Up-skilling the teachers for inclusive practices

Teacher empowerment for inclusive practices is always a challenging task for policy makers and teacher education providers. Professional training in catering for diversity has been frequently criticized as indequate, inappropriate and incompetent to meet the contextual demand. School teachers look for systmatic, in-depth and solution focused training, in comparison with the generic, therorectical and reflective training provided by the tertiary institutes. They expect training with tailor-made contents of front-line cases and hands-on experiences. Training courses for autism, specific learning disabilities and attention deficit/hyperactive disorder are more popular with a large number of applicants from the schools. However, local surveys report that instead of disabilities awareness, strategies in fostering attitude and inclusive culture are essentital for professional development. Teacher educaiton in inclusion should address the imminent issues and teachers' concerns appropriately, in order to meet the local development and to response the global move in inclusion. With reference to the recent three years' work in teacher education for inclusion in Hong Kong schools, the discussion will focus on how the needs of course participants are identified and addressed. In relation to the encounters and difficulties, the adoption of the wide range of strategies in course implementation will be elaborated in details. More importantly, the partnership of schools, tertiary institute and Icoal educaiton authority further strengthen the significance of the joint effort in teacher empowerment for catering for diversity. The discussion will shed light to the future planning for teacher education in inclusion.