Ecological Pathways to Inclusion: Mesosystemic School-University Transition Partnerships for Students With Specific Learning Difficulties

Main Research Question

How do educators perceive the barriers and opportunities shaping school-university transition pathways for students with SpLD in Saudi Arabia?

Drawing on the bioecological perspective and KTTP, this main research question is developed into the following sub-questions, reflecting key system levels (policy, school, and school-university coordination) through which educators interpret transition processes.

Sub-Questions

Research Design

This study is situated within a broader research program investigating ecological pathways to inclusion for students with (SpLD) in Saudi Arabia. While the overarching project addresses multiple ecological levels, the present research concentrates on transition practices at the school-university interface and the collaborative mechanisms that shape this mesosystem. A qualitative, inductive design within an interpretivist framework was utilized to examine educators’ understanding of transition practices and school-university partnerships for students with SpLD, with particular attention to institutional sensemaking and the organization of responsibility across this underexamined and weakly formalized boundary. The study focuses on institutional actors, specifically secondary teachers and university academics, and does not include students or parents. This reflects its analytical aim to consider how transition responsibility is understood and enacted within mesosystem level institutional structures. While KTTP emphasizes planning for students and engagement with families, these are treated here as institutional functions, analyzed through educators’ interpretations and practices within organizational contexts, not through direct discussions from students or parents.

Educators’ narratives were analyzed as institutionally situated knowledge shaped by policy frameworks, role expectations, and organizational constraints, rather than as decontextualized personal views. Consequently, participants’ interpretations were understood to be embedded within governance structures and accountability regimes that organize schooling and HE, rather than reflecting purely individual judgments.

For analytic clarity, the study employed the Saudi Ministry of Education’s (MoE) operational definition of SpLD (Ministry of Education, 2015). This definition was regarded not as an uncontested or definitive account, but as a governing discourse that shapes educators’ professional sensemaking, documentation practices, and decisions regarding identification and support. Accordingly, the analysis focused on how official classifications organize responsibility, visibility, and eligibility within institutional contexts.

The analysis was guided by Bronfenbrenner’s Ecological Systems Theory (Bronfenbrenner, 1979, 2005) and KTTP (Kohler et al., 2016), which informed the interpretation of how transition practices and interagency collaboration are enacted across systems, without presuming idealized institutional capacity or uniform implementation.

Participants

Purposive sampling (Patton, 2015) was used to recruit educators located at key points within the transition system: secondary SpLD teachers and university faculty in special education. Sampling aimed to capture perspectives across school-level practice and university-level policy, governance, and support structures rather than to privilege professional expertise as neutral or authoritative. Accordingly, university academics were included as institutionally embedded actors whose roles and accounts are shaped by organizational hierarchies, policy frameworks, and professional accountability.

Participants were recruited to reflect variation across educational settings. Guided by the information-power principle (Malterud et al., 2016), the focus was on the depth of insight into transition practices and institutional coordination, rather than statistical representation. Fourteen participants took part: five secondary SpLD teachers recruited from three secondary schools and nine university academics recruited from four universities. One of the university participants (A6) had previously served as director of a university disability support center and is included within the nine university academics. Recruitment procedures and participant characteristics are summarized in Figure 1 and Appendix A, respectively.

OPEN IN VIEWER

Figure 1.

Participant recruitment criteria.

Data Collection

In-depth insights into school-university transition practices were gathered via semi-structured interviews (Patton, 2015). The interview guide was refined using the Interview Protocol Refinement Framework (Castillo-Montoya, 2016) to ensure alignment with the study’s aims (see Appendix B). Fourteen interviews were conducted in Arabic (nine by telephone, five via Zoom), each lasting 25 to 50 min. All interviews were audio-recorded with consent and transcribed verbatim. Questions focused on participants’ perceptions of the barriers shaping collaboration between schools and universities in supporting students with SpLD. Two pilot interviews, with a university academic and a teacher, were used to refine the guide but were excluded from analysis. Arabic quotations were translated into English via forward-backward translation and verified by a bilingual special-education specialist to ensure linguistic accuracy and conceptual clarity.

