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Corresponding Author

hawani@utm.my

Abstract

Education for all has been a global priority to ensure that all students have equal access to high-quality education regardless of disability or minority status. In Malaysia, the special education integrated programme (SEIP) is designed to close the inequality gap by integrating special education into existing government and vernacular schools. Numerous studies examine the travel patterns of regular students to school, resulting in a dearth of research on the travel patterns of special needs students to formal school. Thus, this paper uses spatial analysis to demonstrate the travel patterns of students with special needs to SEIP schools. This paper demonstrated that the majority of SEIP schools in the Johor Bahru district can be reached within a 5 to 10 minute drive. Individual travel time analyses between origin (home) and destination (current versus ideal school) indicate that the majority of secondary school students attend their ideal neighbourhood schools, but not primary school students. The average travel time is 12 minutes, with 89 percent of them travelling by car. The travel time clustering analysis revealed that the majority of students who commute to school live within a radius of 2 to 10 km and within a time range of 10 to 20 minutes. However, a small group of these special students commutes to school for 20 to 25 minutes each day. The preliminary findings can be improved and may aid in the design of carpool and transit schedules, as the majority of these students heavily rely on their cars for transportation. The effects of the lengthy commute to school could be further investigated, as these children are vulnerable and any negative impact on their mental, emotional, or physical development must be addressed.

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