BARRIERS TO ENSURING INCLUSIVE EDUCATION IN THE PROCESS OF TRAINING FUTURE NURSING PROFESSIONALS

Abstract

In recent years, Ukraine has been undergoing a renewal of the higher education system accompanied by a transformation of public attitudes toward students and professionals with disabilities. The focus of the pedagogical community has increasingly shifted to ensuring high-quality inclusive learning for both neurotypical students and future nursing professionals with disabilities. The rapid transformation of the goals of higher education institutions, particularly under wartime conditions, the implementation of a competency-based approach, and the growing complexity of professional tasks faced by future nursing professionals continuously pose new challenges for educators. These challenges highlight the urgent need to eliminate barriers to the development of an inclusive educational environment. Professional medical education requires future nursing professionals to acquire not only theoretical knowledge but also specific manual skills, as well as to develop clinical thinking, professional ethics, and deontology. Given the current socio-economic context, higher medical education institutions are mobilising pedagogical and material resources to ensure equal access to medical education for all students. However, a number of barriers still persist, including academic, physical, and evaluative ones. Academic barriers are closely linked to subject-specific, spatial, and physical conditions of education. Physical barriers arise from insufficiently developed infrastructure of educational institutions, which limits full access of future nursing professionals with disabilities to all resources of higher education. Evaluative barriers primarily stem from societal stereotypes regarding the educational capabilities of learners with disabilities. It is generalised that eliminating academic, physical, and evaluative barriers in inclusive higher education requires a comprehensive set of measures aimed at supporting the professional training of future nursing professionals with disabilities and, ultimately, at improving their quality of life. The removal of physical barriers is intended to create an inclusive infrastructural environment that ensures maximum comfort in learning and communication for students with special educational needs. Full academic access to quality education involves psychological and pedagogical support for students with disabilities, as well as an individualised approach to teaching implemented by academic staff and other educational professionals. Overcoming evaluative barriers entails social, rehabilitative, and corrective support, along with a range of measures focused on socialisation and the development of interpersonal communication among students with disabilities.