Data Analysis

Data were analyzed using Reflexive Thematic Analysis (Braun & Clarke, 2021). Analysis was iterative, involving repeated familiarization with the data and progressive refinement of codes and themes. An initial inductive phase allowed patterns to emerge from participants’ accounts without predefined categories, followed by a theoretically informed phase during which themes were interpreted using Bronfenbrenner’s Ecological Systems Theory and KTTP.

MAXQDA supported data organization and a transparent analytic audit trail, while interpretation remained researcher-driven and reflexive. Secondary-school-teacher and university-academic accounts were first analyzed separately to preserve role-specific perspectives and subsequently examined comparatively to identify convergence, divergence, and responsibility displacement across sectors. Coding remained grounded in participants’ language, with theoretical mapping applied only after inductive analysis to avoid forcing analytic fit.

Analytic attention extended beyond explicit statements to moments of hesitation, ambiguity, contradiction, and silence, particularly where participants deferred responsibility or referenced institutional constraints. Reflexive memos documented analytic decisions and emerging interpretations, while peer debriefing was used to interrogate assumptions and explore alternative readings rather than to achieve coding consensus. Themes were organized across ecological system levels and transition components and analytically interpreted through an integrated ecological/transition framework within a single consolidated mapping (Appendix C). The “What This Reveals About Transition” column highlights the conceptual significance of each theme, showing how institutional design, boundary work, and temporal misalignment shape transition fragility for students with SpLD. Final themes were refined to ensure they remained close to participants’ phrasing while illustrating patterns of alignment, fragmentation, and omission across transition systems.

Ethical Considerations

Ethical approval was obtained prior to data collection. Participants received an information sheet detailing the study’s purpose, procedures, confidentiality measures, and their rights, including voluntary participation and withdrawal before data analysis without consequence. Written informed consent was secured before interviews commenced. As the study involved professional reflections rather than sensitive personal disclosure, the potential risk of harm was minimal. Participants could decline to answer any question or withdraw at any stage before data analysis without consequence. The potential benefits of improving inclusive educational policy and strengthening school–university transition support for students with SpLD were considered to outweigh these minimal risks.

As interviews were conducted via telephone and Zoom, participants were informed that audio data would pass through third-party platforms and consented accordingly. Anonymity was maintained using coded identifiers (T = teacher; A = academic). Audio files were stored securely, anonymized during transcription, and deleted following accuracy checks.

The inclusion of few secondary school teachers (n = 5) reflects structural features of SpLD provision in Saudi Arabia, where specialized programs and formally designated roles are concentrated primarily at the primary level, with more limited formal provision at secondary stages. This organizational configuration shapes where SpLD is institutionally recognized and resourced, resulting in a comparatively small pool of secondary educators with formal responsibility for students with SpLD, particularly regarding transition planning. Therefore, recruitment focused on teachers with relevant experience at the secondary stage, where transition to HE becomes salient despite limited institutional infrastructure. While this distribution reflects the structural organization of provision, it may also shape the study's analytical emphasis, with university perspectives potentially giving greater visibility to institutional expectations and post-entry considerations. To address this, the analysis adopts a systematic comparative approach, examining teacher and academic accounts in relation to one another to identify convergence, divergence, and points of tension in how responsibility for transition is constructed across sectors.

Both authors have special-education professional backgrounds and are institutionally embedded within Saudi special education systems. This insider positionality functioned as an analytic resource, enabling informed interpretation of governance logic, institutional routines, and professional silence surrounding transition practices. Familiarity with policy frameworks, role hierarchies, and documentation processes supported nuanced analysis of how responsibility for transition is articulated, deferred, or displaced across institutional settings. At the same time, this positionality required careful attention to potential power dynamics and socially desirable responses, particularly when engaging with academic peers, where shared professional knowledge and hierarchical sensitivities may shape how critique is expressed. The authors were mindful that researcher positionality can shape data generation and interpretation across all stages of the research process (Wilson et al., 2022). To address this, interviews emphasized confidentiality and openness, encouraging participants to reflect on challenges, tensions, and areas of uncertainty instead of relying solely on formal accounts of practice. Analytic attention was also given to moments of hesitation, ambiguity, and indirect critique, enabling less explicit forms of institutional tension to be identified rather than overlooked.

