Equal and Inclusive Education as a Prevailing Challenge to the Right to Education

Abstract

The role of education is indisputable in our culture. From the moment we are born we are constantly learning new information and skills. Education has such an importance that we recognize it as a part of human rights. Nobody disputes that children have the right to education. The second article of the universal declaration of human rights declares that rights should create conditions for equality. Therefore education should be equal for all children. Nevertheless, is this the reality in all cases? In Slovakia for example, (but also in many other countries in the world) we have plenty of problems with inclusive education. Sociologist Zuzana Kusá argues that in Slovakia there is a trend to separate the children which are deemed "normal" from the disadvantaged and to create special classes for the latter group. The right to education should involve inclusion and should create cooperative conditions for the learning of children. Slovakia is one of the countries that do not provide a cohesive inclusion of all children. Therefore, we shall examine the current state of the right to education and analyze how we could improve its deficiencies. We will use the concept of affirmative action (positive discrimination) as presented by Michael Sandel in the title "Justice. What´s the right thing to do?" The second concept that we will examine is the concept of equality of opportunity, as presented by John Rawls and others. We will investigate how these two concepts might help us with an improvement of the right to education and how they could fix some of the prevailing issues for example faced in Slovakia´s educational system.