Abstract
Every student deserves equal access to quality education regardless of socioeconomic status, ethnicity, geographic, gender, location, or whether s/he/they has/have a physical and/or cognitive disability (Slade, 2017). Yet, accessibility to education for students with disabilities can oftentimes be inaccessible. This paper offers a preliminary investigation of accessibility in public schools and higher institutions of learning for students with disabilities in Jordan. For the purpose of this paper, the definition of accessibility is confined to the architectural and structural environment and physical barriers faced by students with disabilities in public schools and institutions of higher education.
The objectives of this descriptive, mixed methods analysis are twofold. First, it aims to better understand the existing accessibility and environmental related issues in Jordanian public schools and higher institutions of learning. This is carried out by examining the availability and paucity of reliable data concerning enrollment, attendance, and accessibility, education expenditure and budgetary allocations, and different types of environmental barriers in schools and institutions of higher learning, in order to better understand the existing accessibility and environmental related issues in Jordanian public schools and higher institutions of learning. The results indicate that in order to ameliorate physical accessibility in education, effective changes need to be considered and implemented.
Second, it investigates the ways in which Jordan is attempting to reduce the amount of these physical barriers. This is accomplished by investigating various components found in the ‘10-Year Strategy for Inclusive Education’ addressing environmental barriers and accessibility in public schools and initiated by Prince Mired Raad Zeid Al-Hussein of Jordan and the Ministry of Education. This strategy “is a translation of the provisions of the Law on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities No. (20) of 2017 and a reflection of the significance of this topic” (MoE, 2020). The aim of this strategy is to implement an inclusive system in public education suitable for everyone. The components being investigated include the ways in which the Ministry of Education intends to approach raising awareness and advocating for students with disabilities, collecting and reporting reliable enrollment and attendance data, and assessing and collating public school expenditure. Overall, this analysis contributes to the pool of limited research that offers insight into issues of physical barriers and accessibility in Jordanian public schools and higher institutions of learning.
Discipline
Architecture & Urban Planning
Geographic Area
Sub Area
Middle East/Near East Studies