Message from Dean

Welcome to the Faculty of Special Needs and Rehabilitation, an academic destination with a long-standing track record of offering unique programmes tailored to harness inclusive education, social justice, equity, inclusion and lifelong learning for vulnerable groups who are often left behind in mainstream society, due to exclusionary able-bodied assumptions that undergird policy development, program design, implementation and monitoring, design of the built environment, curriculum design and teaching and instructional practices. We prepare our students to interrogate and reframe dominant discourses, stereotypes and unfounded societal beliefs and practices that perpetuate the view of disability as an inherently negative category equated with inability to work and/or lead a dignified independent life.  The faculty is Uganda’s only academic entity with a statutory mandate to train personnel in special needs education, rehabilitation and other disability inclusion fields. To execute this mandate, the faculty is home to experts of international repute who are national and regional thought leaders in their focus areas of teaching and research.  Over the years, our unique programs have attracted students from the East African sub-region, Sub-Saharan Africa and the rest of Africa. Beyond academics, we offer technical support to line ministries, departments and agencies (MDAs), organizations of/for persons with disabilities and private sector actors in areas of policy development and reforms, systems change, research consultancies, disability mainstreaming, inclusive program design and service delivery, identification and assessment services and reporting on disability inclusion.  The faculty’s unrivaled niches are inclusive education, disability studies, disability policy research, community-based rehabilitation, assistive technology, inclusive community education and development, andragogy, and lifelong learning. I invite you to join our faculty where you will not only engage with seasoned scholars, but also get connected to a fraternity of potential employers, social justice advocates, and an engaged alumni community for lifelong learning opportunities.