More than 20% of Russian schools will be adjusted for children with disabilities by 2016 under the “Accessible Environment” state program, head of the Russian Labor and Social Protection Ministry department for affairs of persons with disabilities Grigory Lekarev said in an interview with RIA-Novosti.

The state program of support to persons with disabilities, “Accessible Environment”, includes the “Barrier-Free School” project.

“When the program was launched in 2011, we had only 2.5% of such schools. Their number grew to 4.5% in 2012. We aim to have 10,000 inclusive schools or 20% of the total number of general education schools in Russia by 2016,” Lekarev said.

The federal budget will allocate 561 billion rubles for the project in 2013, 3.53 billion rubles in 2014 and 4 billion rubles in 2015. The state budget invested approximately one billion rubles in the “Barrier-Free School” project in 2011 and 2012. Regional budgets will allot about 9 billion rubles for the project within five years.

Lekarev said that schools need to adjust to children with disabilities not only from the architectural point of view. The method of teaching of children with disabilities should be also changed.

Источник: RIA Novosti