4 Students with Disabilities: Education access and implications for cognitive ju (4/7) -- Disabilities in Haitian Schools

4 Students with Disabilities: Education access and implications for cognitive justice Samuel Régulus | Abstract/Rezime This paper discusses preliminary results on the data collected (from 2018 to 2019). Marco’s story illustrates an emotional reality and establishes a relation between cognitive justice and disability in the school system. The analysis also allows us to conclude that children with disabilities as well as their parents are victims of grave symbolic violence and stigma. It shows that if necessary, measures are not taken, this unfair situation will strengthen social injustice and increase the gap between privileged children and underprivileged children, regardless of their social profile. Atik sa a itilize istwa Marco, ki se yon jèn k ap viv ak yon andikap depi li tou piti. Li mete aksan sou pwoblèm lenjistis konyitif, lenjistis sosyal ak esklizyon nan zafè lekòl. Analiz yo pèmèt nou di – timoun k ap viv ak andikap yo ansanm ak paran yo, viktim vyolans senbolik ak estigmatizasyon ki grav anpil. Mo-kle: jistis konyitif, lenjistis sosyal, edikasyon enklizif, aprantisaj ekitab, andikap | Introduction Cognitive justice is based on the understanding that there exists a plurality of knowledge and the right of these different forms of knowledge to coexist in dialogue outside any hegemonic framework of dependence. It was coined by the Indian scholar Shiv Visvanathan in 1997 to question the absolute dominance of modern science and to propose the search for alternative paradigms, particularly those derived from indigenous forms of knowledge (Makoelle, 2014). It is articulated around a paradigm that seeks to reconstruct the conceptual systems governing models of humanity and different ways of being, while acknowledging and respecting the knowledge system of each individual and each community. In education, cognitive justice is concerned with the lack of knowledge about the backgrounds and cultures of individual learners, which constitutes an alienating process that deprives children of their rights and disadvantages them epistemologically (Odora Hoppers, 2015). It therefore advocates the availability of educational infrastructure and resources that can facilitate learners’ development individually and collectively so that they can be sufficiently equipped to meet both specific and general needs, in both local and global contexts. Without discrimination and exclusion, learning must be an emancipatory process in which local knowledge systems are recognized and integrated into the teaching and learning process in order to make the learning outcomes of the environment interact with external data. In Haiti, the school system seems to be entirely oblivious, even in theory, to the notions of cognitive justice, inclusive education, school inclusion, equitable learning and critical pedagogy. In its modes of operation, it seems that this educational system does not much care that it tends to replicate the cultural and social injustices that plague Haiti