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NEW PEDAGOGICAL AND ORGANIZATIONAL STRATEGIES IN CONTINUOUS ADULT EDUCATION FOR THE DISABLED PEOPLE AND PEOPLE OF THE THIRD AGE
SELECTED ASPECTS OF INCLUSIVE EDUCATION OF DISABLED ADULTS IN POLAND AFTER 1989
D. Apanel T. Maliszewski
Education is a value, hope and task, as well as an important tool of development of society and each person.
We in Poland and Europe are on the way to a "society that studies".
It is our right, duty and chance. Also a chance for a person to whom fate was not so kind as to the others1.
Disabled adults hold a special place in the established social consciousness, because the criteria of adulthood are mainly connected with the ability to function independently in the society. The ability to create a family, professional work, independent life and earnings, the realization of other diverse needs connected with being of age - those are the tasks which, unfortunately, cannot be implemented by many disabled adults.
It is known that during the last century the education of disabled persons became institutionalized, and interest in disabilities ceased to be connected with the education of school-age children. In due course, it also began to manifest itself in respect to disabled adults as well. Such changes are observed in many countries. However, up to the 1990s, traditional rehabilitation solutions based on the social care system were predominant in practice. In Poland, their social assistance houses became their principal institutional form. According to Polish statutory provisions, such institutions are intended for "rendering personal, trustee, accessory and educational services... to the person in need for round the clock supervision because of their age, illness or disabilities who cannot function by themselves in everyday life."2
Substantial changes in the Poles' approach to the problems of disabled adults began to take place during the period of political transformation started in 1989, when normalization and integration concepts began to be implemented. Western experience, which the Poles began to take advantage of intensely,
1 Ochonczenko H., Mitkowska G. Osoba niepetnosprawna w spotecznosci akademickiej. - Krakow 2005, p. 9.
2 According to the data of the Main Statistic Institution of Poland of Poland (GUS). Website: http://www.stat.gov.pl/gus/definicje_PLK_HTML.htm?id=POJ-5067.htm, access date: 17-02-2014].
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demonstrated the specificity of disabled adults distinctly, especially their unfavorable social situation and functional problems. In this context, many works differentiating the social situation of a disabled child and a dysfunctional adult were published in Poland1. Specific ways of their rehabilitation were developed with regard to specific features of adults. They were differentiated depending on the type, extent and consequences of the disabilities of a specific adult person. Those ways, being at present customized bases for the rehabilitation of such people, do not only include various forms of general education and vocational training, but also elements running far beyond this scope of problems.
The democratization of social life, scientific and technical progress, and globalization changes during the last quarter of a century brought about many changes in the functioning of disabled persons in Poland. Two other processes taking place in Polish society played an important role in this situation: The socialization of education and the ideas of lifelong education and the continuing implementation of lifelong education ideas. Numerous legislative documents (e.g., the Constitution of the Republic of Poland, the Law on Higher Education, as well as the Universal Declaration of Human Rights adopted by Poland) legally guaranteed to all disabled adults the same rights to education as those of ordinary people. The participation of Poland in the global program "Education for All" initiated by UNESCO in 1990 and proclaiming the leveling and total elimination of all forms of inequality in access to education also became one of the most important prerequisites for the development of different forms of integrated and inclusive education of disabled adults.2
Higher education is increasingly becoming one of the forms of education influencing the level of normalization of disabled persons' life in Poland. The obtainment of higher education is regulated by the Law on Higher Education dated July 27, 20053. At present, higher educational institutions strive to level the chances of getting access to education for disabled students and to keep the level of informativeness of classes the same as for ordinary students. That is why the number of disabled students in higher educational institutions increases every year. The report of the Main Statistical Institution of Poland (GUS) demonstrates that the total number of disabled students studying at Polish educational institutions in the academic year 2011/2012 was 30,249 (among them 16,394 - on a full-time basis, and 13,855 - extramurally)4.
