Required Reading:
Below are seven academic journals that discuss political issues related to special education. Some of the articles are Canadian and others written by American scholars. Your task is to review each article and then choose one to write a reflection.
The names of the journals and articles are:
- The Journal of Special Education (2005), Can Poverty Explain Disproportionality in Special Education?
- Inclusion or Exclusion: The Special Education Dilemma in Quebec Public High Schools (2004)
- Educational Research (2006), Disproportionate Representation of African American Students in Special Education
- Alberta Journal of Educational Research (2010), Special Education in First Nations Schools in Canada
- Implications of Charter Litigation for Special Education Policy in Canada (2010)
- Alberta Journal of Educational Research (2008), Voices in the Field: School Leadership in Special Education
- Educational Theory (2012) Defending Rights in Special Education
Module Task:
- In your reflection, briefly discuss the content of the article. This should be about ½ page in length.
- Relate the article to your own professional experiences and give your opinion on whether or not you agree or disagree with the article. Make sure you give informed professional reasons.
- Give suggestions that you think would help remedy the situation.
~ Post your reflection
~ Read all posts made by your colleagues
~ Respond to at least TWO of your classmates' posts
Total Online Hours: 10
INSTRUCTOR NOTES
To ensure that you do not spend time searching for these articles - PDF copies of the articles can be found in the Content Area of the course under Resources
_________________________________________________________________________________
I have decided to reflect on the following reading:
Special Education Legislation and Policy in Canada
Shirley R. McBride, Ph.D.
Senior Researcher
McBride Management Ltd.
Victoria, B.C.
smcbride@telus.net
The reading ultimately describes the implications that legislature about Special Needs Education and the legislature's impact on other documents. It is important to note that different pieces of policy and different Bills has made a world of difference in Canadian education. I was born in 1990 and thus would not personally know or understand what it meant when the turn of century brought about reform and change in basic human rights and freedoms within Canada as a part of constitution. What is highlighted as crucial information in the article is that the government has established policies that are built to support for students in need of accommodation and modification within their learning. The policies that are in place have the potential to achieve maximum effectiveness which would essentially produce an educational pathway that is individualized to the needs of a student who is struggling. In provinces it seems that there is no approach that uniformly governs/inspects the special education areas of each province to ensure efficiency throughout Canada. It is stated that some provinces have made it clear that the inspection of special education areas of the education system are being treated and inspected with more of a checklist approach when in reality they should along the lines of a rubric style inspection. In other cases it is important to recognize that the criteria in an Individual Planning Program or Educational Program is created in a way that has purpose to the student career and development as a student in the educational system rather than simply a student in one particular classroom. What I am trying to say is, rather than producing a document that states a student "is sleepy in class" or "will finish all homework on time in the coming year"; a document is produced that states what will specifically be done to help the student not sleep in class, "Student A will put up their hand to ask if they can use the restroom when they are feeling tired,"; "Student A will utilize their use of the school agenda with the teacher at the end of each day and have their guardian sign their agenda each evening to ensure that the student was present. Finally, in response to the lack of inspection taking place, McBride challenges the idea of the policies as infallible by providing examples of situations where the schools boards were taken to court and battled against for negligence towards a student with needs.
My professional experience strongly supports the beliefs of McBride to an alarming extent. I have taught using the British Columbia Curriculum for an extended period of time in a school of very high needs in regards to language and overall learning. At the time beginning, it was not difficult to see that the classrooms were riddled with students who needed varying levels of support. A good reason for that was that the parents imagined the school being better for students with special needs because of their flexibility with students schedules, support/resource rooms for students who struggled. This was a different experience for students who needed these supports compared to what they would have been getting at the local public schools. The school utilized a School-Based Team (if you can recall from the previous module the posts by colleagues who looked at BC's special needs programs), but the school based team essentially only took on cases that were put on their radar through failure/grade criteria. When a teacher had a behavioral issue with a student it was quickly disregarded (especially if students were achieving acceptable/commendable grades). This mentality of only examining cases of failures was a long term attitude that was held by the SBT team. Its not to say that if a student who was diagnosed with autism came into the school and clearly needed supports that he wouldn't be considered-but with enrolled students who were unidentified, it was something that the SBT was not interested in exploring.
In the article the problem for special education utilization and efficient execution of the program comes from the lack of attention spent on distinguishing what is effective support/not. The SBT team in the previously mentioned experience demonstrate the immediate problem that McBride describes by implying that the amount of (or lack thereof) execution/operation policy reflects that effectiveness the SBT would actually hold.
In regards to a solution, the SBT team, continued to follow through with that particular flow of identification criteria (grade based) for currently enrolled students but also began to create blocks of class/support for students to find themselves in the resource room instead of the classroom themselves. The students would not be fully withdrawn as they would still have 2-3 classes a day depending on the level of support/how many credits their current situation would allow them to sacrifice. In doing this the school began to take on teacher recommendations for students who were "on their radar" for any number of reasons-namely learning/behavior based. The school was still developing an understanding for SEL (Social Emotional Learning at that time). In creating an administration block for supporting withdrawn students and a support block for teachers who were not fully enrolled in classes for each block; also opening the block up to inviting subject specialists to come in on a voluntary basis to assist as needed or even just coming in to build rapport and good associations for students with the school environment.
