Given the worldwide trend toward the integration of children with special needs into the general school system, and the Program for Educational Modernization (1989-1994) in Mexico, Mexican educators have had to reassess the politics of special education, focusing on different service delivery models. One model, Integrated Groups, which has been functioning since the 1970s and is primarily for children with learning and language disabilities, is described. New legislation recently enacted recognizes and encourages the collaboration of general education and special education to meet the needs of all children. During the school year 1994-1995, the Secretariat of Public Education (SEP; the Mexican centralized public school system) is piloting, in Mexico City, a proposal for the integration of children into the general classroom. This new model of service delivery is designed to provide greater site-based approaches to the education of individuals with learning disabilities.
The United States and Mexico, frequently referred to as "distant neighbors," are undergoing an inevitable process of integration, collaboration, and cooperation on many fronts. One of these is education. In spite of the geographical proximity of the two countries, and the challenges that an increasing number of new Spanish-speaking arrivals from Mexico pose to the U.S. public education system each year (Figueroa & Garcia, 1994), U.S. educators know very little about the Mexican educational system. The intent of this article is to provide a perspective on special education in Mexico, specifically in the area of learning disabilities (LD).
The worldwide trend toward main-streaming has led Mexican educators to reassess the politics of special education. The Program for Educational Modernization (1989-1994), developed during the administration of President Carlos Salinas de Gortari, includes guidelines for delivery of services to persons with disabilities and plans for the integration of children with learning disabilities, beginning in the 19941995 school year. This is congruent with the recent policy of certain international organizations, such as UNESCO, who are advocating equal quality educational opportunities for all individuals. Educational systems must serve all children, including diverse and exceptional populations. Eliseo Guajardo Ramos, the director of Special Education in Mexico, characterized the current status in the provision of special services to students with disabilities as follows:
The potential demand for special education is ten percent of the population, we cover about one percent. We cover the explicit demand for services, but when we encounter additional necessities, we have to campaign so that those children requiring special services, receive them. Many times parents do not approach us asking for help because they don't realize that special attention is available for their child's particular problem. We are currently only providing for those who knock on our door, but we know that there are even greater needs among the population that we are not meeting. (cited in Garcia, 1993, p. 18)
Table 1 provides a profile of the provision of services on a national basis as of 1992. The 1992 figures in the table compare the demand for services for students with special educational needs with the population actually served. These numbers confirm the great discrepancy between needs and services provided in Mexico (Santos & Aguere, 1990). Students with learning disabilities constitute approximately 67% of those who receive services. The majority of the services are provided in urban areas, leaving children in isolated rural areas poorly served.
According to Article 3 of the Mexican Constitution, every Mexican has the right to an elementary education. That article is interpreted to mean that these laws also provide for the education of children with special needs, but it does not mandate special education on a federal level (Direccion General de Educacion Especial, 1985).
In 1993, Article 3 was amended and the new Mexican Ley General de Educacion ("General Law of Education") was initiated. For the first time, the Mexican nation passed legislation committed to providing for the education of individuals with disabilities on a federal level (Pescador Osuna, 1994). Article 41 in the new law states that special education is to be provided to individuals who have permanent disabilities (mental retardation, cerebral palsy, visual and hearing impairment, etc.) or temporary disabilities (learning or language disorders), as well as to gifted individuals. The first group, individuals with permanent disabilities, has traditionally been provided services in more restrictive settings, whereas the second group, children with learning or language difficulties, are considered to have disabilities that can be more easily accommodated in a general education setting.
The new legislation's focus is on school-age students with disabilities, and it gives high priority to the integration of all children into general education settings. For those who cannot be integrated into general education, the law states that the educational system must prepare them to become independent and productive members of society. This educational plan includes counseling and training for parents, general classroom teachers, and other school personnel who are involved in the integration of students with special needs. It is anticipated that education for individuals with disabilities will be provided either in a general school, in an integrated setting, or in a special school if the child cannot be mainstreamed. The document does not oblige the general school to integrate children with disabilities, nor does it elaborate on the modifications required to serve them adequately (Gomez-Palacio, 1994).
