<b>Public transportation for rural school students with special educational needs

Abstract

 This article describes and analyzes the availability and conditions of public school transportation for students with special educational needs (SEE). There is little production of texts in the area of special education, which takes into account families that live in the countryside and that have children with disabilities. Conflicts over land distribution in our country show a long and sad history, as a place of great social inequality and neglect of public policies. This is the context in which we have studied countryside education. In this work we analyze legislation on education and transportation, official social indicators and empirical data that was gathered during visits to rural areas in the state of São Paulo. During the visits, interviews with rural residents were conducted, and the theme school transportation would always appear – given the importance of school transportation for students who live in the countryside, or who have special educational needs. The results indicated that there was an increased use of school transportation by students with SEE in primary education; the poor conditions of school transportation interfere with the access, attendance, retention and dropout of students who live in the countryside and use school transportation. We hope this study will support the debate on the right to school transportation for all students, and that it will promote production of studies on real life conditions of students, children of rural and city workers.