Everyone Belongs

Everyone Belongs Synopsis

The majority of children with special needs attend special schools. Schools where the ethos acts to exclude the children from full involvement in society. Everyone Belongs challenges the very existence of special schools. This is a book that challenges the wider culture of exclusion that segregated special needs education imposes on children and their families. Lively, forthright and often amusing Ken Jupp demonstrates how the ideology of inclusion can be applied to our education system. Inclusion benefits everyone in society, non-disabled children gain valuable life skills that complement their education while disable children have an improved chance of reaching their full potential. Inclusion creates a society where the best is made of every child's potential and disabled and non-disabled people alike are fully participating and equal citizens of society. In Everyone Belongs Ken Jupp describes his experiences of initiating a pilot study in which five children, all with profound learning disabilities, attended their local mainstream school. The findings of this pilot study were so enthusiastically positive that the Local Education Authority is working towards the closure of the special school and has re-appraised their entire special education service. The five children are still in their mainstream schools, growing in a way that would otherwise have been impossible. Everyone Belongs offers positive suggestions for developing an alternative education system in which all children have equal opportunity and value, and can learn together, each at their own pace.