The definition of a child with learning disabilities in Mexico is "a child of normal intelligence, [who] for particular reasons possesses difficulties in acquiring literacy and calculation skills" (Direccion General de Educacion Especial, 1984, p. 24). According to governmental statements, this definition does not assume that the child possesses a particular pathology that is assumed to be the cause of the problem; rather, the difficulty in acquiring knowledge in different content areas is due to (a) a blockage or lack of development in the psychogenetic understanding of natural numbers and written language, or (b) traditional but inadequate pedagogical approaches to the teaching of literacy and calculation (Direccion General de Educacion Especial, 1984). As a result of these concerns surrounding the definition of learning disabilities, special education authorities have avoided the use of a label to classify children with LD and focused more on appropriate service delivery for them.
The General Direction of Special Education developed a set of procedures for the evaluation and detection of children with learning disabilities. Identification begins with the general classroom teacher's referral of students with difficulties in reading, writing, and/or math calculation. These children are then administered the Test of School Knowledge (Direccion General de Educacion Especial, 1984), which consists of reading and comprehension items administered individually, and writing and calculation items administered in small groups. It serves as a filter, detecting those children who need further evaluation. Children scoring below a certain criterion are then administered the Monterrey Test (Gomez-Palacio, Guajardo, Cardenas, & Maldonado, 1981), which more comprehensively assesses the areas mentioned previously. The Monterrey Test is based on a model of psychogenetic development designed to examine the cognitive structures necessary to access reading, writing, and calculation.
In the 1980s, the General Direction of Special Education in Mexico City cooperated with professionals from the United States and began to adapt commonly used psychological tests normed in the United States, such as the System of Multicultural Pluralistic Assessment (SOMPA; Mercer, 1979), the Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children-Revised (WISC-R; Wechsler, 1974), and the Kaufman Assessment Battery for Children (K-ABC; Kaufman & Kaufman, 1983). Although public school personnel were required to follow the assessment procedures outlined by the General Direction of Special Education, practitioners in private schools, clinics, and institutes adhered to a United States model of psychoeducational evaluation, even applying United States norms to Mexican children to determine eligibility. The typical psychological assessment used by school psychologists and educational diagnosticians for a student referred for special services was similar to that used in the United States and included the age-appropriate Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children-Revised, Mexican version (WISC-RM; Wechsler, 1984), the Bender-Gestalt Visual Motor Gestalt Test (Bender, 1946), and the Draw a Person (Naglieri, 1988).
The increasing number of students identified for placement in integrated group settings resulted in a broader, more comprehensive effort in 1981 to meet the educational needs of all children. Proposal for the Acquisition of Written Language and Mathematics (PALEM) is an early intervention program designed to facilitate the acquisition of written language and mathematics. The purpose of this program was twofold: (a) to increase the quality of general education and (b) to reduce the rate of retention. This instructional approach was first piloted in integrated group settings for children with learning disabilities. After the model was found to be successful, it was implemented in first and second grade in general classrooms throughout Mexico. The intervention procedure was described in a manual outlining the theoretical framework and general guidelines for the teacher of the appropriate activities to be implemented during the school year. It also included a workbook detailing individual and group activities to be used depending on the child's language and mathematical development. This model targeted children experiencing academic difficulties early in their school career by providing well-grounded instruction in written language and math based on a Piagetian theoretical framework. The model has now been adopted by general educators as an effective approach to increasing academic performance and decreasing the dropout rate.
The thrust toward a specialized delivery of service in Mexico for children with learning disabilities began in 1960, when the Office of the Coordination of Special Education (OCSE) was created to address the problems of failure and high dropout rates at the elementary-school level. The 1960s also saw a resurgence of interest and a plethora of research efforts to document the efficacy of segregated schools. The Secretary of Public Education decided that for less severe problems, the general classroom was a superior placement, and that even children with various levels of hearing and visual impairments could profit from that classroom while receiving compensatory training.
In 1970, the OCSE was replaced by the Direccion General de Educacion Especial, headed by the Assistant Secretary for Elementary Education. In the 1970-1971 academic school year, an intervention approach called Grupos Integrados ("Integrated Groups"), designed to teach children with learning disabilities, began in Puebla, a state southwest of Mexico City. During the 1971-72 school year, the Mexican federal system of centralized public education (the SEP) adopted the model in an effort to combat the high incidence of failure and retention of children in the first grade. This program was expanded in the 1978-79 school year to all states throughout Mexico. The adoption of the Integrated Group model by general education, to improve the quality of education for all children, resulted in greater cooperation between special education and general elementary education (Escalante Herrera, 1994).
