Inclusion, exclusion and underachievement: what might be done in Scotland?

Throughout the world, there is an increased awareness of variations in the quality educational provision available to different groups of children. Some children with additional support needs and those living in poverty are amongst the most disadvantaged in education and these disadvantages are often intergenerational. Many of these concerns have been highlighted by recent international comparisons of educational outcomes (OECD, 2007) and children's well-being (UNICEF, 2007), which ask serious questions about education in Scotland.

This presentation will locate recent developments in inclusive practice and additional support needs in a broader discussion about the need to educate all children more effectively than we may have done in the past. In particular it will explore the ways in which some schools have been able to increase children's participation in a relevant and meaningful educational process. Central to this task is a focus on what teachers and other adults who work in schools need to know and be able to do.

A series of key questions will be addressed:

• Why is there such a long tail of underachievement in Scotland?

• What are there institutional barriers to participation and achievement?

• What can be done to foster learning, achievement and participation?

Martyn Rouse is Professor and Director of the Inclusive Practice Project at the University of Aberdeen.

Previously he was a senior lecturer in education at the University of Cambridge and Director of Studies for Education at St Catharine's College, Cambridge.

He was a teacher for 16 years in London and also worked for a local authority advisory service.

He has undertaken commissioned research and development work for local authorities in the UK and for several national and international agencies, including the European Agency for Special Needs Education and UNICEF.

Recent international work includes the Schools for All Project in the Republic of Latvia for the British Council/European Social Fund and the Inclusive Practice Project in the Republic of Georgia for UNICEF as well as work in Armenia.

He co-ordinated a Department for International Development (DFID) project with the Kenyan Ministry of Education designed to build educational capacity at the local level so that more disabled children can attend school and has worked with colleagues from the Universities of Cambridge, Edinburgh and Oxford on RECOUP a five year project funded by the British Government looking at the ways in which education can help to reduce poverty in Ghana, India, Kenya and Pakistan.

He has carried out research on the role, identity and status of teachers of special educational needs and is chair of the steering group for the HMIE review of provision for pupils with dyslexia in Scotland.

He has published widely on additional support needs and inclusion and is a well-known speaker on these issues nationally and internationally. He is the co-author of Achievement and Inclusion in Schools published by Routledge in 2007.