The aim of the research was to explore how 55 Swedish independent schools, directed at (or limited to) students in need of special support (SNSS), describe their organisation, work and visions. The empirical data of the research consisted of the schools' website presentations, which were processed and analysed in consecutive steps. The results showed that the students' complicated school- and life situations were often combined with disabilities mainly in the neuropsychiatric field. The majority of the schools (76%) practiced both schooling and methods for treatment and care, differentiating their role from the mainstream track. Neuropsychiatric and psychological perspectives had a significant influence, reflected in how the schools describe their daily routines, therapeutic methods of treatment and access to specific categories of staff. Small groups, individual instruction and competent staff were described as specific features. Teaching content and didactic aspects were seldom highlighted. The focus on the websites was on socialisation and subjectification while qualification, i.e. knowledge development, had a more limited role. The study points to a need for further research exploring daily pedagogical practice in more depth and calls for a greater focus on student perspectives. Consequences for learning contexts are discussed in the concluding part of the article. The specialist role, the independent schools in the present study tended to take on are most urgent issues to discuss in an educational context striving for equity and inclusive learning environments.

I uppdraget för högre utbildningen ingår att bredda rekrytering av studenter och att ge alla lika möjligheter att fullfölja sin utbildning (Prop. 2001/02:15 s. 18). En central del i det arbetet är att också erbjuda stöd till studenter i studie/skriv/verkstäder (eller annan benämning). Studien tar sin utgångspunkt i tidigare forskning om studieverkstäder eller motsvarande, nationell såväl som internationell. Under vt-18 inleddes föreliggande studie genom möten med personal och ledning vid två studieverkstäder i södra Sverige varvid studien presenterades. De etiska principerna och villkoren för intervjuerna klargjordes och ett godkännande erhölls till fortsatta möten med aktiva lärare. Inledningsvis togs kontakt med intervjupersonerna via mail inför ett personligt möte. Syftet med föreliggande studie är att undersöka hur lärare, verksamma vid två studieverkstäder i högre utbildning, erfar de organisatoriska ramarna och de pedagogiska/didaktiska villkoren. Frågeställningar: •Hur/på vilka grunder har lärarna rekryteras till studieverkstaden? •Vari ligger enligt lärarnas uppfattning studenternas behov av stöd och hur upplever de att de kan möta dessa behov? •Hur bedrivs det pedagogiskt stödjande arbetet? Möjligheter och begränsningar? Metoden innebär semistrukturerade intervjuer där lärares erfarenheter och upplevelser är i fokus. Det insamlade materialet transkriberas, bearbetas och analyseras med hjälp av kvalitativ innehållsanalys. Resultatet förväntas ge kunskap om studieverkstädernas funktion för att stödja och utveckla studenters möjligheter att stanna kvar och lyckas i sin utbildning.

The aim of this paper is to discuss challenges for staff in Higher Education encountering students in disabling conditions. The study takes a point of departure in a series of workshops designed to strengthen the competence among staff at Malmö University to develop inclusive learning environments in their field of responsibility. The research questions concern the participants’ understanding of what constitutes an inclusive learning environment and their preparedness for acting in line with rights for people with disabilities to an education free from discrimination. Content analysis from field notes taken in dialogues with the participants showed that barriers exist e.g. due to procedures in order to get a statement qualifying to support as well as not having a statement meaning that the student becomes carrier of her/his own problems, responsible for telling each staff member about the disabling conditions and needs. Tension appeared in the analysis between giving support to the individual student and a proactive problem solving in a flexible learning environment to the benefit of all students. Principles of equal access and widened participation are not easily applied leading to the conclusions that further efforts need to be made to disseminate existing knowledge in the field and moreover to identify knowledge gaps by involving students, coordinators of support and other staff in different survey studies. The framework for the coming studies is anchored in theory and practice developed in Universal Design for Learning focusing staff development and students’ sense of belonging when facing disabling conditions in higher education.