Reflexivity was maintained throughout the analytic process to examine how professional expectations, shared disciplinary language, and insider assumptions shaped both participants’ accounts and the interpretation of data. Reflexive memos and peer debriefing supported critical interrogation of taken-for-granted assumptions. In addition, multi-stakeholder sampling, transparent audit trails, and rich contextual descriptions strengthened the credibility, dependability, confirmability, and transferability of the findings.

Findings

This section presents the findings in relation to the main research question, focusing on how educators perceive the barriers and opportunities shaping school–university transition pathways for students with SpLD. Each theme is aligned with a specific research question: Theme 1 (RQa) examines policy and institutional influences on the operationalization of transition practices; Theme 2 (RQb) explores how school-level practices, beliefs, and resources shape transition readiness and individualized planning; and Theme 3 (RQc) considers school–university coordination and constraints on developing structured partnerships. Theme 4 provides a cross-cutting perspective on how policy shifts interact with system-level arrangements over time across ecological layers. Themes are organized ecologically across policy, school, and school–university systems, highlighting where transition mechanisms are coherent, fragmented, or absent. Table C1 maps themes across ecological systems and transition functions.

Theme 1: Policy Practice Gaps Across Ecological Layers

Across cities and across both school and university roles, participants outlined persistent gaps between national inclusion policy and the operational practices governing student transitions with SpLD. These gaps were reported across multiple ecological levels, macrosystem policy, exosystem ministerial systems, and mesosystem school–university coordination, shaping how responsibility for transition was understood and enacted. To enhance analytic transparency, this theme was mapped against ecological system levels and core components of KTTP, illustrating areas of alignment and misalignment across transition structures.

Theme 2: Fragile School-Level Transition Practice (Microsystem and Exosystem Constraints)

Despite some variation across schools, transition practices were described as fragile and uneven, shaped more by organizational conditions than by individual teacher commitment. This theme highlights the interaction between classroom practice and wider school arrangements, such as workload, planning structures, and assessment, that shape transition preparation. While teachers emphasized everyday classroom and workload challenges, academics framed these issues as systemic concerns related to policy enactment, coordination, and institutional design.

Across interviews, teachers characterized transition provision as constrained by high workload, unclear mandates, and limited institutional support. One teacher captured this concentration of responsibility succinctly: “I am the team… everything falls on me as the teacher” (T4), reflecting how transition work was individualized rather than supported through formal structures. This was echoed by T3: “There’s no one else involved in transition planning… it’s just me trying to manage everything.” Overall, responsibility was often concentrated in individual roles rather than distributed across coordinated school structures, although a few participants described limited, informal instances of shared responsibility, which remained inconsistent and weakly supported.

These efforts were insufficient to address broader constraints shaping classroom practice and transition preparation. Teachers described classroom practices as inconsistent and lacking procedural guidance: “Teaching is unorganized and not following a clear methodology… classroom activities are still traditional” (T1), indicating limited alignment with transition preparation goals. Heavy workload pressures further constrained proactive planning: “The burdens on teachers are enormous; there isn’t time to focus on transition planning properly” (T4). While widely reported, some participants noted that workload pressures varied across schools, with occasional instances of more structured support. Similarly, a small number of participants indicated that some teachers attempted more structured or adaptive practices, though these efforts were not consistently supported at the school level.

Transition planning was widely described as weakly enacted. Teachers reported that formal plans existed but were rarely activated: “The transition plan isn’t activated in the way it should be… it remains mostly on paper” (T5), indicating limited translation into practice. This was further reflected in T2’s speech:

We write plans because we have to, but we don’t really use them in practice. They’re there on paper, but they don’t really shape how support is provided or how decisions are made. Most of the time, teaching continues as usual, and the plans aren’t actively referred to or followed in day-to-day work.

These findings suggest that planning often functioned as a procedural requirement rather than a practical tool, with no participants describing its consistent or effective use in transition practice.

Moreover, students were often described as excluded from planning processes: “Students don’t really know what an IEP or transition plan is, and they don’t take part in it” (T4), highlighting limited opportunities for involvement and self-advocacy. Although common, some participants noted limited attempts to involve students, though these were not systematically embedded. Similarly, T1 stated: “Students are not part of decision-making; they just follow what is decided for them” (T1), suggesting that planning was not experienced as participatory. Academics reinforced this gap, noting that formal guidance was not consistently operationalized: “The ministry guide even includes a transition planning template, but in schools it’s not actually used” (A6), pointing to a gap between available policy tools and their enactment in school settings.

