Inclusive education is failing at schools

Early last month, an incoming junior-high school student in Taichung with discipline issues allegedly attacked a teacher with a broom, with the teacher at risk of losing sight in one eye from the incident. The case is not isolated, but the tip of the iceberg of long-hidden teacher-student conflict.

It is imperative that the fundamental systemic problems behind the issue be confronted. In the absence of complementary measures, sufficient professional educators and adaptive streaming mechanisms, has so-called “inclusive education” deviated from its original ideals?

Inclusive education originated from international human rights advocacy in the late 20th century, advocating for the placement of students with physical or mental disabilities or special needs in regular classrooms to learn alongside their peers, to promote educational equality and social inclusion.

Taiwan enacted the Special Education Act (特殊教育法) in 1984 and amended it in 2023 to implement inclusive education. The ostensibly well-meaning legislation has significantly departed from its original intent due to insufficient resources and a shortage of personnel.

I once taught at a public junior-high school for one year, where I found maintaining classroom order to be extremely challenging in every class. There were often students needing special guidance or who struggled to adapt to the pace of learning. Their emotional outbursts or disciplinary problems frequently disrupted teaching, forcing me to send them to the Student Affairs Office on an almost daily basis.

Those kinds of situations not only exhaust teachers physically and mentally, but also deprive the majority of students of the right to learn in peace, creating a triple-lose situation for teachers, students and their special-needs classmates.

The late James Kauffman, a professor emeritus of education at the University of Virginia, and John Maag of the University of Nebraska-Lincoln wrote that “there is an increasing resistance to calling things what they are and, instead, considering disability just another form of diversity or difference that has little to no implication for education.”

They called this “a grotesque abuse of language and concept that bodes ill for students with disabilities as well as those who teach them” in a paper titled Emotional/Behavioral Disorder: Why and How do We Name It?

Pursuing equality does not mean all students must receive identical educational arrangements.

More than 2,500 years ago, Chinese philosopher and educator Confucius (孔子) proposed the principle of “teaching students according to their aptitude.” The purpose of education has never been to force all children into the same mold, but rather providing appropriate learning environments and support based on each student’s abilities, traits and needs.

Today’s inclusive policy without complementary measures is forcing students with different needs into the same standard and environment, which frustrates special-needs children as they struggle to adapt, and plunges general students and teachers without specialized training into instability and safety threats.

Education authorities should promptly and comprehensively review the challenges in implementing the Special Education Act, supply professional special-education staff, and establish safety isolation and case referral mechanisms, returning the true authority of “adaptive streaming” to schools.

Otherwise, the chaos and teacher-student conflicts are likely to continue. In that case, the grand exodus of parents transferring their children from public schools to private schools, where inclusive education is not compulsory, would continue.