The transformative dilemma of disabled students’ participation in the NCEE: moving toward inclusion or integration?

Abstract A crucial component of the United Nations’ Conventions on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) is to promote ‘inclusive education’ for the disabled population. As a member of the CRPD, China has made transformative efforts to promote inclusive education for disabled students in the past decades, including policy changes in the National College Entrance Examination (NCEE). Through reviewing Chinese disabled students’ participation in the NCEE, this article concluded three historical stages – Exclusion, Specialization, and Integration –of China’s disability higher education. Although the past few decades have seen significantly increased access to higher education for disabled students due to legal, institutional, and social changes, the goal of ‘inclusive education’ is yet to come true. The NCEE Physical Examination Criteria shed light on the fundamental limitations in China’s current education system predisposed by the state’s political lens predicated upon managerialism and productivism. Considering China’s present conditions, we outline three ways of promoting disabled students’ right to higher education in reference to the CRPD.