Department of Special and Social Education

The Department of Special and Social Education at FoE JEPU is a top facility dealing with the promotion of the development of inclusive education in the theoretical and research area, as well as in the area of promoting implementing educational practice.

The first important event in this area was the project on The Path to Inclusion: From Segregation to Positive Diversity in Education, which FoE JEPU worked on between 2014 and 2015. In addition to the research activities, the project mostly aimed at direct support of schools in the area of creating an inclusive educational environment. We implemented internships abroad to inclusive schools in Great Britain and Finland for almost 200 school management employees.

The follow-up project entitled School for All: Inclusion as a Way to Effective Education of All Pupils, solved in 2016-2019, confirmed the position of FoE JEPU as an excellent workplace in the field of promoting the development of inclusive education. Our Faculty became the main bearer of the project and partnered with the Faculty of Education at Charles University in Prague, the Faculty of Education at Masaryk University in Brno, and the People in Need organisation. We supported dozens of schools within the project. The key activities included personnel support of the activity of school counselling departments, a pilot verification of the position of an inclusion coordinator at 23 schools all over the Czech Republic, education and professional guidance for teachers, or coordination of the support for pupils at risk of educational failure. We supported the formation of an inclusive educational environment and implemented internships abroad again, for the teachers of participating schools.

The Department staff, as experts in the field of special and social education, are also involved in other similarly oriented projects run by other entities. The most important one is the individual systemic project of the Office of the Government of the Czech Republic entitled High-Quality and Inclusive Education in Territories with Socially Excluded Localities (2016 – 2022). Some of the other extensive and important projects are, for example, the Regional Action Plan of Education in the Ústí nad Labem Region, Supporting Pupils with Special Needs PROKOM or Education as a Social Exclusion Prevention Tool in the Ústí nad Labem Region, implemented in 2017 – 2019 (2020) by or in cooperation with the Ústí nad Labem Region.

The Faculty has also achieved considerable international success in this area. Between 2012 and 2015, the Faculty staff were involved in the EMPAC international project (Engaging Migrant Parents and Children), which was also supported within the PROGRESS community programme. A team of experts from Great Britain (Borough of Ealing, University of East London), Italy (Municipality of Bologna, University of Bologna) and the Czech Republic (Ústí nad Labem Region, J. E. Purkyně University in Ústí nad Labem) studied the possibilities of supporting the involvement of children at risk of the negative consequences of social exclusion in preschool education.

Between 2017 and 2019, a group of employees of the Faculty of Education participated in the implementation of an important European project entitled ISOTIS – Inclusive Education and Social Support to Tackle Inequalities in Society. The research consortium of the project supported within the prestigious Horizon 2020 programme worked under the supervision of the University of Utrecht (Netherlands) and it included, among others, the University of Oxford (Great Britain), the University of Amsterdam (Netherlands), Trinity College Dublin (Ireland), the University of Porto (Portugal), the University of Warsaw (Poland), the University of Oslo (Norway), Masaryk University (Czech Republic), Université Paris-Est Créteil Val-de-Marne (France) and others. Once again, the central theme of the project was the support of inclusive education, involvement of groups of people at risk of social exclusion in education and tackling inequalities in education.

Partnership with students is an important topic to us. Therefore, teams of selected students also worked in all the aforesaid project under the supervision of our academic staff.

The experience acquired within the implementation of the projects and long-term cooperation with schools and other institutions led to the foundation of the Centre for Social Innovation and Inclusion in Education, which the Department of Special and Social Education closely cooperates with. The Centre is a completely unique workplace within the Czech Republic. Its activity focuses on the support of the development of inclusive education and other modern trends related to the crucial social aspects of education.

And last, but not least, the Department of Special and Social Education is also considered to be an excellent workplace in the field of working with children with a serious social deviation (behavioural disorders).

FOR ERASMUS STUDENTS

Erasmus Coordinator

Mgr. Jaroslav Říčan, Ph.D.

Address: Hoření 13, 400 96, Ústí nad Labem (Office No. 206)

E-mail: Jaroslav.rican@ujep.cz

Tel.: +420 475 282 168

Study subjects in English

KPG/E002 – Multicultural Skills

KPG/E003 – The Basis of Inclusive Education