The objective of Integrated Groups was to ensure that all children remained in school through sixth grade. Those children who failed first grade were placed in a separate classroom for 1 or 2 years, with a teacher specially trained to work with them. The underlying concept involved reconstructing the curriculum within the special classroom and then reintegrating the child into the general classroom. This self-contained classroom was located within a general school; thus, these children continued to associate with their peers from general education, although they were physically and academically isolated from them during the major part of the school day. The ultimate goal was to screen, diagnose, and teach those children who had already had some schooling but who appeared immature with regard to the basic processes necessary for reading and writing or mathematics. The temporary placement terminated when it was judged that the child could return to the appropriate grade level (normally, second grade). The identified children were considered to have LD.
The groups were organized according to geographical area, in seven regions; these regional centers were responsible for evaluating and supervising the delivery of instructional services. The components of each regional center were distributed in sets of five schools and included a support system of speech and language therapist, social worker, and school psychologist who worked exclusively with these particular students. The supervisor of each regional center reported to the area coordinator.
The Teacher-Specialist Program in Learning Problems opened in 1972, within the official government-sponsored teacher-training institutions, the normal de especializacion ("specialized teacher schools"). Since the opening of the initial "Normal de Especializacion" in Mexico City, 21 additional states throughout Mexico have added their own normal de especializacion, preparing personnel in different careers in special education. Specialists in hearing and language impairment, mental retardation, and learning disabilities are prepared in all state schools, whereas only a few of the state schools prepare teachers to teach students who are visually impaired or blind, students with neuromotor disorders, or students with delinquent and socially maladaptive behavior.
In the private sector in 1965, the University of the Americas opened a program for training therapists in speech and hearing, followed later by programs in language and learning disabilities. The University is equipped with a teaching clinic that provides services to the public, often at minimal cost. The clinic began as a treatment center for children with hearing impairments and later added services for children with language impairments and learning disabilities and their parents. Other private universities have followed suit, but with less extensive programs. A proliferation of private clinics staffed by graduates from private institutions makes it relatively simple for parents to locate help for their children in many areas of Mexico City. Outside of the city, help is not so readily available, except in public institutions or with trained personnel in private practice. The lack of teachers nationwide continues to be a critical issue in the provision of services to children with special educational needs (Escalante Herrera, 1994).
Psychoeducational evaluation and therapy centers (centros psicopedagogicos), under the auspices of the General Direction of Special Education of the SEP, provide services for eligible children from first to sixth grade and, sometimes, adolescents who are in general classes and have academic difficulties. Frequently, the same children who are in the Integrated Groups are referred when they have not quite managed to complete the required academic material (M. Tabera, personal communication, July 17, 1994). The psychoeducational evaluation and therapy centers were created in 1970 in response to the need for academic support for children experiencing difficulties in the general education classroom. Students typically receive two to three classes per week (depending on the individual program) in groups of five students.
Prior to receiving instruction in a center, children are referred by their general education teacher to a center for counseling, evaluation, and placement. These centers serve to diagnose and place students eligible for services into the appropriate psycho-educational evaluation center. Other services include counseling for parents and public school personnel. These centers are staffed by a psychologist, a language therapist, regular classroom teachers, a physician, and a social worker, and function independent of the public schools.
In addition to these services, centers for rehabilitation and special education, controlled by government health services and the hospitals, are equipped with clinics for the treatment of children with various problems.
In response to the increasing number of students placed in Integrated Groups since their inception, Mexican special education authorities are attempting to implement a new model that will broaden and diversify services for all children with disabilities throughout Mexico. Similar to practice in the United States, special education in Mexico has acted as a second system, with its own students, teachers, supervisors, and process of financing. The focus is solely on the differences inherent in children with special needs, leading to segregation of these children from general education.
Presently, the Integrated Groups model discussed previously is being phased out, to make way for a proposed program of educational integration in Mexico. The new Program for Educational Modernization emphasizes discontinuing special education as a parallel service delivery model and strengthening it, instead, into a complementary service of general education.
