A delegation from Malaysia visited the University of Minnesota in February as part of a collaboration that aims to expand on and support Malaysia’s goal of including 75 percent of students with special education needs in mainstream classes by 2025.

Leadership and faculty from Sultan Idris Education University, as well as representatives from the Southeast Asian Ministry of Education Office Regional Centre for Special Educational Needs, met with leadership in the College of Education and Human Development (CEHD), the Institute on Community Integration, and the Global Programs and Strategy Alliance.

The visit kicks off the final phase in a collaboration, funded by a CEHD Global Signature Grant, between the TIES Center at UMN and the Centre for Inclusive Research on Community and Disability at Sultan Idris. The TIES Center works with U.S. states, districts, and schools to support the movement of students with disabilities from less inclusive to more inclusive educational environments.

The project, led by Kristin Liu and Jessica Bowman at UMN and Hasrul Bin Hosshan and Mohammed Syaubari bin Othman at Sultan Idris, is developing an inclusive education systems change action plan for Malaysian students with disabilities. The researchers received additional funding from an International Travel Grant, administered by the GPS Alliance.

“Our collaboration with Malaysian educators is a wonderful opportunity to take what we have learned about creating change towards more inclusive school systems in the U.S. and to adapt it globally,” said Liu. “By working together with Malaysia, we're not just sharing tools and research, we are building a bridge of understanding that can transform educational experiences for students with disabilities across different cultural contexts."

Hosshan, who was a visiting scholar at the University of Minnesota Institute on Community Integration in summer 2023, applauded the government’s goal of inclusive education but said there is currently no mechanism to evaluate the quality of such programs. He hopes to use the Inclusive Education Roadmap — developed by the TIES Center to help states, districts, and schools achieve greater inclusion — to develop a framework for measurement and to support teacher education.

As the collaboration moves forward, the researchers will be working to adapt the Inclusive Education Roadmap for the Malaysian context. The current project focuses on one secondary and one elementary school, and the researchers hope to expand throughout Malaysia and then to other countries in Southeast Asia like Brunei and Thailand.

The delegation also engaged in conversations with University leadership to expand the collaboration to other research areas, and to create opportunities for student exchange and faculty development.