JONAED

Inclusive education is educating ALL students in age-appropriate general education classes in their neighbourhood schools, with high quality instruction, interventions and supports so that all students can be successful in the core curriculum. Inclusive education is not just about including children with special needs, but about including all children. Inclusive education is being interpreted in this paper to mean the education of all students including girls, especially in the Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) disciplines. Getting girls to finish primary education and providing them with fair opportunities to complete secondary school is a priority in UNICEF’s Gender Action Plan. UNICEF helps countries build stronger education systems that deliver quality education to boys and girls. These include removing gender stereotypes from learning materials, teaching teachers about gender, helping schools and governments use learning assessment data, and providing communities with key data so they can hold education systems accountable. Making sure that national education plans and policies consider gender is key to ensuring that girls and boys enter and succeed at school. In this paper, the concern is not only on girls’ general education but in their education in the area of Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM). This paper will therefore address issues of how girls will be adequately and effectively included in the STEM disciplines. The barriers hindering their full participation in STEM will be highlighted and measures that had worked in ensuring removal of these barriers, thus ensuring inclusiveness will be discussed.