PROGRESS AND DIFFICULTIES OF INCLUSIVE EDUCATION IN PUBLIC SECONDARY SCHOOLS IN NIGERIA

Inclusive education which draws its origin from the Salamanca Declaration, is currently one of the burning issues in academic circles in Nigeria, and the globe at large. This paper therefore examines progress and difficulties of inclusive education in public secondary schools in Nigeria. This category of schools was established to provide students opportunity for higher education without discrimination on the basis of disability, gender, to name a few. Ideally, inclusive education in Nigeria is about physically impaired students being accorded opportunity to school with normal students in same school settings without segregation. It additionally goes with adjustments in the regular schools in terms of administrative strategies, curriculum, infrastructure, instructional aids, among others, in a bid to accommodate the special learning needs of the children irrespective of their forms of disability, and accompanying difficulties in learning, Accordingly, inclusive education has been practiced minimally in a few states in Nigeria. Nevertheless, the foregoing efforts have been constrained by paucity of fund, inadequate specialists, corruption, poor leadership, misinformation, and external influence, like in mainstream education. These serve as cog in the wheel of progress of inclusive education in Nigeria. Based on these, conclusion was drawn and recommendations were made, including an appeal to government to establish special schools in all localities where intensely impaired students can access, and special funding for inclusive education, and so on.