Políticas de acesso e permanência de alunos com deficiência em universidades brasileiras e portuguesas

Abstract

This research analyzes the organization of the Federal Institutes of Higher Education - IFES, in Brazil and Portugal, on policy and institutional actions related to demands for access and permanence of students with physical, visual, hearing and intellectual disabilities in higher education. For that, we have used two types of designs, i.e., the documentary and the field critical-descriptive one. In Brazil the study comprised UFG and UFU, and in Portugal, UMinho and University of Porto - UP, involving 14 students with disabilities and 18 managers of institutions, through semi-structured interviews and analyzes of their content. The results indicated that one can not say that there is a policy of inclusion in terms of access, because of privatization of higher education institutions both in Brazil and in Portugal as well as the non-maintenance of universal characteristics of selection and exclusion, despite institutional specificities. There is an advanced legal apparatus in Brazil on permanence that needs to be put in practice because the accessibility features provided by law are issues to be evaluated for authorization, recognition and accreditation of institutions as well as for performance in evaluation policies of the federal government. In Portugal, there is no national legislation for access and permanence in higher education in the universities surveyed, but specific laws aimed at people with disabilities that include accessibility features resulted in institutional policies in the form of orders and statutes. The results do not allow us to say that Ifes are inclusive once there is an integrationist prevailing movement within them, which transfers to the student the effort to fit himself/herself in the university context. However, we realize that, support services are slowly being able to organize actions allied to other institutions organs so as to outline an institutional policy of inclusion. The purpose of this study is to present a situational diagnosis of the selected institutions in order to support future research and the development of institutional policies to ensure access and permanence of students with disabilities.