Inclusive Education into Mainstream Primary Education: A Comparative Study between Malaysia and Bangladesh

Abstract

This study primarily attempts to compare primary education system between Bangladesh and Malaysia and then compares government initiatives of both countries to integrate special needs children into main stream primary education. Literature review and secondary data were used for this comparison. Findings show that student enrolment rate in both countries is almost same. But there are significant differences in the drop-out rate, infrastructure and government-budget. The percentage of boys’ enrolment is higher than girls’ in Malaysia but girls enrollment is a little higher in Bangladesh. Girls generally outperform boys in Malaysia but in Bangladesh boys perform better. Teachers-pupil ratio is 1:12.6 for Malaysia but it is very high 1:50 in bangladesh.  The Government of Malaysia has taken different measures such as incentives for special needs children and teachers as per head count, allocation of special budgets for facilities improvement and accomodation, supplying of available teachers and special needs students’ friendly infrastructure. In Bangldesh, the Government has made the policy and  instructed school management to be supportive towards special needs children. But the Government effort can be considered as planning stage rather than implementation. The Government is also planned to recruit teachers with special needs training but no effective initiative is visible.  Comparing to Malaysia, Bangladesh has to face many challenges to reach to the stage where Malaysia is now. The identified issues need further attention of the researchers and policymakers to be clarified.

Key words: inclusive education, Primary education, Malaysia