Abstract
Nigeria like many former colonial African countries has come to realize the importance of equalizing educational opportunities for all. Before now disabled Nigerians were neglected because of societal attitude, beliefs and misconceptions. Government policy statements ushered in charge although still insignificant. The family and the community groups have been identified as important in the education of disabled persons. This paper puts into research focus the "Barrier factors in Effective participation of the Family and community groups in the Education of Disabled Nigerians". Five research questions guided the study. The instrument for data collection were based on an open - ended questionnaire and interview. The subjects used for the study are 1000, combing family members and community groups.
The study was carried out in fifteen local Government Areas of three states. Data were analysed using mean and t statistics. Using a survey approach the paper reports and identifies funds, personnel, societal attitude and lack of seriousness on the part of government as barrier factors for effective participation of family and community groups in the education of disabled persons. Based on the findings the paper recommends mounting awareness campaign directed towards a change in attitude and governmental support through proper funding and implementation of policy statements among others.
Background of the Study
Nigeria is a country in West Africa. It is bounded in the North by Niger in the South by Atlantic Ocean, in the West by Benin and in the East, by Cameroun. It has a total population of about 100 million people. The estimated total number of disabled persons the world over is about 400 millions, ten percent of the world population (Stunbery 1974; Newell, 1977). This figure according to Achalu (1992), is equivalent to nearly the combined population of the United States and the Soviet Union. According to World Health Organization (W.H.O) estimate, one out of every ten persons in the world may be disabled at any one time (W.H.O. Report, 1976). Although no census of the disabled persons has been carried out in Nigeria but statistics extrapolated from information supplied by states suggest roughly 10,000,000 for the whole country. This figure, approximates a disability rate of about ten percent of the country total population.
Nigeria like many former colonial African countries has come to realize the importance of education in the all-round development of the individual. The realization of the above, made government to adopt education as instrument par excellence for individual and national development (National Policy on Education, N.P.E., 1981). In fact, education constitutes the largest industry of state government in Nigeria. Most state government spend between 30-50 percent of the annual budget in education (Adedoja, 1999). Education is an indispensable tool for integrating both the abled and non-abled individuals into the society. Education enlightens liberates, and prepares one for useful living. The place of education in liberating an individual and in maintaining world peace and understanding has been articulated by the president of the Rotary Club International Kinross. Kinross (1998:43) states that "the strongest weapon on which the world can wield against poverty and hunger and the most powerful tool for world peace is education". Education no doubt liberates and assist individuals to develop their potentials and become better and functional individuals (Okeke, 1996).
Involving families and communities is the recent trend in the education of exceptional persons. The move in this direction observed Ozoji (1993) is because the community is expected to participate more actively in service provision for exceptional persons as it has done for the majority of others. Each individual belongs to family system. The family is the most basic institution in our culture and the primary arena in which children learn to interact with their environment. The family is also the transmitter of biological and genetic endowment and a contributor to the psychological strength or vulnerability of its members. The vital place of the family in the development of the individual made Auguste Comte the famous French Philosopher to say "nature did her best when she bestowed upon mankind the family institution".
Following from the above, the family especially parents often have insight regarding the characteristics and needs of their children which can be helpful in devising treatment and educational programmes (Simpsons and Kamps in Hallahan and Kauffman 1990). The families make up the community. Initiating a change in attitude towards the exceptional persons for instance, seems more effective starting from the community since most of the superstitious beliefs, values and customs that powerfully affect the exceptional persons negatively are rooted in the communities. The above, may have informed the introduction of community-based rehabilitation (CBR) programmes by the World Health Organization (WHO) in 1976. The programme was designed to embrace important issues such as social, economic and education integration. In fact, the objectives of community-based vocational rehabilitation (CBVR) as contained in the speech of Bickersteth (1991 are:
| i) | to discourage street begging among the disabled individuals |
| ii) | to examine in details vocational needs of the disabled and place them with the artisan of their choice within their immediate environment |
| iii) | to help the disable pick a choice career that will be marketable within his immediate environment |
| iv) | to identify various forms of vocational opportunities available for disabled persons in their immediate environment |
| v) | to encourage self-employment where paid employments are not available. |
Thus the C.B.V.R. was designed to provide exceptional persons with the facilities that will restore them as authentic human beings, restoring their dignity and integrity and harnessing their intrinsic and extrinsic potentialities so as to enable them take their rightful places in the society.
