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 * Managing change in an intergrated school- a Hong Hong hybrid experience.** Pattie Luk Fong Yuk Yee (2005)

Many schools in Hong Kong started integrating students with special needs in their regular classrooms, following a world-wide trend to include pupils with special needs in the regular classrooms. This article presents a case study about a school in Hong Kong that decided to follow the mentioned trend. The unique thing about this study is that it wants to show how the school was able to do this combinig east and west: the idea of integrating students with special needs into regular classes came from the west but this school did it while maintaining the east traditions. Slee (2003, p. 14) says that "Inclusion is not about disability. It is about educational reconstruction, about school reform and social change". This requires shift of policy focus; instead of focusing on special education for pupils with special needs, the focus is on answering to the diversity within one school for all students. In the last twenty years, in Hong Kong there has been an increase in integrating the disabled into the regular schools and the community. For such project to succeed, the author recommends a whole school approach: all stakeholders need to be prepared for such a big change because it could be a very heavy emotional stain on everybody involved: teachers, students with special needsand students without special needs, parents and staff as well. The most important reform document, "The educational blueprint for the 21st century" (Education Commission, 2000) emphesizes the importance of education and life-long learning for all pupils and the schools have to allow the pupils to develop each according to his own strenghs and characteristics. Hong Kong is unique in that it has the British system well grounded in a society that is mostly Chinese(98% of population are from Chinese ancesrty). So you have Western system with traditional Chinese society. Parents in Hong Kong want their children to learn in prestigious primary schools which use English as a teaching language. The result of this is that only well-off families are able to afford prestigious kindergartens which are affiliated with prestigious primary schools. The present paper was a case study which lasted two years 2000-2002. This project is an answer to obtain more information about the process of including students with special needs in regular classes after the pilot project which was funded by the government in 1997-1999. Both observations and interviews were used. The goal was to find out any new insights, understanding, relationships and cocepts rather than assuming the old hypotheses( Merriam,1988). The school chosen is a government school which believes in the whole person development and not just the accademic development. the accademic level of the pupils is low and they have many behavior problems in some of the classes. Most parents have low socio-economic status.The whole school was observed and key people such as the parents, principal, vice-principal and the nine students with disabilities(who were also studied thoroughly) were interviewed. The research questions were: 1) what are the specific features of the change process as school try to move in the direction of integration? 2)How is the idea of integration/ inclusion being understood in Hong Kong? 3) To what extend do these processes mirror the Western intergration literature?

This research found that the change process required is full of emotion and that teachers learn through practice which means that they need to be better prepared for such a big change. Change also takes time and it should be gradual. The research also found that the school adopted a policy which treats all pupils the same rather than according to their individual needs. This means that all pupils were given the same curriculum and sat for the same exams. At the same time, the school welcomed and accepted any voluntary help it could get from a trained teacher or from the parents, so they were adapting their policy as needed. Since all pupils were given the same curriculum, parents of pupils with disabilities had to make up for the gaps in their kids' learning, at home, which caused a lot of stress, hard work and pain for them and for their children. The research also found that the biggest change that needed to be made was in attitude and in caring (parents and personnel). Teachers' caring was found to be a key element for the success of such a project. In the future, the diversity of pupils, their individual needs, strenghs and weaknesses should be taken into cosideration in planning the teaching in an integrated school. Parents, teachers and staff should be educated that each individual is unique. My opinion: I believe that integtaring pupils with special needs in regular classrooms is a wonderfull idea. It is also a learning experience for parties involved but each case or pupil with special needs should be studied thoroughly before in order to fing out if and how he can be integrated. I agree with the author that educatind all stakeholders is a must and that change should be done gradually. Another big change that needs to take place, I did not see it mentioned in the article, is the physical change of the school building that is the building itself: elivators, special bathrooms, access to all classrooms and labs. Most importantly more work is needed on the teachers skills for such a project to succeed. I would like to add few important points that were written by my peers, I agree with Mdalali's comment that it is of extreme importance to work on changing the attitude of all concerned parties regarding pupils with special needs and that can happen only through education and patience.Mdallali and Lanna also added that integrating pupils with disabilities into regular classes may not be successful in ALL subjects, depending on the level of that child's disability. This point of consideration may, had it been used in the schoolthat was studied in Hong Kong, may have eased some of the pressure and frustration kids and their parents felt. Rana asked a very valid question regarding testing kids with disability. I think that integrating pupils with special needs in regular classes is a wonderful idea yet very challenging for all parties, therefore there is no need to add stress by testing them the same as pupils without disabilities. I would like to conclude by saying that in general it is a great idea but we, the education system with all its people, have still a lot of learning to do but most importantly a lot of educating and changing in attitude to do.