Developing schools without barriers

“Ma’am, may I please go to the toilet?” or “Can I go play outside?” are usually innocuous requests by most schoolchildren. Barriers to accessibility Several barriers impede the participation of CWD in accessing educational opportunities such as inaccessible school buses; inaccessible facilities in schools ; and inappropriate infrastructure in classrooms. At training programmes conducted by UN-Habitat India and IIT Kharagpur recently, school teachers and special educators said that accessible infrastructure within schools, such as ramps or tactile paths, are either in deficit or have not been constructed utilising suitable materials. Through interactive training sessions and simulation exercises that encourage empathy-building, more than 400 participants, including children, school faculty and staff, were informed about different types of disabilities among children and the specific barriers experienced in different infrastructure zones of a school. A multi-pronged participatory approach towards providing an enabling environment for the empowerment of future citizens is needed to ensure that stakeholders in the school ecosystem collectively work towards promoting accessibility and inclusion in schools.