Participants also highlighted the absence of structured assessment systems and shared decision-making processes for identifying needs, planning support, and preparing for transition. As one teacher noted, “We don’t have any standardized tools, and there isn’t a clear team responsible for assessment and planning” (T3), pointing to the lack of systematic frameworks and collaborative structures. This information was echoed by an academic participant: “There’s no real system for assessing students’ needs or coordinating decisions, each school’s teachers just do their own thing” (A8). Limited assessment infrastructure was also described as restricting students’ understanding of their own learning profiles: “Students don’t know their abilities or strengths… that’s the situation we see” (T1), limiting support for self-awareness and transition preparation. There was little evidence of either structured or informal assessment approaches being used to support transition planning.

Educators also described school environments in which expectations of students with SpLD were often low and embedded in school culture. As one academic noted, “The biggest problem is low expectations from special education teachers; many of these students could succeed at university, but they’re not encouraged” (A6). This pattern extended to general education contexts, with reports of stigma shaping expectations. For example, T2 recalled, “A general education teacher once told me, ‘You just pass them; you’re giving society weak models,’” reflecting deficit-oriented assumptions influencing both practice and transition readiness.

The absence of multidisciplinary teams was repeatedly identified as a key constraint. Teachers described transition planning as concentrated within a single role: “We don’t have a team” (T4), highlighting the lack of collaborative structures. Academic participants similarly emphasized the absence of coordinated, cross-sector support. As A3 noted, “Teachers should not be held solely responsible, as they often work in isolation. Greater cross-sector coordination is needed, yet multidisciplinary support, while widely advocated, is rarely realized in practice.” As a result, responsibility remained largely individualized, with limited authority, time, and institutional support.

However, these patterns were not uniform. A small number of participants indicated that individual teacher initiative could partially mitigate these constraints: “Some teachers try to support students beyond their role, but it depends on personal effort” (A9). While such efforts may compensate for systemic gaps, they were described as inconsistent and difficult to sustain without formal support.

Overall, school-level transition practices reflected structural constraints and uneven coordination. Through the KTTP lens, these patterns indicate partial or inconsistent enactment of student-focused planning and development. Ecologically, limited alignment between classroom practices and broader school coordination reduced continuity of support, shaping uneven access to transition preparation for students with SpLD.

Theme 3: Thin and Nonspecific School-University Partnership (Mesosystem Across Institutions)

At the SUB, participants described partnerships as present in principle but limited in structure, continuity, and disability-specific focus. While teachers framed these gaps in terms of limited access to information and uncertainty about university pathways, academics tended to interpret them as structural absences in coordination, formal agreements, and institutional responsibility.

Across participants, interinstitutional connections were characterized as weak, episodic, and oriented toward the general student population rather than the specific needs of students with SpLD. As one teacher noted, “We don’t really know anything about universities, their services, or which majors are suitable for our students” (T5), highlighting limited information flow between sectors. This was reinforced by academic perspectives: “As far as I know, there have been no formal, or even informal, attempts by universities to build partnerships with schools” (A5). Similarly, “There is no clear communication between schools and universities” (A9) reflected the absence of structured channels. Overall, participants described communication between sectors as limited or unclear, although a few referred to occasional informal contact that was not sustained or systematically organized.

School-university interaction was commonly described as one-off or short-term, rather than embedded within ongoing transition processes. Several teachers referred to isolated visits that lacked follow-up or preparatory value: “Only once did we receive an invitation, years ago, and it was just for three students to visit” (T5). Similarly, “Sometimes our university hosts secondary school students, but I think they invite only high-achieving students” (A2), indicating limited and selective engagement. The impact of these activities was also questioned. As one participant noted:

These visits don’t really help students prepare, they’re mostly just general exposure. Usually, it’s a quick tour around the university, like walking through lecture halls or the campus, without any real guidance on academic expectations, available support services, or how students with learning difficulties would actually manage university life.

