecturers within a pro-inclusion model of inclusive education consisting of a nested system of intersecting relationships. The findings underline that lecturers have an important role in creating a transformative momentum that impacts the quality of inclusive education both on a philosophical and on a pragmatic level.