What is "inclusive education"?

In the current moment, I can't give a complete definition of "inclusive education" and I may never be able to. Funny thing is, I am currently finishing a masters in "inclusive elementary education." In addition to studying "inclusive education," I taught for a year in an "inclusive school" in a Washington DC public charter school as well as a semester student teaching in an "inclusive school" in Brooklyn, NY. In both schools, I was in an "inclusive classroom."

I suppose I could start to address my inability to give a complete definition of the term "inclusive education" through the fact that its genesis is Public Law 94-142, the Education of All Handicapped Children Act (1975) and a movement brought about by advocates, scholars, and families who pushed for the rights of students and all people to equal access in education and all other aspects of life experienced by the average person. So, "inclusive education" doesn't have to do with all children...at least not directly. "Inclusive education," "inclusive classrooms," and "inclusive schools" have come to refer to the full placement of students traditionally segregated from the regular classroom or neighborhood school as opposed to a local institution or day school, into classrooms and schools with their same age peers near their home. While there are many ways to continue on this topic and go off onto where the movement is going, my goal is to strictly deal with the term "inclusive education," which I say I can't and may never be able to define.

In DC, my first grade classroom was made up of 14 students, 9 with Individual Education Plans (IEPs - see PL 94-142 for more info) and all of them African American. In Brooklyn, the fourth grade classroom I student taught in was made of 27 students, 13 with IEPs, and all were students of color. Both schools were more than 90 percent students of color. While I realize that both schools were making attempts--albeit significantly flawed--at composing a classroom that included students of all abilities, I could hardly call these classrooms and schools inclusive for reasons beyond the direct association of "inclusion" with PL 94-142 and the disabilities rights movement.

What I witnessed in these schools was the over-classification of students of color as having learning disabilities and emotional disturbance disorders. What I witnessed was exclusion of students of color from schools where "more able" and "less labeled" white students received their public education. What I witnessed was best intentions for all restrained by a lack in having traveled too far down the road away from segregated schools prior to Brown v. Board of Education.

This is not to say that I didn't attempt to create an inclusive feel in both of these classrooms. All students have different abilities and different styles of learning. All students have a unique history and identity that is both dependent on and independent from their race, religion, gender, sexuality, ethnicity, etc.. All students are people and they all require an Individual Education Plan. So, for this reason, "inclusive education" means as a teacher, as a school, and as a larger community, we need to accommodate to each other and include everyone in a way that is fair and equitable.

As a teacher, we must be prepared to include everyone. Currently, in politics, including students with disabilities is a developing and long overdue movement. This means, that currently, we need to be prepared and willing to teach students of a greater variety of needs...but aren't we always needing to be so? For this reason, while I'm aware of the necessity for the term "inclusive education" and the definition it has within the political and educational discourse, to me it means "include 'student name' in the educational experience." Those names are going to keep changing, and thusly, so will my definition of the term.