Background to The Diploma on Inclusive Practice And Special Educational Needs.

I think to just to get onto something that was academic for me to reaffirm my own learning, to get that opportunity to be out of school and to do something that was purely for me and it was a really exciting process because I knew I was going to university to meet with colleagues and to do something at a really high level which would question my practice, add to my practice, change my practice and allow me to bring things back into school because I was aware of the fact that although I thought we weren't doing a bad job at my school, that there was always room for improvement. And I think being able to see what inclusion really meant and to see the differences between inclusion and integration and to actually question how inclusive was I and was I truly inclusive or were there areas where I felt maybe this wasn't working? Definitely, because I've come into an environment now since starting the course which is really quite old fashioned. And I've been able to change attitudes amongst the staff and change working practices and I really know where it is that I'm coming from now. Whereas had I gone into that environment before doing the course, I don't think I would have had the confidence to try to get things changed in my own environment. The impression I get from this course is that they want us to develop more collaborative practice, work with other schools, develop outreach programmes, and things like that. But I don't think you can do that unless you know that an intervention is actually going to work in your own setting first. So I think they need to promote more of the changes in your own setting before they start expecting us to go out to other schools and impact on other schools. It's just been all together a really exciting academic experience but it's also been a chance to take back good practice and just to look at the whole way we're doing things. I am glad I've done it, yeah. I am now I'm at the end. Yeah, I do. Each time it approaches I'm thinking, 'Oh my goodness, I've got to do it again,' but then the sense of achievement when it's done is definitely well worth it. Very much so, yeah. It's certainly helped me in my professional role. It's been good fun. Strangely, I've quite enjoyed writing the papers. It's been fantastic. I loved it.