Dubai: Knowledge and Human Development Authority has appealed to private schools in the country to accommodate 19 special needs children forced to leave the centre they are studying as it will be closed in March 2009.
Parents of the children started the appeal much earlier, when Emirates English Speaking School, which started by the beginning of 2007, requested the children to leave the school.
The centre caters to borderline children who eventually sit with their mainstream classmates, a step that is critical for their development.
Earlier, in a written statement to Gulf News, S.S.U. Tabrez, the principal of the school, said: "Due to acute space constraints we are closing the centre [Emirates English Speaking Centre for Special Needs] with prior approval from the Ministry of Social Affairs, which is the licensing authority."
However, following the parents’ plea to the press and Knowledge and Human Development Authority (KHDA) the school agreed to keep 19 special needs children for one more academic year. S.S.U.Tabrez said: "In a meeting in March 2008 with school officials, parents had only requested to continue the centre till June 2008. The school authorities had agreed to the request even though it was affecting more than 1,200 students."
According to Tabrez, from the beginning parents were provided with alternative centres and one of these centres agreed to accept all children but the initiative was refused by some parents since it doesn’t include school integration.
"Some of our children have borderline learning and behavioural disorders, whereby they do not fit into any institution and need to be in the company of regular school goers and EESS provides the perfect environment for their progress," said A.M., a parent.
"We are not requesting the school to keep us (children) as they kept their part of the bargain but we appealed to authorities to help us find an alternative as we are living in continuous anxiety," said another parent with a child with mild autism.
A written statement from KHDA to Gulf News said: "KHDA has gone as far as it could to secure the best interest of the students and the school. However, given the situation, KHDA would like to extend a request to other private schools that can accommodate those students to notify the authority so that the students would not be left unattended to."
"The school in question might no longer be able of providing adequate service for those students, even if it had space to accommodate them. However, under the licensing guidelines and regulations for the coming years, private schools are required to provide learning support services and qualified teachers for students with special needs," Mohammad Darwish, Chief of Licensing and Customer Relations at KHDA, said.
"Students are the main focus of the authority - whether special needs or main stream - and their needs are fully addressed in the strategy of KHDA. We are working with schools to prevent such scenarios from happening in the future," he said.
Recently, the education minister said: "The new federal law in the UAE makes it clear that it is the responsibility of all federal agencies to ensure that citizens with special needs are provided appropriate facilities."
The 2006 federal law mandate all academic institutes to provide for the needs of children with disabilities as they have equal rights.
By Siham Al Najami, Staff Reporter
Page last updated 01 January 2020