Logopedes to engage in Pristina schools for the first time

In addition to the need for assistants and psychologists, schools need logos, who are estimated to be able to help children in need.

This school year, 99 students with special needs who attend primary school classes, “Hilmi Rakovica” in Pristina, will receive services from the logos who are engaged in this free programme. This is a pilot project that is supposed to expand into other schools where there is a possibility.

Leonora Bajraktari, municipal adviser to Pristina's Municipal Assembly, has been initiativeing for this service to be introduced free of charge in schools, as a permanent absence.

She told Radio Free Europe that the reason they started with school in question is that there are 99 children with special needs whose families live with social assistance and access to this service has been very small, since it is very expensive financially.

In private administration, parents of children with special needs for logopedic services have paid up to 600 euros a month.

For the first time in the Republic of Kosovo, free logo service is being offered in schools. This service is very expensive, and the state has never provided it. I have established contacts and decided that these services to offer the students of the logo who have agreed to volunteerly engage”.

I'm very proud that, along with volunteer logos, we've managed to get this service into child service. This project will eventually expand”, Bajraktari said.

Otherwise, Kosovo has 43 thousand children with special needs, until 38 thousand children go through schooling.

According to experts, among the factors that children with special needs do not follow in school are the unequivocal conditions. One of the needs of these children is the logos.

A mother of special needs, Hello K. Speaking of Radio Free Europe shows the importance of the presence of logos at schools and offering free services.

I have a child with special needs that needs logopedic treatments. We haven't been able to send him to get this service because of the prices we couldn't afford and we've left him behind. Monthly it costs 600 euros to logopedic treatment”.

I've heard that there will be logos that will offer this service to children free of charge. That means a lot to us as parents. Only those with these problems understand the importance of this initiative”, she said.

Otherwise, the word logo consists of two words of origin from Greek, and they are logos-word and paidei-education, which means an education of speech or speech.

In spite of commitments, however, schools in Kosovo continue to face the problem of lack of assistants for children with special needs, as well as psychologists and logos.

Parents of children with special needs for years have paid assistants for their children at school. Most schools also lack adequate infrastructure for these children.

In the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology, in an earlier response to Radio Free Europe, they say they are working on establishing professional capacities in schools, as well as building the necessary infrastructure that enables access of children with special needs.

They say August in co-operation with local and international partners has trained over 8 thousand elementary and lower school teachers, including pre-school institutions, in programs that have methods of teaching and access to disabled children.