T1 also said, “These visits are more about showing the campus than actually preparing students for what they will face academically.” This suggests that outreach activities were not integrated into structured transition planning.

Participants further emphasized that these activities were generic rather than SpLD-responsive. Visits and information sessions were described as oriented toward typically developing students, with little guidance on accommodations, learning support, or disclosure pathways. As one teacher noted, “The visits are for all students… nothing specifically tells a student with SpLD, ‘This is for you’” (T4). Another participant highlighted the absence of any disability-specific information: “No one explains support, accommodations, or who the student should contact if they have learning difficulties” (T2). Similarly, an academic stated, “There’s no specific guidance for students with learning difficulties” (A3). Students with SpLD were therefore described as participating in general activities without access to targeted information to support informed preparation.

At the university level, disability support centers were similarly characterized as administrative rather than pedagogical, reinforcing the limited educational focus of interinstitutional engagement. As one academic noted, “Our university center mainly deals with financial support and transport; there’s no academic support” (A8), showing that support services were not aligned with academic transition needs. Staffing limitations further constrained provision: “Many centers are run by non-specialists, so services become administrative, not educational” (A7), and “Support centers deal more with procedures than actual learning support” (A2). Participants therefore described institutional responses as prioritizing access-related procedures over educational continuity.

When reflecting on what would constitute meaningful partnership, academics defined it largely through what was absent: formal agreements, designated transition coordinators, shared student information, disability-specific orientation, and clear referral pathways. As one academic noted, “There is no structured agreement or system that connects schools and universities in this process” (A1). Teachers were similarly unclear, often positioning partnerships as “school administrations’ responsibilities” (T1, T3, T4, and T5), indicating limited ownership at the practitioner level. Participants largely described these elements as missing, suggesting limited institutionalization of partnership structures. As A5 reflected, “What we have cannot really be called a partnership; there is no coordination, no shared planning, and no continuity between the two sectors.” In this context, partnership was often described as more symbolic than operational.

A few participants described exceptions in which informal, person-dependent connections enabled more proactive support: “Sometimes it works because someone knows someone at the university, so the student gets guidance before applying” (A4). However, these were described as fragile, dependent on individuals, and difficult to sustain when roles changed.

Overall, school–university partnerships were acknowledged in discourse but weakly enacted in practice, and largely nonspecific to SpLD. From a KTTP perspective, interagency collaboration remained insufficiently operationalized, with limited mechanisms to support disability-responsive planning or continuity of responsibility. Ecologically, the school–university mesosystem lacked stable structures to coordinate information, accountability, and support for students with SpLD during transition.

Theme 4: Policy Shifts and Temporal Misalignment (Chronosystem)

Across settings, participants described recent policy changes as time-bound interventions that altered access without corresponding changes in preparation, coordination, or institutional support. Chronosystem dynamics were most visible in relation to admission policies and temporary exemptions from standardized entrance examinations.

Teachers described these examinations as significant barriers: “They can’t pass Qudrat or Tahsili [main national university entrance exams in Saudi Arabia]; they struggle with these tests” (T3). Similarly, participants noted that without exemptions, some students would be unable to access HE: “Without exemptions, many of these students wouldn’t even have access” (A1). Together, these responses highlight the role of admission policies in shaping initial entry opportunities. While teachers generally welcomed exemptions as easing access, “The exemption news is good; it may help some student's access university” (T3), some expressed uncertainty about their longer-term impact. Teachers emphasized widened access, whereas academics framed exemptions as procedurally driven and insufficient without parallel changes in preparation, accommodation, and coordination.

However, through discussions with academic staff, exemptions were often viewed as procedural access without structural recalibration. Academics repeatedly emphasized that changes in admission criteria were not accompanied by adjustments in preparation pathways, accommodation planning, or cross-sector coordination. As one noted, “Exemptions can lower expectations” (A6), while another emphasized, “The solution is accommodations and preparation, not avoidance” (A8). This concern was reflected across participants: “Students enter university, but they are not ready to cope” (A1), indicating a gap between access and readiness.

