Perspectives of Guardians/Parents in Portugal: Interpreting the Inclusive Education Policy through Lived School Practices [anonimizado] 1 , & [anonimizado]

Ana Eloisa Carvalho^1,2*Amélia Veiga^1,2

• ¹Center for Educational Research and Intervention, Faculty of Psychology and Education Science, University of Porto, Porto, Portugal
• ²Faculty of Psychology and Education Science, University of Porto, Porto, Porto, Portugal

In Portugal, the Legal Framework for Inclusive Education (Decree-Law 54/2018) replaced the former Special Education Framework (Decree-Law 3/2008), which had applied exclusively to students with permanent difficulties in accessing the curriculum. The new framework promotes the personalization of education for all students, introducing a multi-level approach (MLA) to curriculum design and enhancing the participation of the educational community, including guardians. However, the impact of these changes from the perspective of guardians remains underexplored. This article examines how the changes introduced by the RJEI are interpreted and enacted in practice. Drawing on Stephen Ball’s policy cycle and using thematic analysis, semi-structured interviews were conducted with eight guardians of students whose educational trajectories are currently supported by selective (MS) and/or additional (MA) measures under Decree-Law 54/2018, and who had previously been supported by measures defined in Decree-Law 3/2008. The participants were selected from four school clusters located in different mainland regions of Portugal (Centro, Lisboa e Vale do Tejo, Alentejo, Algarve), ensuring some geographical diversity in the data. The findings reveal progress compared to the previous policy, especially in the identification of educational responses better suited to students’ needs and in the development of more collaborative decision-making processes between families and schools. Nonetheless, structural challenges persist, such as the lack of adequate human resources and the limited autonomy of schools, which hinder the effective implementation of inclusive practices. This study highlights how inclusive education policy evolves through interactions across different contexts within the policy cycle, showing how institutional actors interpret and translate the policy in diverse ways. It also shows that centralised decision-making and insufficient resource allocation constrain schools’ autonomy and weaken the goals of inclusion and equity set by the RJEI. According to guardians, meaningful implementation depends on increased investment and enhanced local autonomy to ensure that all students benefit from high-quality educational opportunities.