Inclusive education.

 

The concept of inclusive education is gaining ground and could now conceivably be enshrined as a right for all learners. Implementing a right to inclusive education requires a whole-system transformation, necessitating the rebuilding of education systems that are able to address and remove diverse individual barriers, allowing all students to learn together, regardless of background, ability or additional needs. This section also considered some targeted rights that could enhance protection for vulnerable and marginalized groups that continue to struggle in the realization of their right to education. Education in, through and for human rights should also be given increased prominence in the international legal framework.

Amendments/additions to the right to education framework could be considered:

 • Ensure an inclusive education system at all levels, in all types and through all modalities, including through: proscribing the exclusion of any individual from general education; the provision of reasonable accommodation; providing individualized support measures including remedial action, auxiliary assistance; ensuring learning environments free from stigmatization and stereotypes; and fostering cultural, religious and linguistic diversity in terms of educational content and delivery. • Update the grounds of discrimination to include persons with disabilities, sexual orientation, gender identity, refugees, asylum-seekers, migrants and IDPs under the grounds for which discrimination is explicitly prohibited. • Ensure the right to education of pregnant or parenting girls and women by explicitly providing for their continued education and re-enrolment where necessary, as well as removing any laws, policies and practices that have the intended or unintended effect of restricting this right. • Guarantee a right to education on health and well-being, including comprehensive sexuality education (CSE), eliminating legislative and constitutional barriers to its enjoyment and ensuring the inclusion of CSE from primary school onwards, that is age-appropriate and culturally sensitive. • Ensure mother tongue education or learning opportunities, whenever possible, for indigenous peoples and individuals belonging to minorities. • Explicitly enshrine the right to education of refugees, asylum-seekers, migrants and internally displaced persons, including those that are displaced or affected for reasons related to climate change, including inter alia: eliminating administrative barriers and providing language and remedial classes, flexible certified learning programmes and psychosocial support. • Institute measures to develop inclusive, responsive and resilient education systems that meet the needs of children and adults in crisis contexts, prioritizing the continuity of education at times of crisis, elaborating a plan for reinstatement within a reasonable timeframe, and ensuring the protection of learners, teachers, other education staff, schools and other education infrastructure in the context of armed conflict. • Take measures to address the digital divide and remove barriers to digital education, such as lack of internet connection, basic infrastructure or devices; and prioritizing the connectivity and inclusion of the most marginalized learners, while ensuring that online education expands learning opportunities, without reducing in-person education. • Ensure that technologies for education purposes conform to minimum education standards and are inclusive by design, including for learners with disabilities and respecting cultural rights. • Take measures to ensure learner well-being in online learning environments and develop digital literacy skills in education, including technical skills as well as critical digital literacy, which encompasses building an understanding of the digital environment including its infrastructure, business practices, persuasive strategies, uses of automated processing and personal data and surveillance. • Expand the aims of education to include the building of soft skills, such as solidarity, compassion, ethics and empathy and education on climate change as well as the protection of nature and biodiversity. • Ensure the right of all learners to know, seek and receive information about all human rights and fundamental freedoms, sustainable development and global citizenship, by ensuring these educational interventions are meaningfully integrated in all education policies, curricula, teacher training and student assessment and ensuring that learners are endowed with the knowledge and skills needed to uphold human rights. • Explicitly prohibit the use of corporal punishment in education and take measures to ensure a safe school environment free of all forms of violence (including genderbased violence) and bullying (including cyber-bullying).