This article appears as part of the Lessons to Learn newsletter.

Earlier this week, a new report declared that the majority of pupils with additional support needs are being failed… and nobody was surprised.

So, in today’s newsletter, I’m going to try to explain what has gone so very, very wrong with inclusion in Scottish education.

First, an important starting point: the idea (and ideal) of presumed inclusion is absolutely correct, because we absolutely should strive to ensure that what we regard as ‘mainstream’ spaces become ever more accommodating to the full spectrum of needs and experiences in our society.

It is surely self-evident that, so far as possible, young people with additional support needs deserve to receive a full and enriching educational experience alongside their peers – after all, why would they have any less of a right to that than everyone else?

It’s also better for our society as a whole to normalise the existence of the huge range of different needs that people have, and to expand our experiences of the generally small but often transformative adaptations that make inclusion possible. That’s as true of the adult world as it is of schools, by the way.

Lessons to Learn | The state of Scotland's colleges – things can only get worse?

Ultimately, adopting inclusion as the starting point of your decision making is the only logical and ethical choice. The alternative is a presumption that some........

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