Research on Policy Reforms Aligned with International Inclusive Education Policy

Qian Wenwen

(Guiyang Nursing Vocational College，Guiyang 550081)

Abstract:As the pioneer of educational reforms,,some developed countries have implemented inclusive education and made remarkable progress.In order to improve the quality of education,China has implemented the nine-year compulsory education policy，which is an epitome of inclusive education in China,and a practice of the meaning and purpose of education.Through collecting,reading and comparing the similarities and differences in the implementation process between China and the Western countries,this paper also discusses another two cases in China,which demonstrates that China's education reform has been in the progress steadily under its own characteristics.

Key words:Inclusive education; Education policy; Reform

Inclusive education is the practice of arranging all kinds of students together to study in the same learning community,no matter how different they are and never classify them into several levels and never separate or arrange some of them into special groups or communities.(Slee,2011).Associated with the human right,inclusion is created as a fundamental learning community where all students should be educated without discrimination (Allan[2],2014).The successful Implementation of inclusive education requires the support of certain policies and laws since enacting inclusive education requires educational reforms such as institution,curriculum,teaching,evaluation,these reforms can’t be carried out without the support and protection by certain policies and laws (Watkins,2009).China is one of the nations among which the government has enacted a series of policy reforms to fit into the international educational mainstreaming(Carrington[4]et al.,2015).

In this thesis,detailed elaboration of the relevant inclusive education policy reforms and practice for the purpose of protecting the rights of minority children.This essay consists of the following five sections:

（1）The relationship between inclusive education and social justice.

（2）The impact of international social movements on education.

（3）The implementation of 9-year compulsory education in China aligned with the international inclusive education background.

（4）Articulating two examples of China’s education reforms in order to advocate inclusive education.

A.Policy implementation in Tibet minority areas.

B.Concerning and improving Muslim girls’ education in Ningxia minority area.

（5）Future prospect of disabled children schooling in minority areas.

1 The Relationship between Inclusive Education and Social Justice

Social Justice is the final goal that all human beings make unremitting endeavour in pursuing in centuries.Education and social justice is interconnected as education is regarded as an essential area for bringing about changes to meet the goal of social justice,while the social movements for social justice are the prerequisite for the rapid development of education (Slee,2011).Inclusive education is one of the products generated under this context..

2 The Effects of International Social Movements on Education

As the evidence,the passing of the Civil Right Act in1964 in US articulates that all people should have the same right to live without discrimination (Greason[8],2009).In 1990s,World conference launched “Education for all ” to ensure the right for all regardless of individual differences (Hunt,2011).All children thus,“regardless of their physical conditions,gender,race,economic status,language,ethnicity,religion,sexual orientation,and cultural background should be fully included as rightful members of their class and school”(UNESCO,2009).It is a successful opening movement for changing the society.Lateral movements like the women’s movement and the United Nation Convention on the Right of People with Disabilities emphasizes the complete equality of specific groups of people in both social and educational contexts.

3 The Implement of 9-year Compulsory Education in China

These international social movements and policy reforms have exerted impact all around the world.Some countries even formulated relevant policies and laws that are responsible for the promotion and implementation of educational policies.While others,have passed relevant policies and laws which reflected the spirit of inclusive education.(Carrington et al.,2015).Taking China’s educational reform as an example,the 9-year compulsory education law of the People’s Republic of China was enacted in 1986 (Zhao,2012).It is a huge progress of Chinese education development as it not only raised the educational standard but also ensued the social justice.The reason lies in the characteristics of this policy:free to all students who are in the corresponding ages; compulsory education to all students who need to be educated by the conditions established by law.(Zhang& Minxia,2006).This education reform aims at educating all children whoever they are,wherever they live,no matter their financial status,and most importantly,it is free and without discrimination.The main purposes of this policy are:popularize the elementary education for all citizen; bridge the gap between developed and undeveloped areas(Ministry of Education,1985).Children especially in the minority areas are benefited,and they are supported and guaranteed the equal rights in education by these policies.

The 9-year compulsory education law are associated with various reforms in different fields.For instance,in 2000,the tax and fee reform was implemented in rural areas through reducing the income of township and village administrative fees(Wei,2008).Minority children are mainly distributed in the rural undeveloped areas.The financial support was gradually shifted from the central cities to the remote counties so that the people’s financial burden can be relieved(Wang & Zhao,2012) to be better prepare their children for education.Another policies like “Modern distance education in rural primary and secondary schools” encourages the sharing of pedagogy resources in all regions for all children(Alamin[1],Shaoqing,& Le,2015) and “The special status plan for teachers in rural compulsory education” provides a large number of positions for teachers in minority areas and raising standards of teachers for meeting various educational requirements(Deng[6],2012).Those policies for the central and western rural areas in minority,in the practice,directly contributed to the development of local education of minority children.

4 Two Examples of China’s Education Reforms

Despite several policies and laws are instituted with in-veracious Commonwealth meanings,which play a “toothless tiger” role in the practice of inclusive education,there certain enacts with deep understandings of inclusion exist in China’ education reforms.In the following section,two specific practices in China will be presented to illustrate the endeavor by the government which attempts to protecte the educational rights of minority children.

