In Chinese Schools Disabled Get Shortchanged Summary

The article, In Chinese Schools, Disabled Get Shortchanged, was published in The New York Times and written by Lara Farrar, who is a journalist with a great deal of experience in China; she has been in Shanghai since 2008, first studying in Fudan University and then working for a Chinese media company. The article focuses on the education system for people with disabilities in China.

Farrar claims that people with disabilities in China get shortchanged because they do not receive equitable access to higher education, have limited career future, do not receive inclusion education, lack specific laws, and lack well-trained special education teachers. She provides interviews with education experts, lawyers, and people with disabilities, and she

Farrar first cites a boy, Mike, from Beijing, as an example, to give the idea that as a person with disability– blindness– he may not have access to a higher education, or even a high school (Lara Farrar, 2014). Because he does not have special assistance in class, he can hardly learn in the school or finish his exams (Lara Farrar, 2014). This leads to him gaining little in the school and was “practically shut out from higher education,” and even high school (Lara Farrar, 2014). Thus, Mike’s mother thinks that there is no way for him to have access to higher education in China (Lara Farrar, 2014). Later in the article, the author contends that many experts in the field believe that, “the Chinese government, despite some progress, is not doing enough to ensure that people with disabilities have equitable access to higher education — or really any education at all” (Lara Farrar, 2014). Then the author gives the idea the government does not offer fair access for people with disabilities to enroll in universities (Lara Farrar, 2014). While all students need to take a physical exam, which can directly test whether students have disabilities, the government also provides guidelines to universities, showing which types of disabilities may lead students to be unable to complete their education (Lara Farrar, 2014). As Human Rights Watch said, these are seen as “a clear

While the Chinese government put a large amount of money into “developing a separate special-education system, from primary-school level to college,” which means that two systems “exist in parallel and rarely interact,” the US government emphasizes much inclusion education at all levels (Lara Farrar, 2014). The author then cites Human Rights Watch saying that these special schools, which is lack trained teachers, far from students’ home, and preventing students back to mainstream, to give the idea that separated education makes people get shortchanged (Lara Farrar, 2014). However, it’s problematic as well. Firstly, the inclusion education, like Education for All, is not always good, and has its pitfalls such as ignoring specific context, not focusing on higher education and having hidden costs (Phillips, D., & Schweisfurth, M., 2007). Secondly, comparative education need knowledge about education systematically so as to understand other nations, studying how national context— historical , economic, and cultural— shapes their education, detailed research, and etc (Phillips, D., & Schweisfurth, M., 2007). However, the author ignored these knowledge so that the comparison does not seem persuasive. Thirdly, inclusion education need teachers to have enough training and background knowledge (Roy and Roxas, 2011). For example, refugee students always receive and have