Research has demonstrated that the involvement of exceptional person's family as an active participants is crucial to the success of any interaction programme. Without such family involvement, any effect of intervention at least in the cognitive sphere appears to erode fairly rapidly once the programme ends (McConkey, 1985). Buttressing the above, the Warnock Report as quoted by Steel states that the successful education of children with special needs is dependent on the full involvement of their parents … Unless parents are seen as equal partners in the education process, the purpose of our report will be frustrated (Steel, 1991).
Inspite of the cenral place of family/community in the education of exceptional persons, it does appear that Nigerians families/communities do not participate in the education of their special needs persons. What is responsible for this? Could this be traceable to some barrier factors? Could gender be responsible? What general pattern do these factors assume?
Research Questions The following research questions guided the study:
Research Method
Design A survey design was used for the study.
Subjects The subjects for the study were men and women from families/communities from Benue, Kogi, Enugu, Anambra, Imo and Abia States in Nigeria.
Instrument The instrument for data collection was questionnaire which comprised of two sections. Section `A' contained three items which sought information on the personal data of respondents. The questionnaire has eighteen items which were structured on four point scale ranging from strongly agree through strongly disagreed. To ensure high reliability of the instrument, samples of the questionnaire were administered on 50 family/community members randomly selected from states from middle belt and the East. The computation of Pearson Product Moment correlation coefficient yielded a co-efficient of 0.79.
Method of Data Collection The questionnaire was administered by the researcher with the help of the research assistants. The research assistants received instruction for a few days on the administration of the questionnaire.
Method of Data Analysis The data collected were analysed using frequency-count, rank ordering, simple percentage and mean scores. A percentage of 60% and above is considered high while a percentage below 60 is considered low mean of 18 and above is high while below 18 is low.
Results Table 1: Barrier Factors in Families/Communities Participation in the Education of Exceptional Nigerians
| S/N | Barrier factors | Frequncy | Percentage | Rank |
| 1 | Poverty | 340 | 76 | 1st |
| 2 | Beliefs and values of the society | 322 | 72.3 | 2nd |
| 3 | Not enjoying the job ready disbaled | 322 | 73.3 | 2nd |
| 4 | Lack of facilities and infrastructure | 320 | 71.9 | 3rd |
| 5 | Misconception about handicapping conditions | 316 | 71 | 4th |
| 6 | Feeling that diability is individual's problem and not family / community | 314 | 70.5 | 5th |
| 7 | Understanding customs and traditions from our ancestors are sacred and not disputable | 312 | 70 | 6th |
| 8 | Negative attitude of the society | 310 | 69.6 | 7th |
| 9 | Lack of finance | 304 | 68.3 | 7th |
| 10 | Limited access to education | 302 | 67.8 | 9th |
| 11 | Lack of resource persons | 302 | 67.8 | 10th |
| 12 | Lack of access to education | 300 | 67.4 | 10th |
| 13 | Religion | 300 | 67.4 | 10th |
| 14 | Ignorance of the causes of disability | 294 | 66 | 11th |
| 15 | Lack of collaboratipn between government and communities | 238 | 53.4 | 12th |
| 16 | Communities frown at associating with handicapping persons | 225 | 50.7 | 13th |
| 17 | Lack of commitment on the part of the government | 224 | 50.3 | 14th |
| 18 | Lack of trained personnel | 220 | 494 | 15th |
The results on table 1 show that poverty ranks highest among the barrier factors inhibiting families/communities participation in exceptional persons education in Nigeria. Lack of trained personnel ranks the least. Most of the items fall within 60% and above, while a few fall below 60%.
Table 2: Prominent Barrier Factors in Families/Communities Participation in the Education of Exceptional Nigerians
| S/N | Prominent Barrier Factors | Frequncy | Percentage | Rank |
| 1 | Poverty related factors | 322 | 72.1 | 1st |
| 2 | Religious related factors | 300 | 67.4 | 2nd |
| 3 | Societal related factors | 292 | 65.8 | 3rd |
| 4 | Government related factors | 291 | 65.4 | 4th |
| 5 | Education related factors | 285 | 64 | 5th |
The results on table 2 reveals that among the prominent barrier factors in families/communities participation in the education of exceptional Nigerians that poverty ranked first with 72.1% followed by religious related factors, social related factors, government related factors and education related factor with 67.4%, 65.8%, 65.4% and 64% respectively. However all the factors are considered as high.
