Monitoring inclusive education: Disability disaggregation of the Fiji Education Management Information System

In order to plan for, monitor and measure the outcomes of disability-inclusive education, governments need valid, reliable and feasible processes for determining disability among school students and for disability disaggregation of Education Management Information Systems.

As a partner on the six year $50 million Access to Quality Education Program (AQEP) in Fiji, the Nossal Institute was responsible for developing and implementing the AQEP Disability Inclusion Strategy for the program. Funded by the Australian government through the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, and managed by Palladium, AQEP worked to improve access to quality education for children across Fiji, including children with disabilities.

One activity within the Disability Inclusion Strategy was developing a Disability Disaggregation Package, as part of the database known as the Fiji Education Management Information System (FEMIS). This is used by Fiji’s Ministry of Education to record and monitor school and student data. This video highlights the use of the Package.

The Package was developed through research by Nossal PhD candidate Beth Sprunt, and is based on a validation and adaptation process of the UNICEF/Washington Group Child Functioning Module. The research compared interviewer-administered use of the Module with parents, to self-administered use of the Module by teachers, to clinical assessments of children with and without disability. Dr Manjula Marella and Prof Barbara McPake are Beth’s PhD supervisors.

The field research was funded by the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, through AQEP and through an Australian Development Research Awards Scheme grant titled ‘Developing and testing indicators for the education of children with disability in the Pacific’ (Monash University, Nossal Institute for Global Health, CBM Australia, Pacific Disability Forum, and Pacific Islands Forum Secretariat).