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Education for all
Tanzania has joined the goal ”Education for All”, which among other things build on the Millennium Development Goals and UN's Convention on Human Rights about the disabled rights. Unfortunately they are far behind from bringing the goals into reality.

- The curriculum of the schools does not show consideration for children and youth with handicap. Disabled children do not always get enough time and necessary aid tools for their exams. They do not always get interpretation, if they have reduced sight or are blind, says Anders Jacobsen, who is national director for International Aid Services in Tanzania.
The organisation has more than 10 years of experience with special education from Somalia and they are now launching a special education programme in close cooperation with the Tanzanian department of education. Only 12 percent of the 15,000 schools have a special education teacher. There is only one teachers seminary in the contry, which covers the special education area, and only 300 teachers per year get extra training. That is why International Aid Services want to help launch a distance learning programme, which can train special education teachers where they already live and work. We also need to establish resource centres in the districts, which can support the teachers.

Untreated disabilities get worse.
But the children also need to get direct help. There is a need for centres, where they can be checked and cleared by doctors, psychologists, physiotherapists and educators. And get information on what form of teaching and aid, which is needed for their challenges. - It is important that the child gets an elucidation from a young age, so it can get the necessary help in order to develop physically, mentally and spiritually, says Anders Jacobsen and continues: - Many children grow up with a little disablilty, and because it does not get checked and adjusted, the child gets serious problems as he/she grows up, and these problems could have been completely or partly avoided.
About 10 percent of the world's population lives with a disablilty according to the World Health Organisation (WHO). UNESCO has come to the conclusion that 80 percent of these llive in developing countries (2005). The majority of these live in the least developed countries, including Tanzania (2006). Only 2 percent of all disabled children in Tanzania are attending school today. This number also includes children, who experience barriers in other areas in connection with education.

Girls are also vulnerable
The sensational numbers are a result of a comprehensive study report induced by International Aid Services. The study includes the regions Rukwa, Mara and Kagera, and the cities Dar es Salaam and Arusha. The report shows that about 17 percent of all children between 0 and 4 years old are considered as 'vulnerable' . About 5 percent or 930,000 are 'especially vulnerable'. And it is especially the girls. In the primary school boys with special needs have a greater chance to complete their education than girls, as a disabled girl is even worse off. There are 7,271,198 children in all between 7 and 13 years old in Tanzania (2007). Different studies have shown that between 1 and 10 percent – 72,000 to 700,000 - are disabled. If only an average of 2-5 percent of the children at the compulsory school age are disabled, it means that 150,000 to 350,000 children should have extra help or access to special education.

Wide backup
The school leaders in the study report all agree, that including education will improve the learning for all students. But they also express the need for changing the general attitude towards disbled people within the local community.
The consultant also spoke to students with a special need at the different schools and found out that they generally liked to attend the same school as 'normal' children from their neighbourhood. Yet they suggested that the schools are designed in order to meet the needs of students with i.e. wheel chairs. The chiefs of the visited districts also think that special education should be implemented as soon as possible. The road is thus cleared in order for International Aid Services to help the many children with special needs and those who do not yet attend school.

Facts:
Before the end of 2014:
- the three focus areas Kagera, Rukwa and Mara must have at least 6 counselling groups for children with special learning needs
- must have at least 3,000 children and youth with special learning needs in the three regions receiving relevant support in order to complete primary school
- must have at least 500 functioning school teachers doing extra training in including teaching

Goals for the first stage of International Aid Services' special education programme in Tanzania

Close cooperation with the Department of Education
Now the time has come for Tanzania. International Aid Services inaugurated an office in Tanzania this February and is now investigating the possibilities of adjusting the ordinary schools to so called ”including schools” in three of the regions chosen by the Department of Education. The goal is for the regions Kagera, Rukwa and Mara to have at least six counseling groups for children with special needs before December 2014. The groups must gather and share knowledge and experience of the local community's attitude towards disabled children's right to education. By the end of 2014 it is the goal is to have at least 3,000 children and youth with special learning needs receiving the necessary support to complete primary school. If the project is a success, it will be implemented in other parts of Tanzania.
All this is happening in close cooperation with the national department of Education.
- We have a lot of experience from Somaliland, Southern Sudan and Northern Ethiopia, although their governments are not strong. To some extend we therefore had to build up the things from scratch. In Somaliland we have only recently handed over the Special School to the Department of Education. The situation in Tanzania is somewhat different. The Department of Education is stronger here, and thus we have had a close cooperation from the start, says Anders Jacobsen national director of International Aid Services in Tanzania.
Tanzania has joined the goal ”Education for All”, which builds on the Millennium Development Goals and UN's Human Rights Convention on the rights of the disabled. The government has yet to carry out these goals.
- Especially in the rural areas the population is quite uninformed about the rights and opportunities of the disabled, says Anders Jacobsen.

Collaborators with network and expert knowledge
How will you carry this out?
- We have selected two major partners to work with. One of them is the Free Pentecostal Church of Tanzania (FPCT), which has 350,000 members and a huge network throughout the country. Through these we will be able to meet key persons and groups, with whom we need to cooperate in order to strengthen the local communities on firebrand level. The other partner is ICD (Information Centre for Disability), an information centre for disabled, which gathers and shares knowledge from all Tanzania, and is very strong in speaking the rights for the disabled, and they have often been called in as counselors for the Government.
Where will you start?
- We want to help different community groups to organize in order for them to be heard, locally, regionally and nationally. But we also see the need for institutional capacity building of the Department. It is the responsibility of the Department of Education to educate teachers to teach children with special needs. But only on a small scale they have been able to do this, and if we just leave it up to the Department of Education to meet this need, it will take a long time. And if we only work with lobbyists and speaking the rights, it will also take a long time.

Long distance training of school teachers
Instead we enter cooperation with a teachers’ Seminary, Patandi Teachers College and start long distance training of school teachers so they get equipped to include children with special needs in their classes. Regional centers will be established where teachers can be called in for seminars, and the children’s needs can be evaluated at a so called clearing. Then an action plan will be made for the individual child and a placement in a relevant institution.
We need to cover large geographical areas. Tanzania is divided in to 24 regions with a total of 15.301 primary schools. The schools are then divided between 130 districts. Only 12 percent of the schools have educated teaches to take care of special teaching. Without help from outside it will be difficult for Tanzania to reach the development goals, which are – among others – to have at least one special Teacher at each primary school.
There is still far to go. But Anders Jacobsen is confident. The Government wants to cooperate, and IAS is welcome wherever they come.
- It was a Danish doctor, who started the Special teaching area in East Africa - Tanzania, Kenya and Uganda. In 1983 Kurt Kristensen went to Kenya with support from Danida and started Kenya Institute of Special Education. It is exiting to be a Danish organization, which is now standing on the shoulders of this work. When we come, the locals say “We remember when doctor Kristensen was here. We remember his dreams… '

Picture at the top: Project coordinator Irene Shayo during a seminar in Singida in central Tanzania.

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