Annually, about 15 percent of students leave grade 9 without full grades. A large proportion of these students have a disability. Eligibility for upper secondary school is the main protective factor for a functioning adult life with work and good health.
Much has been done to try to increase equality and for more people to reach eligibility for upper secondary school, but not much has helped. About half of the students with disabilities today are unable to complete their schooling.
Several of our affiliates, among others Attention and Autism and Asperger’s Association, make their own surveys that unequivocally show year after year that the student group has low goal fulfillment and high absenteeism; that there are shortcomings in support and low competence of the staff.
The government says that Sweden should have an equivalent world-class school. But students with disabilities do not seem to be part of the school the government says it wants to see. These students are constantly under the radar, despite the fact that we have a school law that is to ensure the right to special support, and which also states that such support must be deployed early.
Much has been done to try to increase equality and for more people to reach eligibility for upper secondary school, but not much has helped.
It is becoming increasingly clear that the Education Act does not work in practice. The Swedish National Agency for Education’s latest report shows that the support continues to be deployed too late and that the local differences are large. In a survey as the National Union of Teachers conducted among its members, 62 percent of the respondents considered that students in need of support measures receive it to a small extent, 4 percent that they do not receive it at all.
The introduction of the read-write-count guarantee has so far not had the desired effect either. The guarantee is aimed at the school’s younger students and means that all students who are in need of support for their language and mathematical development must receive the right support at the right time.
The teachers’ union is critical and believes that the guarantee only leads to mandatory surveys of students’ knowledge. If the survey shows that a student needs special support to catch up, then that support may still be lacking.
Another problem with the Education Act is that it excludes students with disabilities from the free choice of school. Today, it is possible for a school to deny a student a place with reference to organizational and financial difficulties. The students who are selected do not need extensive support. The students who are excluded are often students with disabilities.
Not only the Education Act but also the UN Convention on the rights of persons with disabilities, the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, guarantees the right to support. The state must not exclude students with disabilities from the public school system. Sweden has undertaken to comply with this convention.
Of course, there are many who do a good job with, among other things, attendance-promoting initiatives and investments in smaller teaching groups. This is of course positive, but without systematic follow-up and statistics, we do not know whether these initiatives will have any effect or not. It is not cost effective and a waste of our common resources.
Why there is resistance against producing statistics on this very issue is unclear. Do you suspect that it will open a dust hatch? That it will cost? Arguments put forward are that it is difficult to pinpoint who actually has a disability, invasion of personal integrity with the risk of stigma, complex legal obstacles and legislation.
But there are also many who claim that it is a worse stigma not to manage their schooling than to be included as a basis in statistics. In addition, statistics and data can be collected in different ways. Of course, national statistics produced on students with disabilities would be at an aggregate level – these are all other similar statistics.
It is not defensible that so many students do not get a chance to succeed in school. It is contrary to fundamental rights and it is unworthy of a country like Sweden to claim to protect precisely these rights.
To produce statistics and data if people with disabilities are also a commitment under the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. In the new the strategy for systematic follow-up of disability policy It is emphasized that the collection of statistics and data is important for Sweden to achieve the disability policy goal. IN Statistics Sweden’s report “Leave no one out” – within the framework of the introduction of Agenda 2030 – it is noted that there are shortcomings in the statistics on children with disabilities.
And if we want to achieve equal health, a functioning school is an absolute prerequisite. In June 2018, the Riksdag decided on an overall national public health policy goal. The goal is to create societal conditions for good and equal health and to close the manageable health gaps within a generation.
One of the sub-goals that is pointed out is to counteract school failures through early identification and action. For society, it is an investment to invest in early intervention, which among others economist Ingvar Nilsson Shown on.
It’s time for Sweden live up to its commitments. We therefore call on the government to commission relevant authorities to produce statistics and data on students with disabilities so that we and other societal actors have a basis to relate to.
If we get there, there is a greater chance that the right measures will be put in place and the right efforts will be made. Then we have a chance to get the equal school we all want.