Needs of children with disabilities

Educational attention to children with disabilities varies due to the lack of well-defined services.  According to information from the 2000 national census, the number of people in Baja California Sur with some kind of handicap was 6,835, of which 66.7% are children and young people.[1] The main handicaps are motor, visual, mental, auditory, and language disabilities.

Special education is provided in four types of educational facilities.  In regular school and in an integrated manner, services are provided to: 969 students in pre-school; 3,531 in primary school; and 344 students attend secondary school (these special education units are registered under 273 primary schools or 46.3% of public schools).  In multiple care centers throughout the state, there are fourteen educational establishments where 680 students are registered that due to their specific conditions, cannot be registered in a regular school.  132 students with disabilities attend pre-school courses in the Centers of Psycho-Pedagogical Care.  Finally, the Resource Information Centers are the backbone of Special Education.  Their role is to guide parents through the special education system and help support each family regarding their specific disability.  At the beginning of the 2003-2004 school year, 1,300 students were looked after at these centers.[2] 

As seen in the table below, services are currently concentrated in La Paz and in primary schools.  This will change with the advent of a statewide contract to accelerate the process for services to the disabled.  Training, orthopedic equipment, and infrastructure improvements, such as bars, ramps and adaptive playgrounds, will be prioritized through a new state-sponsored program.  Nonprofit organizations are taking the lead, with assistance from state agencies and the Family Development Agency (DIF) in each municipality; a new association of social service organizations will help coordinate activities.  In addition, job training workshops, clinics, and medical services will be incorporated.[3]   

Source:  Secretary of Public Education in BCS. Department of Information Systems and Statistics.

* -Corresponds to a pilot program based in La Paz that was expanded to other municipalities in 2004.

**-Information validated by the State Information Center.

Private schools do not have the capacity to respond adequately to students with special education needs, particularly the mentally disabled. Only a single private institution in the city of La Paz tackles integrated education for the mentally challenged or disabled, applying the Montessori System; this school has had significant results in stimulating the abilities of these students.  Nevertheless, because of the method (Montessori only serves small groups) and the high cost, this system is only affordable to a very small sector of the special-needs population and for that matter, it is only available in La Paz.  This situation must be addressed so that families with special needs can access appropriate education, training, and care for their children.

In order to integrate special education students into mainstream social and working life, it is critical to increase their academic success before introducing them to a working atmosphere that may be hostile and discriminatory.  The Baja California Sur Institute for Attention to Disabled Persons (Instituto Sudcaliforniano de Atención a Personas con Discapacidad) promotes recruiting handicapped people for employment, as well as informing families about government programs that offer productive employment to this segment of the population. Still, a lack of opportunities remains for disabled people who want training to become effective in the workplace.