School inclusion: "We are reaching our limits"

Gabriela Pinto and Emilie Weydert lay out some of the tools they use in their work on a table: Attachments for pens in different shapes and colours to make it easier for pupils to write by hand, a folder with exercises to help them focus and a set of spelling tasks.

Together with three other colleagues, Pinto and Weydert form the five-person support team for pupils with special educational needs (ESEB) (see info box) at the Nordstad-Lycée (NOSL). Their tasks include counselling teachers and parents or making diagnoses, but above all supporting pupils. Social pedagogue Emilie Weydert explains: "We either go into the classroom to support the pupil with support needs. We may also support several pupils in one class, mostly in the Préparatoire (Voie de préparation, pre-vocational level, editor's note), but also in the Général and Classique. There, however, the support usually takes place outside of class, during the extended lunch break or after school, where they receive extra training from us, for example concentration training."

The multidisciplinary teams that have long been established at regional directorate level in the primary school system have now found their way into the state's secondary schools. This is provided for in a law passed last summer.

The NOSL was one of the first secondary schools in the country to have an ESEB team. In December 2020, pedagogue Gabriela Pinto started working in Diekirch, initially on her own. The team grew over the years.