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Prof. Evariste Karangwa has been the Dean of the UR CE School of Inclusive and Special Needs Education, since 2014. A school he contributed to initiate, design, equip, and continues to serve diligently. It indeed the service that has lead to his well deserved promotion to the rank of Associate Professor in Special Needs Education.

His current experience seems to draw from a rich background experience as a career educator started way back in Ugandan leading schools (King’s College Budo & St Mary’s College Kisubi), and was already a seasoned secondary school teacher when he was appointed by MINEDUC to put together one of the post-genocide rural schools, Group Scolaire Gahini as its head teacher (1995–1999).

It must be said however, that it is indeed the context in the schools at the time, embodying post-genocide challenges and vulnerabilities that reshaped his carrier orientation towards inclusive education of marginalized groups. His school pioneered the inclusion of disabled students for the 1st time in Rwandan education, and had remained the only one in the country for many years. An initiative (among many others) reported by Enabling Education Network (EENET) Newsletter Issues 7 (2003) and 12 (2008) of Manchester University ( to read more : http://www.eenet.org.uk/enabling-education-review/enabling-education-12/newsletter-12/12-4/) as Rwanda’s education innovative accomplishments.

It is following the challenges, experiences and initiatives in the school that he undertook postgraduate studies in Management of Special Needs and Inclusive Education at the University of Birmingham (UK-1999-2000) and the Catholic University of Louvain (Belgium-2003-2006) respectively with the goal of introducing inclusive education programs in Rwandan teacher training. He started the 1st department of Special Needs Education in former Kigali Institute of Education (KIE) in 2000 and was closed in 2003.

As Head of Department (2000-2003), Deputy Dean (2006-2010), and Director of Postgraduate studies and Research (2010-2011) he chaired the MINEDUC Task Force for the Development of Inclusive Education in Rwanda (TFDIER : 2007-2012) to spearhead the inclusion of disabled students in Rwandan Universities ; coordinated the UNICEF- MINEDUC-KIE Child-Friendly School (CFS) program (2007-20010) to render ordinary schools more friendly to children with disabilities and other Special Needs, reviewed the National Policy on Inclusive Education (2013) ; designed the UR policy and guidelines on inclusive teaching and learning (2015), as well as the Inter-University Council of East Africa’s (IUCEA) academic quality guidelines for students with disabilities (2017).

In essence his promotion was not only to the owed substantial contributions cited above at national, intuitional and individual levels, but also to his rich experiences that lead to building a wide range of data, and focused research interests and products. His recent publications include educational resources for teacher training, research publications in the ‘International Journal of Inclusive Education’ (IJIE) of 2007 & 2018 ; in the International Journal of Disability & Development in 2010 : the International Journal of Disability & Society (2018) ; in Studies in Inclusive Education (1918, Vol. 40) ; and the International Handbook of International Special Education published by Praeger in June 2017 ( To read more : http://orcid.org/0000-0002-2168-4881).

It is with these background experiences that the renewed foundation of the School of Inclusive and Special Needs Education in UR CE was irrevocable. The school was actually stated in Article 225 of his Excellence President Paul Kagame’s RPF manifesto of 2010, as well as Article 215 of his 7 Years Government Plan (7YGP 2010-2017), as a national commitment, and still serves as its founding Dean. It is on this platform therefore that he successfully presented his application for the promotion to the rank of Associate Professor of the University of Rwanda, in which his teaching portfolio was excellent, for it proved exceptional contribution of a professional educator.

Published by

Ntirandekura Schadrac
PRO, UR-CE