THERE are 88,352 preschool, primary and secondary school students, according to the Education Ministry, who have global developmental delay (GDD), intellectual disability, autism, Down Syndrome, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), dyscalculia (severe difficulty in making arithmetic calculations), dysgraphia (unable to write coherently) and dyslexia (difficulty in reading or interpreting words, letters and other symbols), among other learning disabilities.

Sadly, this group were sidelined during the pandemic, the Khazanah Research Institute (KRI) report on how the Covid-19 pandemic disrupted education for 4.9 million Malaysian students, found.