R Chigadula
Montfort College, Low Vision Programme, Zimbe, Malawi
Education of the visually impaired in Malawi started in the 1950s with two special schools. In 1968, partial integration was introduced where the visually impaired children were integrated during school hours and segregated into special boarding facilities after school. In 1983, an Itinerant teaching Programme was introduced in two districts. Under this service delivery system, children were afforded the opportunity to attend school in their locality thereby operating from home to school in the company of relatives and friends. Inspite of the positive changes in the educational service deliveries for the visually impaired from the 1950s to the 1980s, there was no distinction between the blind and the low vision they were all trained using blind methods. In 1995, it became necessary to introduce the Low Vision Programme with a view to give adequate support to the children who had some residual vision by allowing them to use their remaining vision to the full. The visually impaired children in all the educational programmes had to be clinically re-assessed so that they could be categorised and placed accordingly. The introduction of the low vision programme gave more meaning and strength to the itinerant teaching programme, which is otherwise known as the Malawi Integrated Education Programme (MIEP). The enrolment in MIEP increased greatly from about 50 school going children in 1983 in the two districts to about 1,000 in 2001 in ten districts.
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