Beyond Ideology: A Qualitative Study on Inclusive Education Barriers

By : Rajashree Roy Som, Subhranil Som

Page No: 71-82

Abstract
Inclusive education aspires to ensure that every individual learner, irrespective of potential, socio-cultural background, or individual difference, has access to meaningful and impartial learning opportunities within regular classrooms.Teachers and other stakeholders play a crucial role in transforming this principle into everyday practice, as their convictions, attitudes, and psychological experiences intensely influence how inclusion is interpreted and implemented. This chapter presents a qualitative exploration of the cognitive and affective dimensions that hold up teachers’ engagement, students, parents’ perspectives with inclusive education. Based on interviews and thematic analyses from diverse qualitative studies, it reveals how educators’ perceptions, professional identities, and emotional labor, students and parents’ experiences shape their responses to the demands of enabling or impel inclusive practices. The discussion emphasises the need for thoughtful understanding, emotional well-being, and collaborative professional support to enhance teachers’ competence to sustain inclusive classrooms. The chapter concludes by soliciting strategies to nurture teacher resilience and strengthen inclusive education at both pedagogical and institutional levels.

Authors
Rajashree Roy Som : Associate Professor, Amity University, Kolkata, West Bengal, India.
Subhranil Som : Principal, Bhairab Ganguly College, Kolkata, West Bengal, India.
 

DOI: https://doi.org/10.32381/JPR.2026.21.01.8