The inclusion of students with impairment in higher education needs enabling legal frameworks to lay the foundation for equal opportunities for those learners in all aspects of university life (Shepherd, 2001:17). To this effect, in the past two decades several countries have revised their legal documents in order to promote inclusive education at all levels of schooling. Accordingly, in 2006 the Ethiopian government also developed a new legislative document, namely Special Needs Education Program Strategy, in order to apply inclusive education in regular schools and in higher education institutions. Following the introduction of this policy document, all regular schools and higher education institutions in Ethiopia have been required to implement inclusive education as a mandatory approach when educating students with impairment, including those who are visually impaired. However, the actual implementation of an inclusive approach is being challenged by the social, political and physical circumstances of higher education institutions. Therefore, this study aimed at examining the existing challenges and prospects towards the inclusion of students with Visual Impairment (VI) in the particular context of Addis Ababa University (AAU). The study adopted an interpretive paradigm for better understanding and in-depth interpretation of the inclusion of students with VI at AAU. An interpretive paradigm also informs the detailed judgements made by experts of a suggested action plan for progressively providing support for students with VI at AAU. The study also applied the critical disability paradigm as a complementary philosophical base in order to examine critically the challenges that students with VI face and to suggest ways to transform the inclusive policies and practices of AAU in favour of the students. The researcher undertook a Delphi investigation to address the main aim of this research (i.e. to determine how best to implement an action plan that progressively increases support for students with VI at AAU over a period of time). The action plan that comprises various support measures and the necessary resources was developed using the empirical results of this study as well as the existing findings and best practices found in the literature study. It was scrutinized and approved by a number of experts. The researcher recommends that the plan should be implemented over the next five years at AAU in order to improve the support provided to students with VI. / Inclusive Education / D. Ed. (Inclusive Education)

This study focused on investigating the significance of peace education to manage institutional conflict at Addis Ababa University, Ethiopia. As conflict is inevitable in all settings, the need for looking at diversified ways of mitigating conflict is paramount and mandatory. Higher education should serve communities and nations in generating solutions on one hand and as well generating educated human power equipped with basic knowledge, skills and required attitude, on the other hand. The situation observed in the study area of AAU and other universities is a concern because the level and magnitude of conflict being experienced in university campuses is increasing. Taking this into consideration, the study employed a qualitative inquiry and collected data from students, academic staff from a variety of departments, the student administration wing student, the Institute of Peace and Security Studies and support staff. The findings of the study tried to identify the nature and cause of conflict. Moreover, it collected data regarding the measures currently taken by the university and as well investigated to what extent peace education can serve as an instrument to manage institutional conflict in AAU. Most of the conflict types were found to be dysfunctional, which involves the affective domain based on the feelings and emotions of the conflicting parties, mainly students to each other. It was injected by ethnic conflict and almost no dialogue is held to resolve the conflicts among them. On the other hand, turbulent situations in the society are enacted at the university, with students entering into conflict demanding their ethnic groups’ democratic and human rights. When conflicts arise, conflict resolving mechanisms are traditional with the university resorting to the use of the external police force with dire consequences such as imprisonment, detainment and even death. The study thus investigated and revealed the potential of peace education as an innovative solution to resolve conflict collaboratively thus satisfying all parties. / Educational Management and Leadership / Ph. D. (Education Leadership and Management)