PADA pays 34 million dinars to provide services for students with ‘learning difficulties’

The disparity in students’ assimilative abilities is considered a natural matter in various aspects. Among this disparities is what is related to linguistic abilities, especially in the early stages of education, and what is related to mental or health abilities, perhaps the most prominent of which is the problem of learning difficulties, the number of people suffering from these difficulties increases year after year.

In Kuwait, 7,197 male and female students suffer from learning difficulties, according to statistics from the Public Authority for Disabled Affairs, which provides them with all educational services in 25 private schools, to which the Authority pays 34 million dinars for their teaching, in addition to 31 schools affiliated with the Ministry of Education, reports Al-Rai daily.

But parents complain about the lack of seriousness and qualification of these schools to teach this category of children, in terms of their lack of qualified teachers and buildings to accommodate them, according to their special needs, in addition to the lack of government schools to integrate them into general education schools, in accordance with the requirements of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, which Kuwait signed.

In 2013, it was made obligatory to implement it within 5 years from the date of signing, but it was not implemented amid demands for speedy implementation, which is no longer an option, but rather binding on the state that has signed the agreement.

It includes the ministry’s experience in schools in Mubarak Al-Kabeer Governorate, and 18 out of 20 schools obtained international certificates and praises for the quality of education.

Al-Rai discussed with a number of officials and specialists the suffering of this group and the exclusion and disruption of its energies, which has always produced many scholars and geniuses, and concluded that there is a delay in integrating them in implementation of the UN agreement, which requires a decision and awareness of officials and society about the importance of this.

Mubarak Al-Badah, Acting Deputy Director for the Educational and Rehabilitation Services Sector, Director of Legal Affairs and Official Spokesman for the Authority for the Affairs of Persons with Disabilities, said that, out of the Authority’s belief that the school is the second environment after the family, which has a major role in shaping the personalities of our sons and daughters with disabilities, it has sought to provide services.

Diagnostic diagnosis determines the type of disability and the quality of educational services provided to them, as those with educational disabilities (difficulties or slow learning) receive inclusive education with their non-disabled peers, taking into account their special needs, in accordance with plans, programs and curricula.