From Them to Us: An International Study of Inclusion in Education - Tapa dura

"The book succeeds admirably in exposing the multiplicity of perspectives surrounding "inclusive education...."The individual commentaries and summary chapter offer a good deal of analysis and critical reflection that serve both to anchor inclusive education debates in the realities of school practice and to tease out the implications of different perspectives." -Comparative Education Review "The book succeeds admirably in exposing the multiplicity of perspectives surrounding "inclusive education...." However the book does more than set out the different perspectives. The individual commentaries and summary chapter offer a good deal of analysis and critical reflection that serve both to anchor inclusive education debates in the realities of school practice and to tease out the implications if different perspectives. In doing so, it helps advance understanding of one of the central and most challenging topics in contemporary school reform.." -Comparative Education Review, August 2001

Inclusive education has become a phrase with international currency shaping the content of conferences and national educational policies around the world. But what does it mean? Is it about including a special group of disabled learners or students seen to have 'special needs' (them) or is it concerned with making educational institutions inclusive, responsive to the diversity of all their students (us)?
In this unique comparative study, the editors have brought together an international team of researchers from eight countries to develop case-studies which explore the processes of inclusion and exclusion within a school or group of schools set in its local and national context. The study includes classroom observation, the experiences of the school day of students and interviews with staff, students, parents and school governors. Through an innovative juxtaposition of the case-studies and commentaries on them, differences of perspective within and between countries are revealed and analysed.
The study arose from a dissatisfaction with previous research, which presents 'national perspectives' or seeks findings that have global significance. This book avoids such simplification and draws attention to the problems of translation of practice across cultures. The editors start from an assumption of diversity of perspective which like the diversity of students within schools can be viewed as problematic or as a resource to be recognized and celebrated.