The school’s role in the process of lifelong education of people with intellectual disabilities

The dissemination of pro-inclusive changes in the system of Polish education promotes the flexibility of its existing offer - organizational, programmatic, and in terms of support, making it more adequate towards the needs and abilities of the people with intellectual disabilities. However, there are some weaknesses present in their implementation, where their elimination or at least limitation could improve the quality and effectiveness of the integrative education of these people. These weaknesses and, at the same time, priority tasks for the school are primarily associated with the need to “fit” program arrangements to the life needs, expectations, and experiences of students and graduates of pro-inclusive forms and the reorganization of the existing school work and its functioning in the local environment as a (self-) learning organization. Therefore, to avert a shutdown of including (and already included) people with intellectual disabilities into the educational space, we should monitor the pro-inclusive changes taking place, in which the school as an educational and (self-) learning institution will be one of the vital links of this multidimensional process.

The dissemination of pro-inclusive changes in the system of Polish education promotes the flexibility of its existing offer - organizational, programmatic, and in terms of support, making it more adequate towards the needs and abilities of the people with intellectual disabilities. However, there are some weaknesses present in their implementation, where their elimination or at least limitation could improve the quality and effectiveness of the integrative education of these people. These weaknesses and, at the same time, priority tasks for the school are primarily associated with the need to “fit” program arrangements to the life needs, expectations, and experiences of students and graduates of pro-inclusive forms and the reorganization of the existing school work and its functioning in the local environment as a (self-) learning organization. Therefore, to avert a shutdown of including (and already included) people with intellectual disabilities into the educational space, we should monitor the pro-inclusive changes taking place, in which the school as an educational and (self-) learning institution will be one of the vital links of this multidimensional process.