How various types of disabilities impact children’s school attendance and completion - Lessons learned from censuses in eight developing countries

Disability Types and Children's Schooling in Africa

“…However, disabilities are often defined in a catch-all category and little effort is paid to compare the disability effects across disability types. The exceptions are the studies by Kuper et al (2018) and Luo et al (2020), who reported children with difficulties in seeing or hearing have the least risk of lagging behind in school. They also found children with difficulty in learning, communication, self-care or remembering suffered most from lower school enrolment.…”

“…Equity and inclusion are at the heart of the 2030 SDG Agenda, while disability is associated with an unequal distribution of resources and opportunities. Several earlier multi-country studies have reported huge gaps in school enrolment between children with and without disabilities (Filmer, 2008;UNESCO, 2018;Luo et al, 2020). However, disabilities are often defined in a catch-all category and little effort is paid to compare the disability effects across disability types.…”

“…Earlier studies comparing the school performance of children with disabilities often relied on incompatible disability definitions and measurements and many suffered from data quality issues (Filmer, 2008;UNESCO, 2018;Gottlieb et al, 2009). Mizunoya et al (2018) and Luo et al (2020) deliberately selected data that had been gathered in surveys that had adopted the Washington Group Short Set on Functioning as a tool to identify people with functional difficulties (WG, 2020). However, many survey sources had modified the standard questions to varying degrees, which made direct comparisons questionable.…”

“…These studies have tended to ignore the considerable heterogeneity in how disability is characterized and its impact on schooling outcomes (Anastasiou & Kauffman, 2011). Among the comparison studies in the literature, Luo et al (2020) were one of the first to explore the disability gaps in school enrolment and school completion rates by considering the heterogeneity by disability type and gender. Although they deliberately selected eight national censuses between 2006 and 2012 that applied the WG-SS, most the censuses only used part of the standard questions.…”

Trials and Tribulations of Collecting Evidence on Effectiveness in Disability-Inclusive Development: A Narrative Review

“…For example, children with intellectual disabilities are often the most excluded, and arguably among the most complex to include in education. In contrast, children with visual impairments often fare better and inclusion may be more straightforward [29]. Violence is a major concern for all people with disabilities, [30] but women and girls may be at particularly high risk.…”