Hablar sobre educación inclusiva hoy supone todo un reto dada la complejidad e incertidumbre que marcan el devenir de la sociedad actual. Sociedad del conocimiento, de la información, pero también una sociedad competitiva que genera nuevas brechas sociales entre aquellos grupos que por distintas razones no pueden competir en igualdad de condiciones. La diversidad es un rasgo y un reto de esta sociedad, las palabras equidad, justicia social, deben marcar las respuestas socioeducativas que permitan a todas las personas. De ahí el sentido de esta publicación, en la que se recogen aportaciones que surgen de la práctica de profesionales, que desde distintos países aportan visiones, experiencias y propuestas de actuación. El documento se configura en torno a 6 ejes temáticos: Intervención educativa, intervención social, formación del profesorado para la inclusión, la incorporación de las TIC, percepciones y cultura inclusiva, y por último una visión de la inclusión desde el ámbito internacional.

La idea de situar a la escuela como motor social, hace recaer sobre la misma una responsabilidad que debe ser asumida con rigor y con valentía por parte de los distintos sectores que conviven en el contexto escolar.La Inclusión es tarea de todos, precisamente una de las claves de este proceso se sitúa en lo coral que deben ser todas las decisiones y acciones orientadas a conseguir y mantener contextos inclusivos. De ahí que palabras como colaboración, convivencia, reconocimiento, corresponsabilidad, son ideas que definen el proceso, siempre en marcha, siempre inacabado, hacia la inclusión. Desde el mismo momento que pensamos que hay personas o grupos que pueden ser excluidos, discriminados, que desde parámetros de justicia social es necesario orientar acciones para evitar esa segregación, estamos dando el primer paso hacia la inclusión. Si solo nos planteamos la inclusión como una meta, si pensamos en la dificultad de conseguir los recursos y que por ello no podemos avanzar, si nos quedamos en la idea que la inclusión es costosa desde el punto de vista económico. Estaremos quedándonos en las puertas.Desarrollar prácticas inclusivas, supone creatividad, iniciativa, empatía, confianza, cooperación, formación. El recurso principal es la propia persona. Transformar la realidad educativa, tiene un primer paso: transformar las “cabezas” de las personas implicadas: profesorado, familias, agentes sociales e instituciones. Sin olvidar en ningún momento la participación y el protagonismo del alumnado.La realidad está ahí, no es solo un bonito sueño. Basta con extender el brazo para alcanzarla. Pero ¡Alarga el brazo de una vez! No esperes que llegue sin tu participación, sin tu esfuerzo, sin tu implicación, sin tu compromiso. Y sí, claro está, también con tus sueños y tu esperanza.Este libro pretende acercarse a la realidad de la inclusión, abriendo puertas. Para ello desde un primer bloque de corte más reflexivo, en los siguientes se afrontarán realidades inclusivas desde distintos focos: la diversidad cultural, la diversidad funcional. Y, en este mundo marcado por las tecnologías, no podemos dejar de lado hablar sobre la aportación desde ese ámbito al proceso inclusivo.

This book documents and disseminates experiences from a wide range of universities, across the five continents, which showcase how the principles of sustainable development may be incorporated as part of university programmes, and present transformatory projects and programmes, showing how sustainability can be implemented across disciplines. Sustainability in a higher education context is a fast growing field. Thousands of universities across the world have signed declarations or have committed themselves to integrate the principles of sustainable development in their activities: teaching, research and extension, and many more will follow.

The book is based on the exchange of professional experiences which featured in an IUCN CEC workshop in August 2002. Practitioners from around the world shared their models of good practice and explored the challenges involved in engaging people in sustainability. The difficulties facing practitioners vary between country and context but some challenges are universal: A lack of clarity in communicating what is meant by sustainable development; An ambition to educate everyone to bring about a global citizenship; Social, organisational or institutional factors constrain change to sustainable development, yet there is an emphasis on formal education, and community educators do not receive the same support; A lack of balance in addressing the integration of environmental, social and economic dimensions leading to an interpretation that ESD is mainly about environment and conservation issues; New learning (rather than teaching) approaches are called for to promote more debate in society. Yet, few are trained or experienced in these new approaches. Practitioners need support to explore new ways of promoting learning. [Foreword, ed].

Despite consistent improvements in the school systems of over recent years, there are still too many children who miss out. It is not only children from disadvantaged backgrounds attending hard-pressed urban schools that the system is failing - even in the most successful schools there are often groups of learners whose experience of schooling is less than equitable. As a result of their close involvement with a group of schools serving a predominantly working-class community over five years, the authors of this book offer an analysis of how marginalisation within schools can arise, and provide suggestions for responding to this crucial policy agenda. They propose a teacher-led inquiry strategy that has proved to be effective in moving forward thinking and practice within individual schools. However, their research has shown that using the same strategy for system change is problematic within a policy context that emphasises competition and choice. Learning from this experience, the authors analyse the factors that inhibit the collaborative approach needed to reduce inequities that exist between the schools, in order to formulate proposals that can move the system as a whole towards more equitable provision. In Developing Equitable Education Systems, the authors focus on the way teachers’ sense of ‘fairness’ can become a powerful starting point, helping individual schools to inquire into and develop their own practice and provision. They provide practical suggestions for practitioners about ways of working that can create a greater sense of equity within particular school contexts, and highlight the barriers to a wider strategy for reducing system inequities that reside in local and national policies and traditions. At a time when government policies in many countries move to extend the diversity of educational provision - for example, through the introduction of charter schools in the USA, free schools in Sweden and academies in England - the authors also include a set of recommendations that offer a timely warning against the fragmentation of school systems in the misguided belief that competition benefits all children. They suggest that a more sensible approach would be to avoid situations whereby the improvement of one school leads to a decline in the resources available to, and subsequently the performance of, others.

Faculty across disciplines want to provide equitable and inclusive classrooms to support all students, but they are overwhelmed by the content they must cover and have no time to address equity and inclusion in their teaching. Equity and inclusion need not be seen as extra work but as important objectives that guide curriculum development. This book provides strategies to create a more purposeful, intentional curriculum that addresses equity and inclusion across disciplines without compromising content. We bring together practical lesson plans and instructional options that faculty can use and adapt to deliver content in a way that is mindful of inclusion and equity.