The first bell rang for the students and the schoolyards were once again filled with student laughter and teasing. There are a multitude of children attending special schools – even in the center of Athens – who once again struggle to get to their schools.
Transportation of students with disabilities presents problems and dire shortages. According to the data, until May, 100 children with disabilities were off the routes in Attica. Areas such as Exarchia have been declared ‘barren’, while the bus runs a route from Alexandras Avenue to Kypseli. This happens because the region of Attica relies on discount tenders to private individuals and if the routes do not have ‘commercial interest’, they are simply not carried out and the children have no means of transport to their school.
The Golgotha of parents
The parents of the children who attend special schools in Attica are at an impasse for another year as many of them work and cannot undertake the transportation of their children to and from school, as a result of which they are forced either to stop their work or to work some hours from home, or in other tragic cases they are forced not to send their children to school.
The vice-president of the association of parents and guardians of the 10th Special Primary School of Athens, speaking to Vima, mentioned the reasons why there are no buses to transport their children to school.
“Since the competition has no commercial interest, either because the money given is not competitive, or because the carriers avoid taking children with disabilities and prefer children without disabilities, the result is that families are left without transportation for their child therefore, children cannot attend school normally or that families lose money and time to transport them to compulsory education”.
The federation of parents and guardians of the Attica region has sent a memorandum to the Attica Region and the Ministries of Education, Interior and Infrastructure, repeating once again the problem faced by parents and students with disabilities. “Students wait hours for city buses, are forced to walk kilometers to get to their school, while many parents pay for taxis to take their children to school. The worst thing is that hundreds of children with special educational needs never get to school, so they don’t go to school, because dozens of routes have been declared barren.”
The region of Attica gives compensation to parents, less than 1 euro per day, which they say is not enough for their transport costs to school.
What does the law say?
According to the legislation (Government Gazette 4217/20218) special schools cover larger areas and are therefore also entitled to free public transport. In the Convention for Children with Disabilities (v.4074/12-Ratification of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities and the Optional Protocol to the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities) it is stated that persons with special needs have priority in education.
Ultimately, instead of the state covering this need in any way, however – as the desperate parents say – the Ministry of Transport follows the ‘algorithms’ that lead to the declaration of barren areas – even in the center of Athens – ‘depriving’ the children of access to schools.
#Schools #Children #disabilities #noncommercial #routes