Tibet is one of China's major frontier minority areas,the Chinese government has been very concerned about the development of education in this region.In order to promote inclusive education,in Beijing,Shanghai,Tianjin and other provinces and cities Tibetan classes (schools) were set up since 1985.The data is from “The Report of the 48th annual international education conference of the national education development----inclusive education in China”published by the Ministry of Education:At present,a total of 76 schools admit Tibetan Students in 20 provinces and municipalities.Therein,a general class of 53 inland high schools recruit 360 outstanding Tibetan students as exchange students every year since 2002.By 2007,a total number of 34,900 junior high school students enrolled and 26,100 high school students enrolled.Meanwhile,Tibet has delivered 15,000 graduated students to participate in local economic development.18 mainland provinces (municipalities),high schools and units were directly administrated by the Ministry of Education to assist Tibet to ensure the sound development of education in Tibet..In 2007-2010,the mainland counterpart support Tibet units by delivering 840 primary and secondary school teachers annually to Tibet and 420 education administrators.Through four years’ effort,3360 primary and secondary school teachers were trained,1680 education administers were cultivated.Training fund was cooperatively resolved by the Tibet provinces,relevant municipalities’ governments.Tibet’ education has made significant progress under the support of the Chinese government.

Encouraged by the positive results from Tibet’s story.Chinese government intends to employ the same method to subsidize other minority areas.Since 2000,Beijing and other 12 cities in 13 high school opened a workshop for Xinjiang high school students.1,000 students are enrolled annually (Q.Hu[10-11],2010).The government intends to expand the enrolment further..It is really meaningful to popularize inclusive education and eliminate the discrimination between the minority children and others.Chinese government is on the right track to reach the inclusive education goal to the level of New Zealand,Berryman[3](2008) notes that Maori in New Zealand has continued to be aided and supported by the health and educational systems.Meanwhile,the colonial values,maori knowledge and Maori people as Maori values fully implement in the educational practice of focusing on equal right to enrol (Carrington[5],2012).Therefore,the meaningful policies,supported laws and feasible systems are absolutely necessary,and indispensable policy-adjust and reforms are also essential for every country which is in an attempt or on the way to implement inclusive education.

The second example concerns the right of minority girls’education issues in China based on the semi-federal education responsibility structure.Ningxia autonomous region is paying special attention to the southern mountains schooling for Hui Muslim children,especially girls.The data is provided by the “The Report of the 48th annual international education conference of the national education development----inclusive education in China”.Since the 1990s,according to the characteristics of the Hui autonomous region,it has become the first toimplement the lodge-system to admit Muslim children in primary and secondary schools for dealing with the drop-out issue of Muslim children.Under the support from both China and UNICEF(United Nations Children’s Fund),the Muslin girls are able to enrolled in the classes.By improving the culture,background and schools’ educational environment,the enrollment rate of Muslim girls has reached to 95% in the Ningxia autonomous region.Due to Increasing concern for minority girls’ education,more relevant laws and policies were issued by the central government and practice by the local cooperative governments.The Sex discrimination in China is absolutely not lower then other nations,therefore like other nations,China is paying more attention to protecting women’s right(Steinfeld,2014).In order to achieve the inclusive education goal in which all people,regardless of their genders,backgrounds,economic status,languages,religions should be given equal rights in education.(UNESCO,2009),Chinese educational system will be perfected and greater progress will be made in the future..

5 Limitation and Further Direction

For the future development education,inclusive education is the general trend of the development of an international education as inclusive education advocates that:the future of our education should be for all people; all the children should have equal access to education; each person should be included; everyone should have the opportunity to engage in a lifelong education; all persons should be able to fulfil their educational needs (Watkins,2009).However,in the process of implementing inclusive education,there are various challenges and limitations..The first one is obviously,during educational reforms,education is basically and compulsorily provided for children,whereas it’s only accessible for all children who are able-bodied.(B.Y.Hu & Szente,2009).The disabled children are excluded even in the developed areas,let alone those in minority areas.Much Unfortunately,few evidence to support disabled children to educate,and the government has less aware of disable children’s education status,though they promulgated the “toothless tiger”policy of “Provisional Policy on the Establishment and Management of Resource Rooms for Children and Youths with Special Needs in Inclusive Placement.” in April 2012.The policy demands that there should be at least one inclusive classes in 3-5 schools in each district.The school should establish resource rooms,with teachers allocated into each room,and provide an individualised educational plan for each student with disabilities (Feng[7],2016).However,problem still exists that the children with disability are learning and studying separately from the able-bodied students (OECD[12],2014).

The Chinese governments are working to fix some problems and bridging the gaps for future educational improvement.Recently,the policy especially on promoting the disabled students’ education status is instituted by the Guangzhou government,which namedl“Suggestions on Strengthening Implementation of the Work on Special Education in Guangzhou City 2012-2016,” in February 2013.It officially included special education into the five-year working plan of the city,and result will be published at end of 2016(Feng,2016).In the future,more educators,scholars,governments and nations will cooperatively participate in the inclusive education reforms,and formulate more effective policies and laws .

6 Conclusion

From the experience of national education reform and development point of view,to implement a new educational ideas,to develop new educational reform,the development of appropriate policies are essential.To push the line of inclusive education,the states and the government should contribute to developing the necessary policy,preferably through certain laws.

Although Inclusive Education has not yet been universally acknowledged,its benefit to all human beings are undeniable.Hopefully,as the development of lifelong education from the mid-1960s suggested then in the 1980s it was popular in many countries to be written into educational law; and EFA (Education for all people)suggested in the early 1990s,it is gradually appearing in the legal documents in many countries,the development of inclusive education will eventually be accepted around the world and be included in the legislation.