Apart from the opportunity to obtain higher education, numerous programs preparing disabled persons for activity in the labor market are organized for such persons. They are implemented with various departments (e.g., regional and local employment services) and financed from the funds of the State Fund for Rehabilitation of Disabled People. Most often, they have the form of professional
1 See: Krause A. Integracyjne ztudzenia ponowoczesnosci. - Krakow, 2000; the same author: Cztowiek niepetnosprawny wobec przeobrazen spotecznych. - Krakow, 2004; Pilecka W., Rutkowski M. Dziecko ze specjalnymi potrzebami w drodze ku dorostosc. - Krakow, 2009.
2 Polish Committee for the Affairs of the UNESCO. Website: http://www.unesco.pl/edukacja/edukacja-dla-wszystkich/ [Access date: 17-02-2014].
3 Dziennik Ustaw RP (Diary of Laws of the RP) 2005, Nr 164, poz. 1365, as amended, see: Ust-awa z dnia 18 marca 2011 r. o zmianie ustawy - Prawo o szkolnictwie wyzszym, Dziennik Ustaw RP 2011, nr 84, poz. 455.
4 GUS. Szkoty wyzsze i ich finanse w 2011 r. - Warszawa, 2012.
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consulting and various forms of training courses. In 2010 and 2012, approximately 50 thousand disabled adults took advantage of professional consulting . Professional consulting and informing usually touch upon the choice of profession, forms and opportunities for career enhancement, defining the place for work, and taking part in the activities of labor clubs that are still very few. They hold courses, various forms of practical training and individual studies whose goal is, first and foremost, preparation for an active job search. The clubs are attended by disabled persons aged 18-24 and "more" educated, i.e. having post-lyceum or secondary vocational education. For many years, training courses remain the principal educational instrument improving the chances of finding a job for disabled persons in the open labor market and thereby, improving their social situation. But these forms of education are harder to organize and more expensive as compared to other forms of professional training. In spite of the fact that their results related to employment are much worse, this type of training still enjoys the maximum demand in Poland1 2.
Furthermore, the Polish model of social and professional rehabilitation of disabled people provides for four subsequent stages on the way leading to the normalization of the life of those people: 1) practical labor therapy studies; 2) professional activity facilities; 3) protected labor facilities; 4) the open labor market. The first two stages were created as transitional forms of employment for those disabled people whose access to the "normal" labor market will require certain training in the sphere of knowledge and skills, as well as positions modeling, but on the workplace rather than in the school environment. During the period when the market economy was in the process of being created, the next two stages were the solutions that exhausted the problem of vocational training for that category of persons within the Polish model of disabled persons' functioning that took shape during the 1990s. However, the solutions that took shape at both those stages were more commercial than social in nature. Therefore we think that the form of those solutions should be reviewed and redetermined. Nongovernment organizations carry out vigorous activities in the sphere of inclusive education of disabled adults as well. They contain schools, supplementary training centers, and offer numerous courses. However, we think that such social entities specializing on working with adult disabled Poles are still very few as compared to the constantly growing needs3. It should be also remembered that at present, education of disabled adults in Poland is not an institutionalized form of education; it takes the form of situational education4.
Translated from Russian by Znanije Central Translations Bureau
1 Golinowska S. Integracja spoteczna osob niepetnosprawnych. Ocena dziatan instytucji - Warszawa, 2004, p. 58.
2 Ibid., pp. 60-62.
3 See: Mokrzyszewski A., Post B., Sikorska J., Instytucje i organizacje wspierajqce osoby nie-petnosprawne w Polsce. Diagnoza i propozycje zmian, Warszawa 2002.
4 Malec M. Spoteczne konstruowanie (nie)petnosprawnosci; Maliszewski T., Zerko J. Edukacja dorostych wobec spotecznego wykluczenia: przesztosc i terazniejszosc. - Warszawa-Gdansk, 2012, p. 264.
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