Children with disabilities face significant challenges in accessing quality education, particularly those who experience insecurity and hardships due to conflict and displacement. Displaced children with disabilities frequently endure social and cultural violence fueled by hatred and divisions within their communities, resulting in societies that are increasingly unwelcoming. This environment further hinders them from receiving proper care and quality, inclusive education, preventing them from realising their full potential.

Difficulties in accessing inclusive education: the case of Tanzania

In 2023, the JRS team in Tanzania conducted a study in Nduta, Ntendeli, and Nyarugusu refugee camps to uncover the barriers to the integration and acceptance of children with disabilities, which hinder the achievement of sustained inclusive education.

The findings revealed that children with disabilities experience direct violence, such as mockery, insults, beatings, and cultural violence resulting in exclusion, and rejection, as well as structural violence also determined by the use of inadequate curricula.

These factors have greatly affected their learning and school attendance, as it was already noted in an assessment conducted by JRS Tanzania in 2020. On average, children with disabilities took two years or more to progress from one grade to another in the three refugee camps. In addition, the duration of their classes was only one or two hours per day, while their peers received more than seven hours of teaching. “Children with mental impairment are the most subjected to violence and labeled as “without educational future” even by children with other disabilities. The education curriculum does not address their specific needs, reinforcing their exclusion from quality opportunities,” said Claudine Nana, JRS Reconciliation Officer.

The entire support system for children with disabilities, particularly teachers and parents, is subject to violence. According to the 2023 study, teachers who work with children with disabilities are often insulted by their colleagues and labeled as “crazy.” They also lack access to specialised training to develop the skills needed to adequately support these children. Parents also have reported feeling excluded from their communities. When the support system for children with disabilities is exposed to violence, it directly undermines its ability to provide the necessary assistance and support.

While schools are safer than their communities, both environments expose children with disabilities to stigmatisation, discrimination, and exclusion from their peers and families. For example, a student from Nyarugusu refugee camp said, “family members do not eat when I am the one cooking due to my condition and their beliefs and misconceptions around disabilities”. This state of violence determines the importance of creating inclusive communities that celebrate differences and offer equal opportunities to everyone.

Fostering reconciliation to overcome barriers to inclusive education

JRS has adopted a framework of reconciliation to address and reduce levels of direct, cultural, and structural violence affecting children with disabilities and those associated with them. Reconciliation for JRS means fostering just and compassionate relationships in the place of dynamics governed by injustice and discrimination.

To address the violence faced by children with disabilities and advance the agenda of inclusive education, JRS distributes assistive devices and advocates for the integral inclusion of children with mental impairment in the curriculum. The JRS reconciliation team also conducts awareness sessions with students, home visits to parents and siblings, and teacher training to improve the quality of their support.

Starting with the implementation of this reconciliation framework in Tanzania, JRS hopes to address the pervasive stigma and violence against children with disabilities and to create safe and welcoming spaces for them to grow.

“JRS is committed to creating inclusive communities that leave no one behind, providing equal opportunities to all children. We renew our call to remember that all children must enjoy their rights, be considered in decision-making processes, and be provided with safe spaces to grow and develop their potential,” concluded Danielle Vella, JRS Senior Reconciliation Specialist.