Participants further reported that little else changed following policy shifts. School practices, university support, and transition planning were described as largely unchanged: “The policy changes, but the preparation stays the same” (T4), and “Students arrive under new rules, but the system treats them as if nothing changed” (A5). Similarly, “Nothing else changes in schools or universities” (A3) underscored the absence of broader systemic adaptation. Across participants, policy change was described as occurring without corresponding institutional adjustment.

Participants also described a lack of temporal alignment between policy announcements and institutional response. New access routes were introduced without parallel investment in preparation, accommodation, or coordination. As a result, responsibility for managing these changes was often experienced as shifting to individual educators and students rather than being addressed through system-level planning. While this misalignment was widely emphasized, some participants viewed exemptions as a positive, albeit partial, step: “Even if it’s not perfect, it’s still better than nothing” (T1).

Bringing these points together, participants described recent policy shifts as time-bound changes that altered access without corresponding changes in preparation or coordination. Changes altered access at particular moments without recalibrating exosystem procedures or mesosystem coordination, shaping preparation and support across the SUB. Consequently, exemptions eased immediate barriers while deferring more durable coordination, suggesting that access was expanded without equivalent institutional support, and that students may continue to face challenges after entry. Overall, participants described policy shifts as altering access at specific moments without corresponding changes in preparation or coordination. Exemptions eased immediate barriers but did not address underlying structural conditions, suggesting that access was expanded without equivalent institutional support and that students may continue to face challenges after entry. From an ecological perspective, these patterns indicate temporal misalignment between policy change and institutional response, with limited alignment across system levels.

To consolidate the discussion, Figure 2 presents an ecological synthesis informed by the findings. It outlines how responsibility for school-university transition is organized across systems. Drawing on Bronfenbrenner’s Ecological Systems Theory and participants’ accounts, the figure illustrates how transition barriers emerge through interactions between policy timing (chronosystem), institutional procedures (exosystem), school-university coordination (mesosystem), and everyday practice (microsystem). These system dynamics are analytically linked to the study’s research questions, demonstrating how each theme contributes to patterns of fragmented responsibility and underscoring the need for sustained cross-system alignment rather than time-limited policy measures.

OPEN IN VIEWER

Figure 2.

An ecological synthesis of how responsibility for school-university transition for students with SpLD is organized across systems.

Why it Matters: From Policy-Practice Gaps to Governance Design

The findings suggest that the gap between national rights-based frameworks and everyday transition practice reflects limits in operational structures rather than policy absence. At the macrosystem and exosystem levels, educators described inclusion policies as formally robust but lacking the mechanisms required for implementation, including shared information systems, clear role allocation, and monitoring processes.

Recent Saudi reforms, including the Rights of Persons with Disabilities Law (Authority of People with Disability, 2023) and Vision 2030 (2016), reflect strong national commitments to inclusion. However, participants indicated that these commitments have not yet been translated into the structures needed to sustain continuity across educational phases (Abed et al., 2025; Abu Alghayth & Alshahrani, 2024). This aligns with international evidence, that effective transition systems depend on interagency communication, defined responsibilities, and enforceable procedures (Park et al., 2023; Poirier et al., 2020).

The absence of cross phase data continuity, captured in statements such as “No student files move between stages,” illustrates how learning histories are not designed to travel across institutional boundaries. Without shared records or structured disclosure systems, continuity depends on students and individual staff, rather than institutional processes (Abed et al., 2025; Lightner et al., 2012; Parsons et al., 2023; Pearson & Boskovich, 2019; Svendby, 2020). In this sense, disability is formally recognized but inconsistently carried through practice (Koutsouris et al., 2025).

At the school level, transition practices were experienced as uneven not because of individual shortcomings, but because responsibility was concentrated on individuals without sufficient authority or collaborative infrastructure. Teachers’ accounts, including “I am the team,” illustrate contexts where planning is not supported by multidisciplinary structures or formal coordination (Al-Juhani & Al-Sharif, 2023; Almutairi & Alquraini, 2023; Alzahrani & Alasiri, 2022). Similar patterns are reported internationally, where inclusion depends on personal commitment rather than coordinated institutional systems and procedural compliance substitutes for shared responsibility (Stentiford & Koutsouris, 2021; Svendby, 2020). This interpretation aligns with evidence that effective transition systems depend on role clarity, interagency communication, structured task allocation, and enforceable accountability (Park et al., 2023; Poirier et al., 2020). Under these conditions, deficit-based expectations may further narrow preparation, while limited assessment and planning structures constrain opportunities for self-advocacy and informed support.

