‘SENitizing’ migrant children in inclusive settings: exploring the impact of the Salamanca Statement thinking in Italy and the United States

ABSTRACT

This paper emphasizes the aporetic nature of the Salamanca Statement on Special Needs Education (UNESCO, 1994), adopting a cross-cultural perspective. It draws on an intersectional perspective on inclusion (Connor, Ferri & Annamma, 2016; Artiles & Kozleski, 2016; Erevelles, 2014) to argue that although inclusion has been defined by such an international declaration as a transformative project to ensure access to quality education for all students, national inclusive policies are still focused on a pathological construction of student difference,  slowly incorporating children from different linguistic and ethnic backgrounds. The focus on Italy and the United States is a response to examine the discourses and practices of inclusion in two countries that have been impacted by the Salamanca Statement thinking. To substantiate our argument concerned with the limitations embedded in the Salamanca Statement, data from two empirical studies conducted in Rome and in Upstate New York will be presented. The studies show how inclusion leads to overrepresentation of migrant students in Special Educational Needs. We conclude that the Salamanca Statement has been transferred into a tool to strengthen normality against difference, and that it should focus on interrupting micro-exclusions for groups sitting at the intersections of race, ability and other identity markers.

KEYWORDS:

• Inclusive education
• Special Educational Needs
• migrant children
• policy
• Salamanca

Acknowledgement

We would like to thank all the participants for taking their time from their busy schedule to participate in both studies. To all the educators, health professionals, teachers, social workers, cultural mediators and refugee youth in Rome, and the teachers in Upstate New York, without you the research would have not been possible.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

ORCID

Valentina Migliarini http://orcid.org/0000-0002-0823-9847

Chelsea Stinson http://orcid.org/0000-0002-7346-387X

Simona D’Alessio http://orcid.org/0000-0002-5390-7090

Notes

1 English as a New Language is the term for English language instruction mandated for students who are identified as having limited English proficiency per New York State ELL-identification processes. Many migrant children in New York State are entitled to ENL instruction in accordance with CR Part 154 (NYSED 2015a).