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Special education needs: Where's the money?

16 septembre 2014, 10:35

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Special education needs: Where's the money?

NGOs running schools for special education needs have been trying to get the Ministry of Education to take over the education responsibilities of the children. Organisations like Special Education Needs Society (SENS) are currently demanding parity of funding with that of mainstream schools. 

 

NGOs running schools for special education needs have been trying to get the Ministry of Education to take over the education responsibilities of the children.

 

Organisations like Special Education Needs Society (SENS) are currently demanding parity of funding with that of mainstream schools. Founder member Ms Jackie Forget laments that the per capita currently provided by the government is dismal. She says that "our overall funding comes from parents, sponsors and recently grant-in-aid. Some parents can provide for their children, others cannot. There is not enough inflow from CSR. Our running expenses are high. These children need skilled trainers and therapists".

 

The expenses for special education needs schools are much higher than those of mainstream. "Our teacher to pupil ratio is at 2:16 (1:4 when we have IP lessons), while that of mainstream schools is 1:40. Right now the ministry says it is giving us a monthly per capita grant of 2800 rupees... but we have been getting under 2000 rupees. We request parity with mainstream schools, as our per capita actually comes to 6500 rupees, and we are currently in deficit," adds Ms Forget.

 

There was a budget of Rs 67 million allotted for this sector. But the number of schools shot up from 14 in 2009 to 38 in 2014.

 

The NGOs are asking for more transparency in the process of permit allocation, and also the disbursement of these funds as per the formula employed by the government, where the allocation is supposedly around 7000 rupees per capita.

 

For the Association de Parents d'Enfants Inadaptés de l'Ile Maurice (APEIM), on the other hand, funding is not an issue, but their demand is that the government should take over the responsibility of these children, as per the rights of the latter.

 

Director of APEIM, Ms Irene Allessandri, says: "Last year, APEIM became  stronger about our vision & conviction, and we decided it was high time for the government  to take over the Child Rights Convention (CRC) and UNCR norms, which Mauritius is committed to. We want the Ministry of Education to take responsibility of these schools. In March 2013, we wrote to them to take over our 9 schools."

 

APEIM claims that they have written repeatedly to the ministry but talks haven't moved further. "We also want to help them till they are ready to take over. We have expressed our intention to work together in the transition phase with our different realities and constraints. We and the parents, want the children to be educated properly and of course under no circumstances will we accept a compromise for our children", asserts Ms Allessandri.

 

The spokesperson at the Ministry of Education and Human Resources Mr. Adinarain Hutchamah, says that "we make sure we give permits to schools only after proper checks". On the issue on funding he replied," The ministry is currently working on this, and will respond soon”.