At the school-university interface, partnerships were described as limited and largely generic. Contact was sporadic and not structured around shared planning or continuity of support. Similar patterns are reported in Saudi and international research, where collaboration remains underdeveloped despite policy commitments (Abed et al., 2025; Abu-Alghayth & Alshahrani, 2024; Alhilfi, 2025; Frazier et al., 2020; Wise et al., 2020).

Participants’ accounts suggest that recent policy changes function as time-bound interventions that expand access without altering underlying transition structures. While exemptions facilitate entry, they do not address preparation, accommodation, or coordination, pointing to a need for sustained institutional recalibration. Chronosystem dynamics therefore reflect policy responsiveness without long-term structural change, resulting in access without scaffolding and cycles of partial inclusion followed by renewed vulnerability (Chiwandire & Vincent, 2019; Hefiela, 2024; Moriña, 2024; Shaw, 2021; Wells, 2025).

These dynamics are evident in the Saudi reliance on national entrance examinations such as Qudrat and Tahsili, where access is strongly structured by standardized assessment. Similar bottlenecks appear in other centralized systems, including parts of East Asia and Europe, where examination regimes shape how inclusion is operationalized. In such contexts, tensions emerge between meritocratic selection and equitable access, as standardized systems privilege normative assumptions of ability and readiness (Stanczak et al., 2024; Taylor & Shallish, 2019). Evidence further suggests that reducing reliance on testing alone does not substantially shift access patterns, with advantages continuing to accrue to already well-positioned groups (Yu et al., 2018).

However, an important distinction emerges. While comparable systems often pair policy adjustments with more developed coordination mechanisms and institutional supports, the Saudi context is characterized by limited formalization of mesosystem coordination across sectors. Consequently, policy shifts are less likely to translate into sustained transition infrastructure, leaving continuity weakly secured at the system level. Examination-related bottlenecks are globally recognizable, but their consequences depend on how responsibility for transition is organized and supported.

What Follows: From Symbolic Inclusion to Operational Coordination

Taken together, the findings indicate that stalled transition systems persist not because effective solutions are unavailable, but because coordination is not institutionally secured. Under such conditions, responsibility is dispersed across actors, and continuity depends more on individual effort than on system design, with risk ultimately displaced onto students and families (Chiwandire & Vincent, 2019; Wise et al., 2020). Under weak enforcement, policy commitments may remain formally intact while everyday practices continue to individualize burden and uncertainty (Konur, 2000; Ristad et al., 2024).

Students with SpLD are particularly exposed within these arrangements. As an invisible and diagnostically negotiable category, SpLD may be excluded from formal transition infrastructure, rendering support contingent rather than secure (Moriña, 2024; Mullins & Preyde, 2013). Viewed across ecological layers, the findings suggest that transition pathways are shaped less by professional willingness than by how roles, coordination, and accountability are structured across policy, school, and university systems. In doing so, the findings directly address the study’s central research question, demonstrating that transition pathways for students with SpLD are structured primarily by institutional arrangements rather than individual capacity or intent.

Transferability and Design-Oriented Coordination Principles

Although grounded in the Saudi context, the findings offer transferable insights for other centralized education systems, where transition depends on coordination across institutional boundaries. Rather than proposing a universal model, the findings identify adaptable coordination mechanisms, including shared documentation, clearer role allocation, and accountable cross-sector interfaces, that address structural conditions limiting continuity. These principles align with the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) and with international scholarship emphasizing system-level coordination over individualized accommodation. In this way, the study contributes a design-oriented perspective on how responsibility, information, and coordination can be more effectively organized at the SUB.

Contributions

This study makes three interrelated contributions to research on transition to HE for students with SpLD. These contributions are grounded in participants’ data across the settings represented and are presented as contextually derived interpretations rather than definitive system-wide claims.

First, as a conceptual contribution, the study reconceptualizes the mesosystem as a site of institutional boundary work, showing that transition is not merely a stage in students’ progression, but a governance problem shaped by how coordination, information, and accountability are organized across sectors. In doing so, this study advances ecological and disability scholarship through illustrating how, within the findings, inclusion may be symbolically endorsed while remaining procedurally weak at the point of transfer.

