People with disabilities can do well, given the same educational opportunities everyone has
Hey I think this is really important! Too many people ignore the needs of people with certain disabilities thinking its futile to educate them.
Invitation to Focus Group discussion on Compulsory Education for Children with Disabilities
http://maruah.org/2009/11/19/fgdiscussion-compulsoryedchildrenwithdisabilities/
(Aim: children with physical disabilities to be included in Singapore’s Compulsory Education Act; also in line with the Convention on the Rights of Children)
When I went to the Vatican a few months ago I was super impressed. The guy who sold us tickets at the counter had 2 fingers only, and he was just handling all the transactions amazingly fast, no different from othr counters, and the queue was miles long but it cleared really fast.
The cloak room was run by just one guy and he had Downs’ syndrome (or some sort of other social disability) and everything was in perfect order, and so efficiently managed.
I was just so impressed with not only these 2 people, but with the people who hired them. In Singapore, even the enlightened people who hire people with disabilities tend to put them where their area of disability is not directly used in their job. There, I really learnt that your area of”disability” can be the primary requirement of your job, but it doesn’t have to matter at all!
(I mean, 2 fingers only & selling tickets much faster than 4x the speed of ANY movie ticket counter in singapore!!! )
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Clarifications:
“same educational opportunities” doesn’t mean same education. We need to be educated according to our needs and strengths. Even amongst mainstream schools, there are humanities , science, arts , commerce etc etc areas of focus, that we can choose according to our strenghts and interest. But the point is that we all need to be educated to be functional adults.
I used the term “certain disabilities” because I believe everyone of us has some sort of disability. Some are more obvious, some are less harmful, some are more convenient, some are more accepted. Myopia is a disability. Forgetfulness is a disability. Shyness is a disability. Candidness is a disability. Remembering things too clearly can be depressing and can be a disability. You know what i mean.
These are some of the disabilities I have (that i know of) :
Maths/ physics (i can’t deal with imaginary numbers, seriously.)
Forgetfulness (i can’t count the number of days I had to walk back from the MRT station because I left my wallet behind & discovered it only at the ticket gates)
I’ve one lung (or so says my PE teacher, who used to prove it by walking at the same speed as my 2.4 jog)
I’ve never got a basketball into the loop.
I could go on, and on. My disabilities have caused people a good amount of grieve, but thankfully no one decided that I shouldn’t be educated as a result.
I think the issue to address is cost. I heard it is rather costly to put these children into special schools.
If education were to be made compulsory for these children, it can put additional financial strains on some families.
If these families cannot afford the fees, what’s the point of hauling them to court for not sending their children to schools?
However, if the fees are heavily subsidized, then educating these children is a non-issue. Just think, free special education for children… You don’t need to come up with a Compulsory Education Act to make it work.
I think MOE/Singapore can afford to subsidized the fees. But I don’t hear enough noise from enough people to push the authorities to do it.
University edu. is expensve, but highly subsidised, or a least the cost can be postponed to be repaid when one is working.
I don’t see why a similar model can’t be pursued with children of special needs.
To use an example.
Fees at NUS for local students studying science is $6.6K per year, while for international students is $9.9k per year. Assuming (because I’m not sure) that fees for international students are not subsidized, the difference is about $3k.
Compare this to cost of running a comprehensive diagnostic test for children with special needs. It can be ~$2K to run such a test. And I saw some schools requiring $2.5k per month for fees!
This is costing more than university education! And unlike university education, where graduates have a good chance to find good paying jobs to repay the loan, companies may be reluctant to employ these children when they grow up.
Furthermore, university education (basic degree) is 3-4 years. For special education, it is going to be a much longer duration and they need to start young.
The loan model is not going to work for families (i.e. most people) who can’t afford it. They will bleed financially.
The government should cover most, if not all, the cost in the education of these children. If the government want population growth with more babies, then the government should cover the cost. People cannot help it if their children are born with special needs.
Factual correction :
https://share.nus.edu.sg/registrar/info/ug/UGTuitionCurrent.pdf
Using the fees of exisiting undergrads as eg:
Local students are subsidied & pay 6.1K a year, and the subsidy (NOT loan) is 19K a year.
Medical students get 88++K subsidy a year
And before you talk about how impt med students are,
Music students get 47++K a year. Subsidy. Not Loan.
I fully agree with CM that the govt should cover most, if not all, the cost
At most they should just pay what all the other kids are paying for mainstream sch, and the same financial aid schemes should apply for the relevant income brackets.
On top of that (but this is outside the scope of education, the topic of my post) , we should have a Special Needs Assistance fund. Not sure if we already have that tho’. Anyone can enlighten??? Our income tax also allows relief for special needs dependants???
“And unlike university education, where graduates have a good chance to find good paying jobs to repay the loan, companies may be reluctant to employ these children when they grow up.”
That’s the whole point. If they don’t have a quality education, of course people re reluctant to hire them!
But look at my Vatican story!
And Pres. Roosevelt (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Franklin_D._Roosevelt) one of the best US presidents, was wheelchair bound!
That’s what we need to change!
Yes, that’s the official numbers for the grant/subsidy. I’m not going to share my “conspiracy theories” here. If subsidy is defined like how HDB defines subsidy, then you know what I mean.
By the way, grant and subsidy can be two very different thing.
If there is income tax relief for special needs dependents, it’s quite useless. Even if a middle income family don’t pay tax at all, it’s not going to help the family finances with the current high fees to maintain and educate a special needs child.
Just imagine, even middle income families bleeding financially from this (off-topic: housing as well) . Something is very wrong, isn’t it?
“That’s the whole point. If they don’t have a quality education, of course people are reluctant to hire them!”
Do you think that, even with a quality education, companies in SG are willing to hire?
I totally have no clue in this. But if businesses here have a choice, you know who they would normally choose.
“But look at my Vatican story! And Pres. Roosevelt (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Franklin_D._Roosevelt) one of the best US presidents, was wheelchair bound!”
I’m not sure how this can change in SG. It probably takes one generation time to see results.
But to make a fair comparison, what’s the statistics of disabled/special needs people like in these countries?
“By the way, grant and subsidy can be two very different thing.”
Just to clarify… This is probably something Uniquely Singapore.
I think that the whole cost thing needs to be put into perspective.
Spending a few thousand dollars on the special school education of a child will definitely help to make this person more independent later on, perhaps even able to take a simple job so that this disabled adult will become a productive (even perhaps tax paying!) member of society.
The reality today is that thanks to excellent pediatric care, we have a number of disabled adults with aging parents who have been denied education and thus have very limited skill sets which increase the costs on society tremendously.
A disabled person who is able to look after himself or herself also frees his/her caregiver to re-enter the economy, thus multiplying the economic benefits of the basic education provided to the disabled person.
Sorry to sound so mercenary but that is the Singaporean way
Thanks so much for this perspective Paul, makes perfect sense for anyone concerned about costs! I think lots of parents with adult disabled children are worried about what would happen to them when the parents are no longer around. That should be a huge incentive for any current parent to educate their child (I hope!!! )
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