Children who suffer from a handicap, be it mental or physical, are not accepted into the general schooling system. Special Education facilities are severely lacking in the Philippines and where they do exist they are ill organised. Such children often remain at home receiving no education at all. This situation offers no guidance or stimulus to such children and can put enormous pressures on the families in question.
To help ease this situation the schoolhouse at Bahay Aurora functions as a special needs centre and a place of learning for children with a handicap.
Some of these children are residents of the complex and others come from the local area. Funding from the Netherlands has provided specially trained teachers for this purpose. As it is extremely difficult or indeed impossible for families in the area to bring their handicapped child to the centre on a daily basis, the children are collected from their homes and transported to and from the centre. In the centre they receive guidance and stimulation.