Second, as an empirical contribution, this study provides cross-sector qualitative evidence from secondary-school and university educators, showing how weak documentation, limited partnership structures, uneven role clarity, and improvised coordination shape transition pathways for students with SpLD in Saudi Arabia. By examining the organizational interface between sectors rather than school or university settings in isolation, it offers a clearer account of where and how continuity breaks down.

Third, as a practical and policy-relevant contribution, the study identifies specific leverage points for reform, including shared documentation, enforceable transition planning, formal school-university coordination, and clearer accountability mechanisms. Rather than treating transition difficulties as student-level adjustment problems, the findings specify the organizational points at which responsibility was often described as not transferring clearly across, thereby offering a basis for targeted institutional and system-level intervention.

Implications for Policy and Practice

The following implications are informed by the empirical findings and highlight potential areas for development. The following implications are derived from these findings. First, procedural continuity requires institutional mechanisms that allow responsibility, information, and support to travel across educational phases. Shared digital learner profiles and enforceable transition plans would reduce repeated disclosure and reposition coordination as an institutional obligation, rather than an individual burden. Second, transition planning at school level would benefit from strong multidisciplinary structures, greater student participation, and more systematic family engagement. Third, school-university collaboration requires institutionalization beyond symbolic contact, including memoranda of understanding, designated transition coordinators, and structured referral pathways. Fourth, admission- and curriculum-related policy reforms should be aligned with preparation pathways, so that expanded access is accompanied by bridging support, early outreach, and targeted skill development. Finally, system-level coordination could be strengthened through the Law of the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (Authority of People with Disability, 2023), particularly through national transition guidance, shared data standards, interministerial protocols, and monitoring mechanisms that translate policy commitments into coherent transition infrastructure.

Together, these implications show that macrosystem ambition currently exceeds mesosystem capacity, highlighting where targeted structural investment could strengthen transition coherence. Figure 3 presents a logic model derived from educators’ perspectives, synthesizing how coordination is understood to operate across enabling conditions, operational practices, and immediate outcomes, and how these are sustained over time through review and adaptation.

Limitations and Future Directions

This paper forms part of a broader research program concerning ecological pathways of the secondary school-university transition for students with SpLD, focusing specifically on school-university collaboration as a mesosystem mechanism. While enabling close analysis of cross-sector coordination, this focus necessarily delimits the claims’ scope.

Although participants were drawn from three different Saudi cities, these settings do not capture the full diversity of educational contexts across Saudi Arabia. Transition pathways in rural areas, remote provinces, and private institutions may differ, warranting extension to underrepresented regions and institutional types.

This study foregrounds secondary-school teachers’ and university academics’ perspectives, illuminating frontline coordination challenges while offering limited insight into where authority for partnership design, enforcement, and resourcing resides. The participants include a higher proportion of university academics than secondary teachers. This emphasis may give more analytical weight to university perspectives and shape how responsibility for transition is interpreted. Especially, it impacts post-entry expectations and institutional accountability. This imbalance can also influence how failures in the transition are attributed across sectors, an issue that is considered when interpreting the findings. Accordingly, the analysis focuses on how transition responsibility is governed and operationalized rather than on students’ lived experiences, which have been documented elsewhere. Future research incorporating policymakers, school leaders, disability support staff, families, and students would enable fuller examination of how responsibility for transition is allocated and negotiated across governance levels.

Semi-structured interviews may privilege accounts influenced by institutional role expectations and professional hierarchies, which can narrow the range of explicit critique in participants’ narratives. Rather than constituting mere respondent “bias” this phenomenon represents a contextually produced feature of the dataset that provides analytical insight into institutional constraints and governance logics. Additionally, the qualitative design limits triangulation between reported and enacted practices. Future research could address this limitation by incorporating document analysis and longitudinal case studies.

Finally, although the Partnership Operations Model offers a theoretically grounded framework for strengthening transition coherence, its components remain untested. Future research may pilot key elements using mixed methods or design-based approaches, with participatory and co-produced methods involving students with SpLD and their families to ensure alignment with lived experience.