Working Group Member Publishes on Lack of Support for Disabled in Indonesian Education

Dina Afrianty, member of the Gender, Religion, and Law in Muslim Societies working group, published an article on the limited degrees of support services for people with disabilities in Indonesian higher education institutions.

“People with disability: locked out of learning?”—Afrianty’s blog post for the University of Melbourne site Indonesia at Melbourne—claims that increasing enrollment in higher education is still limited by a lack of infrastructure and supportive government policies and academic services.

While some universities have made accommodations and government has voiced verbal support, the existing segregated special school system allows many institutions to turn away disabled students, who rely heavily on family support if they do gain entrance to mainstream schools, writes Afrianty.

Afrianty suggests using Islamic texts that emphasize social justice to change discriminatory attitudes, along with better staff training and increased funding.  Read the full article here.