The function and objective of special education under Article 41 of the new Mexican General Law of Education (Secretaria de Educacion Publica, 1993) is to serve as a support to general education. Under the new law, students with special education needs are identified when, in relation to their peers, they encounter difficulties learning grade-level content and as a consequence require adaptations to achieve the curricular objectives (Direccion General de Educacion Especial, 1994).
The new model, the Unidad de Servicios de Apoyo a Educacion Regular (USAER; "Unit of Support for Regular Education"), at this moment in the pilot stage in Mexico City, is based on the concept that the academic problems of students need to be considered within the double context of learner and classroom. The primary emphasis is to provide the learner with special education needs access to the core curriculum by modifying the objectives, the content, the assignments, or the materials used in school. The USAER has a director, 10 special education teachers, and a technical support group per unit. The latter consists of a speech and language therapist, a psychologist, and a social worker. If other specialists are necessary, they will be called in on a case-by-case basis. Each unit will serve five schools; two special teachers will be placed in each school. Each school will have a special classroom, termed a "support classroom" (aula de apoyo), equipped to work with students and their families. The director of each unit will be housed in one of the five schools. The model's similarity may be likened to either a pull-in or a pull-out model, as we know it in the United States, depending on the individual needs of the student, but with greater local control maintained by the unit. The teachers who formerly were a part of the Integrated Groups model will now serve as resource room and support personnel to general classroom teachers. They will be responsible for about 20 children throughout the week, but the children will remain for a great portion of the school day in their respective classrooms. The general classroom teacher, in collaboration with the resource specialists at each school site, will decide which children will be served and for how long. The children served by this model will include those with academic difficulties and learning disabilities.
A growing demand exists in Mexico for special education services for individuals with disabilities at all levels. Currently, services are being provided to only 1% of individuals with disabilities who require them. Of those receiving services, two thirds have learning disabilities. The Mexican government has addressed these concerns by passing legislation urging greater collaboration between general education and special education. As a re-suit, service delivery to individuals with disabilities is being restructured to better plan for the educational integration of all children.
Special education in Mexico, in step with worldwide trends, is in the process of transformation. The role of special education is critical for ensuring equal opportunity and a quality education for all children with special educational needs in the least restrictive environment. In Mexico, as elsewhere, this requires a reconceptualization of the role of special education and its relationship to general education, retraining of both general and special education teachers to meet the new demands of an integrated system, and time for the articulation of services in general and special education.
EDITOR'S COMMENT: In the June/July 1992 issue of the Journal of Learning Disabilities (Vol. 25, No. 6), we began our special International Perspective on Learning Disabilities series (see that issue for an introduction to the series). To date, we have published perspectives from Canada, Germany, New Zealand, Colombia, Italy, Scotland, and Portugal, and two different perspectives from the United States. In this issue, Todd Fletcher and Cynthia Klingler Kaufman de Lopez present their perspective on learning disabilities in Mexico.
This is an ongoing series, and manuscripts from several countries are in progress. Individuals wishing to contribute a manuscript for the special series should contact Dr. George Hynd, Aderhold Hall, Athens, GA 30602, or the Special Series Editor, Doreen Kronick, 221 Broadway Ave., Toronto, Ontario, Canada M4P 1W1. Readers' comments are welcome.--JLW
We would like to thank Sandra L. Engoron and Ivan Escalante Herrera for their helpful comments and suggestions during preparation of this article.
Note. The demand is calculated on the basis of the current population, as reported in the 1990 Population and Housing Census, cited by the National Institute of Statistics, Geography, and Information Management, taking into account the variables used for the category of "Area of Attention of Special Education" by the World Health Organization.
REFERENCES
By Todd V. Fletcher and Cynthia Klingler Kaufman de Lopez
Todd V. Fletcher, PhD, is an assistant professor in the Department of Special Education and Rehabilitation at the University of Arizona and specializes in bilingual/multicultural special education. Cynthia Klingler Kaufman de Lopez, PhD, is a professor in the Department of Education in the area of learning disabilities at the Universidad de las Americas in Mexico City. Address: Todd V. Fletcher, Department of Special Education and Rehabilitation, University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ 85721.
