Changing our story: The Pursuit of Inclusive Education

While plans for inclusive education are often ambitious, practice is usually recalcitrant. The project ‘Changing our story: The Pursuit of Inclusive Education’ contributes to the knowledge and professionalisation of inclusive education in the Czech Republic, Slovakia, the Netherlands and Ghana. Research group Inclusive Education supervised the research and students in the Netherlands.

With tailor-made activities and a practical approach, the team aims to provide insight into the challenges and opportunities they face in their organisations and countries. The aim is to come up with solutions and innovative findings that take into account local and cultural contexts.

Using the ‘storytelling’ method, students, education workers and wider communities from these countries aim to rewrite the narrative of inclusive education.

Goals

The project has the following goals:

• Promoting the values and benefits of inclusive education
• Professionalisation of staff members
• Development of training and an information platform
• Becoming skilled in using stories as analytical approaches and tools that take into account local and national contexts
• Engaging students and their community as valuable partners and resources

The results

The project produced an online course, an art exhibition and a documentary.

1. The free online course ‘Inclusion at HE in stories’:
   The Inclusion at HE in stories course is primarily intended for teachers, students and support staff at colleges and universities. However, the course is of interest to anyone interested in the topic of inclusion in higher education. 
   
   In the course, you will find many stories documenting the phenomenon of inclusive education in higher education, especially in the Netherlands, the Czech Republic and Slovakia. The course is based on the principles of sharing, inspiring and reflecting. You will explore the benefits of inclusive learning environments, as well as the challenges and concrete proposals for solutions.
   
   Click here to join the free online course!
    
2. The art exhibitions: Changing Our Story
   In spring 2024, exhibitions were held in Pilsen (Czech Republic), The Hague and Nitra (Slovakia) that deal with changing the future through story inclusion. Can passing on our own experiences contribute to change? Can we use our stories to help shape what inclusion is and what it means to us?
   
   The exhibitions reflected on the development of inclusion in society and in the field of education. Moreover, inclusion was presented through personal stories and experiences. 
3. Documentary:
   The documentary (by director John Akerman Ozguc) tells the story of the journey of collaborative learning and the actual progress of the project, including all its triumphs and pitfalls.

Collaborative learning

This is an Erasmus+ project in which - besides The Hague University of Applied Sciences - higher education institutions from the Czech Republic, Slovakia and Ghana also cooperated.

Read more

https://changingourstory.eu/