The Attitude of University Students with Special Educational Needs to the Inclusive Environment at Their University

Abstract Introduction: In order to build a quality inclusive environment (not only in education) it is not enough to have material and personal capacity. The students themselves also need to be included via quality assessment of this environment. Research focused on the attitudes of university students with special educational needs (SEN students) towards the inclusive environment quality at a specific educational institution in Slovak conditions has never been done before. Methods: The research team aimed to identify SEN students’ attitude (N=20) to the quality of inclusive university environment. To maintain anonymity, university will not be specified; as for students, only their degree of study and gender will be listed instead of their age (65% were females). An attitudinal questionnaire developed by the authors was used to identify how the respondents perceived the quality of inclusion in the respective university environment. Results: SEN students’ attitudes show the highest score in emotional components (AM=3.607; SD=0.602). Additionally, there is a statistically significant relation between their attitudes and the coordinator’s work quality. A statistically significant difference was measured between the attitudes of those SEN students who were satisfied with the work of their coordinator and those who were not (p-value 0.008). We noted a strong deviation in favour of the satisfied students. Discussion: SEN students generally perceive the inclusive environment at the faculties at which they are currently studying as positive, which can result from the fact that coordinators are appointed specifically to cater to their needs. A distance course has also been created to improve the inclusive environment for students; it helps to improve the effectiveness of communications between coordinators and students, and quickly resolve any issues related to education. Limitations: Both the size of the research sample and the fact that the survey was conducted at only a single university were limiting factors. Thus, we cannot generalize our findings to the entire university SEN student population nor to all Slovak universities. Conclusions: In the conditions of the institution in question no research of this nature has ever been done before. In order to increase the internal quality of the school environment a reflection on the inclusive environment quality from SEN students is necessary. Looking forward, we recommend carrying out a more detailed observation of the inclusive environment quality in relation to the coordinator for students with special educational needs (hereinafter SSEN coordinator), their work quality and expertise.