Teachers often experience insecurity and challenges when confronted with inclusive education (Van de Putte & De Schauwer, 2013) and the didactic questions about content, aim and method in teaching become central. The present study is part of a three-year school improvement program in Sweden (http://www.ifous.se/programomraden-forskning/inkludering/). The aim of the study was to look into the didactic aspects of developmental processes in schools striving to create inclusive learning environments. The research questions concern the motives for the schools to engage in the project, the meaning expressed by the team members about didactics and learning, ways of documenting the work, evaluation of processes and plans for the future. The theoretical points of departure for understanding and analyzing the processes in question are taken in definitions of didactics as reflection and critical scrutiny of teaching and learning. The complexity of developing knowledge and skills as well as identity for students and for teachers is considered and the philosophical underpinnings of the study relates to the human being as a subject becoming “human among humans” through pedagogical action (Uljens, 2001). Assessment of learning outcomes as constructive and encouraging for motivation and self-esteem among students is contrasted to when used in a wrong way assessment and testing might have a detrimental effect on the person. Here, the translation of inclusive concepts and values into didactic action in an inclusive learning environment is a challenge, which the school teams in the study had to deal with. The methodological approach is inspired by on-going evaluation (Ahnberg, Lundgren, Messing & von Schantz Lundgren) in longitudinal developmental processes of school development and as a catalyst for change close to praxis and school context. Data was collected as dialogic interviews, documentation from the schools e.g. logbooks, plans, evaluations, questionnaires etc. presenting a wide variation in ways of documenting the processes during the project. The findings point to the importance for schools to continue and deepen processes already started. Didactics and learning was understood as making a difference for the students socially as well as knowledge wise for those who need special support as well as those who need more challenges in their studies. How to assess in an educative manner (Jönsson, 2008) is a central theme in the findings and so is a strong intention and conviction to continue the work. The space for didactic action is largely dependent on legitimacy through the school leaders and prerequisites such as time, competence development, trust, joy and inspiration, evaluation, analysis, and research based knowledge. Inclusive learning environment is dependent on knowledge about didactic praxis on a class room level in the Nordic countries as well as globally.

The study is part of a three-year school-improvement program in Sweden on creating inclusive learning environments, comprising several organizational levels from policy and management level to classroom praxis (http://www.ifous.se/programomraden-forskning/inkludering/). Research on inclusive education in an international context frequently focuses the placement of individual students, administrative and organizational problems and attitudes towards policy and steering documents (Forlin, Douglas & Hattie, 1996 ; Ainscow & Miles, 2008 ). Often, a praxis of exclusion is built into educational systems (Van de Putte & De Schauwer, 2013 ) where thinking of students in categories forces pedagogues into locked positions (Tetler, 2000 ). In school development, the formation of teachers into teams may play a central part as an improvement strategy (Nordholm and Blossing, 2014 ). The aim of the present study is to document and analyze the processes experienced by 32 school teams, chosen by their school leaders in 12 municipalities to implement the intentions to create inclusive learning environments in their schools. The research interest focuses how the informants describe pedagogical and didactic prerequisites and organizational conditions and how they acted when implementing inclusive learning environments in the local school context, their role and legitimacy, the support structures and the signs of change they have seen towards a more inclusive learning environment during the developmental program. The methodological approach is inspired by on-going evaluation (Ahnberg, Lundgren, Messing & von Schantz Lundgren, 2010) as a way to contribute knowledge about longitudinal developmental processes in school development close to local school context and praxis. Group interviews with the members of the teams were conducted each year in a dialogic manner with the ambition to give continuous feed back to the school teams as a way to promote developmental learning during the program. Except for visits to the schools and interviews, the researchers took part in seminars within the program and collected written documentation from the schools. The research interest concerns intentions expressed by the teams in the beginning of the program, the processes during the implementation phases and a final evaluation after three years. Data was analyzed according to qualitative content analysis and contains a rich variety of experiences and thick descriptions from the participants. Significant shifts of perspectives during the three years appear in the findings displaying how school problems and student-perspectives were understood, how the concept of inclusion was interpreted and enacted, how the teachers used analysis and reflection to promote inclusive learning environments and how frustration and insecurity among staff was transferred into collegial cooperation. The main shifts can be described in terms of taking steps from ideology to implementation, from being stuck in locked group constellations to finding flexible solutions, from seeing the teacher as the carrier of problems to collegial professionalism, and from viewing the student as the carrier of problems to analysing difficulties on several levels. School development related to inclusive learning environment is a democratic issue relevant in a Nordic as well as a global educational context and the complexity of educational organisation on different levels (Scheerens, 2015).