The number of students with disabilities is stable present in schools in Veneto. Compared to 2022/2023, the 2023/2024 school year saw growth contained between 0.4% and 1% in the different school levels.
In upper secondary schools they are Vocational institutes to gather the greatest number of students with disabilitieswith an average incidence on the total number of students of 7.6%. They are entrusted to high schools a larger number of students with “severe” disabilities, where these are 76.3%. The provinces that show a greater percentage change in students with disabilities are Treviso as for the primary schoolprimary and lower secondary schools, while for secondary school It results to be Padua.
These, in summary, are the data that emerged from the “Data collection for the 2023/2024 school year on types of disabilities” created by the Usr Veneto Office II. Two internal monitoring activities were activated: the first, after the closing of registrations (legal situation), the second at the beginning of the 2023/2024 school year (de facto situation), aimed at collecting data relating to students with disabilities and to the types of diagnoses present in the institutes of the regional territory. “This report is part of the constant attention that the USR for the Veneto dedicates to the issue of disability – declared general director Marco Bussetti -. A tool that we give to our managers, staff and all stakeholders to understand the needs and any emergencies. I believe the picture that emerges gives the dimensions of the commitment and concern that the Veneto school dedicates to disability. We reserve particular attention to the issue of behavioral distress.”
The survey took into consideration the pupils of all state schools in Veneto (subdivided by province) for a total of 558,835 pupils. There are 21,268 students with disabilities present (3.8 percent of the entire school population): 1230 in childhood, 8880 in primary school, 5947 in lower secondary school and 5211 in upper secondary school.
In the provinces of Belluno, Rovigo and Vicenza the incidence is higher than the Venetian average in all school levels, while in the province of Treviso the data is recorded in nursery school, and in the province of Verona it is observed in primary and lower secondary schools.
Analyzing certifications in nursery schools, “severely” students are 76.6% of students with disabilities, in primary school they are 54.5%, in lower secondary school they are 45.8% and in upper secondary school there is a value of 52.9%. The provinces that are above the Venetian average of 52.9% in all school levels are the province of Treviso (63.5) and Padua (61.9).
There highest percentage of students with gravity in upper secondary school is found in the province of Padua (65.8%). In upper secondary schools, the lowest number of students with disabilities concerns high schools, 1.2%, but with a greater incidence of students with serious disabilities, 76.3%. In Treviso there is the highest percentage of students with serious disabilities enrolled in high schools, i.e. 85.1%. On the contrary, professional institutes have a greater number of students with disabilities, but with less severity in percentage terms.
Analyzing the diagnoses (certifications) of disability – taking into account that for the purposes of scholastic inclusion one or more parallel diagnoses can be indicated without specifying the prevailing disability and therefore there is no numerical correspondence between diagnoses and pupils – it is highlighted that the type of disability that occurs most often is behavior disorder, especially “externalizing behavior disorder”. This is a pupil’s discomfort that spills over to the outside, causing alterations in the surrounding environment (aggression, opposition, transgression, etc.). In Veneto there are 8912 diagnoses of this type, equal to 26.7% of the total. This is followed by intellectual disability 21%, language disorder 18%, psycho-relational disability with 14.7%. Lower percentages for neuromotor disability 10.4%, genetic syndromes (3.8), hearing disability (1.9) and visual disability (0.9).
The disorder most commonly found in nursery school is psycho-relational disability (40.7%), while in primary school the most diagnosed disorders are externalizing behavior disorder (26.2) and language disorder (26.0 ). In lower secondary school, 32.6 percent of diagnoses concern externalizing behavior disorder and in upper secondary school, intellectual disability constitutes 28.9 percent of diagnoses.
Complete the report an analysis of data at the provincial level. Except for Verona, the most frequently recorded disorder is externalizing behavior disorder.
The survey was published in full on the USR Veneto website at the address: https://editoreveneto.gov.it/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/REPORT-disabilita-2023-2024.pdf.
