Parents of children with hearing impairment task Govt on inclusive education

Kampala, Uganda | THE INDEPENDENT | Parents and teachers have asked the government to put in place policies that offer inclusive learning to children with special needs across the country.

The parents say that they lack access to sign language interpreters which denies the children the basic foundation of access to necessary needs of life.

Halima Nakanwagi, a mother of a 12-year-old girl living with hearing impairments from Buyende district says that her child was unable to access education due to a lack of schools for special needs children in the area

Nakanwagi further says that sign language interpreters should be deployed at lower health centers and local government units, which will enable children with related disabilities to access services in their areas of jurisdiction.

“If there were sign language interpreters in the lower health facilities and sub-counties in our district, my child would have acquired not only quality needs attention, but also induction to standard communication skills at an early age,” she says.

Ssematimba Wasswa, another parent says that responsible government agencies should use LCI leaders to track down children living with disabilities for easy enrollment in the available inclusive schools.

Rachel Bagaaga, a sign language teacher says that, due to knowledge gaps, most parents pay less attention to children living with disabilities, abandoning them to suffer silently, with limited spaces to express themselves. Bagaga also says that children with hearing impairments, mostly face the challenge of poor menstrual health management, which they cannot easily communicate to either their peers or teachers.

She further expresses fear that most girls are easily given away into early marriage, by mostly insecure parents who think that, the men marrying their children are doing them a favor since they are widely stigmatized by the wider public.

Paul Wandera, the proprietor of Bridges of Glory inclusive primary school, with an enrollment of 150 children who are deaf in Kayunga district says that he drew his inspiration after finding a deaf child locked up in the house all day, whereas, his other siblings were left to freely play in the compound. Wandera notes that the incident inspired him to look out for deaf children from different parts of the country.

According to Wandera, he mobilized sign language teachers to skill them in primary communication skills, as a means of boosting their literacy levels before assembling them in an inclusive learning environment.

He, however, says that, most parents lack the willingness to help their children excel, with limited efforts in providing them with scholastic materials, abandoning all their cares to the school administration.

Wandera adds that, with uncertainties on the affordability of inclusive secondary schools to accommodate the learners after completion of primary school, they have set up a skilling center where the pupils are equipped skills in computer literacy, smart agriculture, tailoring, crafts making, mechanics, among others, which can empower them to be self-sufficient in their adult lives.

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