Following the amendment of the special education law in Israel: perception of the educational setting and parental mental health and stress

ABSTRACT

Empowering parents of children with special needs emerges from supporting their decision-making processes and choices regarding the child's placement through legislation. The latest amendment of the Special Education Law in Israel aims to ensure the inclusion of students with special needs in the general education system, granting parents the option to decide on their child’s placement, and allocating budgets in accordance with the ‘funding follows the child’ principle. The purposes of this study were to investigate the differences in levels of satisfaction from the educational setting between the pre- and post-amendment groups, the differences in levels of parental stress, well-being and distress between the groups, and to predict parental well-being and distress. Parents completed an online survey, measuring parental satisfaction from the child's educational setting, mental health, and parental stress. Parents in the post amendment group believed that the educational setting was more suited to the child and contributed to the child academically, emotionally, and socially on a higher level compared to parents from the pre-amendment group. They also reported lower levels of distress than the pre-amendment group. Findings suggest the amendment promotes family-school system relationships, leading to higher levels of satisfaction and mental health and lower levels of stress.

KEYWORDS:

• Special needs
• legislation
• mental health
• stress
• empowerment

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Esther Isman

Dr. Esther Isman is the head of the Teacher Training Program in Special Education in Bar Ilan University, Israel. She is a senior lecturer in the special education track and directs the practicum. She has 30 years of experience in the field of inclusion of children with special needs, both in academia and the Ministry of Education. Her research focuses on inclusion of children with special needs and the relationships between cognitive modifiability and emotional factors, language and thinking skills.

Avital Laufer

Dr. Avital Laufer was the Dean of Behavioral Science at Netanya Academic College for the last three years. For ten years she was the vice mayor of Netanya, a major city in Israel, and served as the head of the local education system. Her studies deal with trauma and major life crises. She has published numerous studies in high-quality academic journals.