The West Asia Regional Conference of the International Council for Education of People with Visual Impairment (ICEVI) is all set to begin on Wednesday in Dhaka.
The biennial event, scheduled from Wednesday to Thursday, will be hosted in Bangladesh for the first time.
These regional conferences bring together delegates, advocates, and stakeholders from across the region to deliberate on critical issues surrounding disability-inclusive education. This time, while 200 participants are joining the conference in person, another 250 plus participants from across the region will join all the sessions online.
Centre for Services and Information on Disability (CSID) and the Quality and Inclusive Education Forum (QIEF), a coalition of 21 large national and international NGOs focussing on education, jointly host the event.
ICEVI was founded after World War II in 1951 on a shared commitment to promoting the right to quality education for children and young people with visual impairment.
“This commitment continues today and is reflected in the conference theme - Enhancing access for leaving no one behind in education,” says Dr Frances Gentle, the ICEVI Global president, in a message. She has arrived in Dhaka to attend the event.
“The principle of leaving no one behind calls upon each of us to reach out to children with blindness, low vision, deafblindness and multiple disability and their families. It calls on us to combat discrimination and inequality in education and society, and to proclaim the human rights of children, in accordance with the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities,” she adds.
Hosted at the Krishibid Institution of Bangladesh (KIB) Complex at Dhaka, the conference is expected to serve as a pivotal platform for fostering dialogue, collaboration and knowledge exchange among experts and practitioners in the field of education, especially for people with visual impairment and deafblindness. With a focus on enhancing access and opportunities for persons with visual impairments, the conference will explore innovative strategies, advancements in technology, and policy frameworks aimed at promoting inclusive education practices.
“This time, while many of the speakers and panellists themselves are people with disabilities, for the first time, every single Scientific session will be moderated by a person with visual impairment! That itself makes this a unique conference”, claim the organizers.
Monsur Ahmed Choudhury, the first-ever Bangladeshi with a visual impairment to earn a Masters's degree and an elected member of the first-ever United Nations Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, is expected to deliver the keynote address.
Gertrude Oforiwa Fefoame, the current chairperson of the said committee, has also sent a video message.
The ICEVI West Asia region comprises of 25 countries of the Middle East, Central Asia and the SAARC Region.
