“Now, ten years later, I think we’re on the right track.” Imane Al-Majali has a daughter, Jumana, with a handicap. Jumana suffers from growth problems and learning difficulties. Even so, Imane wanted her to go to a normal school, with ordinary children. When that didn’t prove possible in Amman, the capital of Jordan, Imane decided to set up her own school.

By now, that school has almost 100 children. It uses teachers who specialise in the education of handicapped children. They do this with speech therapy and with music, drawing and gym lessons. At the same time, they take account of the children without handicaps, so that they also receive the attention they deserve.

Proof of success
Over the years, acceptance has grown, and the mix of normal children and those with a handicap is working well. So well that when the children move on to secondary education, they remain in contact with each other. Former classmates come to the rescue of handicapped children if they’re being teased or discriminated against. That, for Imane, is proof that her mission has been a success.
 
Imane is proud of the parents of the other students, who say their children are developing in a positive way: accepting more responsibility, being more sensitive and wanting to help those weaker than them.

Bureaucracy
The school wasn’t set up without a struggle, though. There was a long bureaucratic process beforehand. But, eventually, Imane received a permit to open a primary school. Then she began a ‘reverse merger’ programme, in which children with learning difficulties were brought together in the same class with normally functioning children.
 
And then, after all the bureaucratic fuss, Imane was confronted with cultural problems: there was little knowledge or awareness of special education in her society. Many families refused to place their ‘normal’ children in the same class as one teaching children with learning difficulties.

“Parents here,” says Imane, “just aren’t used to such an idea. Ten years ago, people thought that these kinds of handicaps or learning difficulties were infectious.”

That’s why Imane began inviting the children of well-educated parents, people with more knowledge and awareness, to attend. In the beginning there were just a few such children in the class and that was mainly because the parents were offered financial benefits.

Microcredit
Imane began her project with a loan of 8000 euros from the Fund for Development and Exploitation. On top of that she had her pension of 4300 euros. But she says the success of her project had less to do with money than with the dominant mentality in society about handicapped children. There are a number of special schools for handicapped children, but no mixed school like Imane’s. That healthy children could attend a class with handicapped children is still, for many people, unacceptable.

Only primary school
Imane thinks it’s a shame her school is only for primary students. When they finish their last year with her, her pupils go on to standard secondary education schooling. That’s why she’s now looking for regular schools that offer time and attention to children with special needs. Although she’s in no financial state to offer secondary education classes, Imane is trying to support her former students in their new schools.

Special teams check up on the children, while Imane herself also tries to find vocational training schools for her former students, to help offer them a better future in that way. Together with the Higher Commission for Semi-Invalids, she’s creating employment for young people with a handicap.

Proud
And after all the difficult years, Imane is extremely proud to say that her daughter Jumana – with whom everything began – is now an assistant to the secretary of her special mixed school and responsible for many administrative tasks.