Abstract
The article presents results of a research about blindness and low vision in the context of democratization of the access and permanence at school. It is grounded in the historical and legal aspects that mark the paths of public policy in the area, from the analysis of the blindness theme with a focus on accessibility, because the categories of visual impairment and other inclusion issues demand specificities that were not detailed in the research. As it is an exploratory research, the results start from a dense bibliographic research in books and articles that contributed to the comprehension of the theme. Thusly, the formal and legal demands that exist to guarantee access and permanence in schools were identified, as well as the necessary structural conditions to offer this service with a framework in the basic legislation that regulates it. The study also gathers some information from the Municipal Education Department of Manaus, which started in 2017 a mapping of the school structure for accessibility. The cataloged data of the physical structure existing in the schools and made available by the engineering department of the municipal education department show the complexity surrounding theoretical and practical issues in the democratic context, which supposes the substitution of the concept of an exclusive school for that of an inclusive school, in relation to the care of students with visual impairments.
Accessibility; Visual Impairment; Exclusive School; Inclusive School