Imagining and reimagining the future of special and inclusive education

Abstract

“Reimagination” is required to create a new vision of education that better serves individuals with disabilities. Imagination is a way of conceiving possibilities and probabilities. The future of special education is imagined within the limits of possibility and probability of “appropriate” education for children with special educational needs and disabilities. Education is reimagined for full inclusion without special education and an alternative reimagination of inclusive special education. Particular attention is given to the administrative structure of public education and to the training of teachers for the imagined approaches to special education. The importance of imagining special and inclusive education being based on science and rationality and the limitations of proposed approaches to including students with disabilities in education are explained.