Table 3: Mean perception of male and female on the Barrier Factors inhibiting Families/Communities participation in the Education of Exceptional Nigerians
| S/N | Barrier Factors | Mean perception of male family/community members | Mean perception of female family/community members | Remark | |
| Male | Female | ||||
| 1 | Poverty related factors | 21.6 | 21.5 | High | High |
| 2 | Religious related factors | 20 | 20 | High | High |
| 3 | Social related factors | 19.6 | 18.75 | High | High |
| 4 | Government related factor | 15.42 | 15.92 | Low | Low |
| 5 | Education related factor | 18.84 | 18.49 | High | High |
The findings of the study reveals that poverty related factors are the most prominent barrier factors inhibiting families/communities participation in the education of exceptional Nigerians. Poverty related factors ranks first among other factors. This is not surprising because most Nigerians are wretched. For instance, in our high ways and streets today, one cannot but notice countless number of both "fit" and "unfit" children and adult begging for alms. Any reflecting persons who see these number of Nigerians begging will only but conclude that government has not done its job. We must remember that a nation is judged not by how the affluent few live but on how it takes care of its less fortunate citizens (Ogbojafor 1995, Okeke, 1999) There is no gain stressing the obvious fact, that the poverty level in Nigeria at the moment is alarming. Although the present government has started with Poverty Alleviation Programmes, the impact is yet to be felt by Nigerians.
The findings also revealed that religious related factors ranks second as the factors that inhibit families/communities participation in the education of exceptional Nigerians. Religious related factors are linked with beliefs and these can be better understood in the social related factor of beliefs and values of the society. Another barrier factor is the social related factors. The African society generally would not want to have anything to do with the disabled because of the superstition surrounding handicapping conditions. In line with the above Meadow (1982) revealed that from the earliest history, handicapped persons have been viewed with a mixture of fear, scorn, awe misunderstanding and pity. Ansahayomoah (1986) confirmed similar attitude toward the handicapped persons among the Akan people of Ghana. Buttressing the above, Adima, Abang, Awanbor, Ladiop and Ogbue (1988), observed that from the days of Aristotle prejudice against the disabled was almost universal and it affected their social, economic, educational, mental and psychological well being. Nigeria is not an exception in this contextual negativism (Okeke, 1999). No wonder then that the social related factors ranks third.
Education and Government related factors were also identified as the barrier factors inhibiting families/communities participation of exceptional Nigerians. Government involvement in the education of the exceptional Nigerians started in the early 1970s. Since then, a bit has been done but a lot more needed to be done. One of the major areas where government should show interest is in the total integration of the exceptional persons. This can be done effectively through education which has been seen by Kinross (1998) as "the strongest weapon that the world can wield against poverty and hunger …" Effective education requires that government should show more commitment in the education of the exceptional persons through enacting laws that will compel all and sundry to take the education of exceptional persons seriously.
In trying to find out the perception of male and female members of the families/communities on the barrier factors inhibiting their participation in the education of exceptional Nigerian, the findings revealed that both male and female members of the society agreed that poverty related factors, religious related factors and educational related factors inhibit their participation in the education of the exceptional persons following the high mean scores of 21.6/21.5, 20/20, 19.6/18.75 and 18.84/18.49 for male and female respectively. However, male and female family/community members do not agree that government related factors are inhibiting factors. This may have been informed by the fact that the education of the exceptional persons have been viewed by Nigerians as humanitarian. Thus Ozoji, Abosi and Kolo (1993) observed that government sometimes thinks that the education of the handicapped is an issue of humanitarianism rather than a legal obligation. Continuing they added that the greater reliance on charity often openly solicited by the government, for the education of the handicapped gives credence to this attitude of humanitarianism.
Summary and Recommendations
This study revealed that poverty related factors, religious related factors, social related factors, government related factors and education related factors inhibit families/communities participation on the education of the exceptional Nigerian. Both male and female members of the families and communities identify poverty as the most prominent barrier factor, followed by religious, societal and educational factors. The disagreement observed by both male and female members of the families/communities may have been informed by the Nigerians attitude of looking at the education of the exceptional persons from humanitarian perspective. Based on the findings, it is recommended that:
1. Government should intensify and become more aggressive in its Poverty Alleviating Programmes to give Nigerians more sense of belonging.
2. There is need to educate Nigerians on the cause of disabilities and re-educate them through cognitive restructuring so that most of the things they have come to imbibe and believe wrongly about handicapping conditions, they may gradually unlearn them.
3. Government should become more responsive to the education of the, exceptional Nigerians by looking at Exceptional Persons education as its responsibility.
4. Government should ensure education for all. Although the Universal Basic Education (UBE) has been launched, there seems not to have been any law enacted to back it. Government should show some evidence of wanting the programme to succeed. Let the UBE not be one of those avenues that are curved out for embezzling funds.
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