Furthermore the article discussed the issue of measurable criteria included in the IPP/IEP's which is a legitimate concern. In regards to promoting student success it is not as simple as putting on a piece of A4 paper that a "student will" or a "student should" complete "Task A" by such and such a time. The reality is there needs to be reasonable goals and timelines set up for effective completion and follow-up by fellow staff, parents and observation of the school board itself in cases of review. In my experience I was never formally shown and or told how to effectively complete/submit a document to A) Identify a student (usually this document was introduced as document that was given to a student who was failing and to hand it to all parties); and B) Support student success. The document our SBT utilized in the beginning was attached for your observation but you can see here and example of what McBride was talking about. The school here does have all parties information necessary but is lacking the essential parts which is follow-up. This document proves superior to some of the sample counterparts one may see elsewhere around the province of BC for the reason that it holds some criteria that one may see in the IEP/IPP-however if a teacher looks at the way the document is used by teachers, its clear that the document is just a wasted paper unless utilized by the SBT. Usually when given out, it is not referred to ever again-no debrief, no closing, its as if its an exit/entrance ticket to the case pile for the SBT team.
The SBT team has long since ran professional development experiences for staff to introduce how to make the document effective, the problem faced after teachers learned of the true implications of (what we call an "I-Report") are now that there are so many of these documents that wholeheartedly go out, but have no real bearing on the student's failure or actual performance in the class. In some cases it is effective, in other cases it feels like busy work to teachers.
To overcome this feeling of busy work that teachers feel when given this would be a couple different things, A) Proper integration/withdrawal of students who are developing English Literacy skills vs. students who are simply learning English as a second language; B) Have the head SERT take on responsibility for follow-up in 1-1 meetings with teachers of a student in a group discussion/interview style of meeting; C) Establish specific criteria for each department/class what situations really constitute the delivery of an "I-Report" for a student (is the student really in need of extra supports; modification; accommodations? or was the student simply away due to the death of a family member and will be back and ready to participate in time?).
https://www.teachers.ab.ca/News%20Room/ata%20news/Volume%2042/Number%2016/In%20the%20News/Pages/Teachers%20overwhelmed%20by%20IPPs.aspx
_________________________________________________________________________________
I have decided to reflect on the following reading:
Special Education Legislation and Policy in Canada
Shirley R. McBride, Ph.D.
Senior Researcher
McBride Management Ltd.
Victoria, B.C.
smcbride@telus.net
The reading ultimately describes the implications that legislature about Special Needs Education and the legislature's impact on other documents. It is important to note that different pieces of policy and different Bills has made a world of difference in Canadian education. I was born in 1990 and thus would not personally know or understand what it meant when the turn of century brought about reform and change in basic human rights and freedoms within Canada as a part of constitution. What is highlighted as crucial information in the article is that the government has established policies that are built to support for students in need of accommodation and modification within their learning. The policies that are in place have the potential to achieve maximum effectiveness which would essentially produce an educational pathway that is individualized to the needs of a student who is struggling. In provinces it seems that there is no approach that uniformly governs/inspects the special education areas of each province to ensure efficiency throughout Canada. It is stated that some provinces have made it clear that the inspection of special education areas of the education system are being treated and inspected with more of a checklist approach when in reality they should along the lines of a rubric style inspection. In other cases it is important to recognize that the criteria in an Individual Planning Program or Educational Program is created in a way that has purpose to the student career and development as a student in the educational system rather than simply a student in one particular classroom. What I am trying to say is, rather than producing a document that states a student "is sleepy in class" or "will finish all homework on time in the coming year"; a document is produced that states what will specifically be done to help the student not sleep in class, "Student A will put up their hand to ask if they can use the restroom when they are feeling tired,"; "Student A will utilize their use of the school agenda with the teacher at the end of each day and have their guardian sign their agenda each evening to ensure that the student was present. Finally, in response to the lack of inspection taking place, McBride challenges the idea of the policies as infallible by providing examples of situations where the schools boards were taken to court and battled against for negligence towards a student with needs.
My professional experience strongly supports the beliefs of McBride to an alarming extent. I have taught using the British Columbia Curriculum for an extended period of time in a school of very high needs in regards to language and overall learning. At the time beginning, it was not difficult to see that the classrooms were riddled with students who needed varying levels of support. A good reason for that was that the parents imagined the school being better for students with special needs because of their flexibility with students schedules, support/resource rooms for students who struggled. This was a different experience for students who needed these supports compared to what they would have been getting at the local public schools. The school utilized a School-Based Team (if you can recall from the previous module the posts by colleagues who looked at BC's special needs programs), but the school based team essentially only took on cases that were put on their radar through failure/grade criteria. When a teacher had a behavioral issue with a student it was quickly disregarded (especially if students were achieving acceptable/commendable grades). This mentality of only examining cases of failures was a long term attitude that was held by the SBT team. Its not to say that if a student who was diagnosed with autism came into the school and clearly needed supports that he wouldn't be considered-but with enrolled students who were unidentified, it was something that the SBT was not interested in exploring.
In the article the problem for special education utilization and efficient execution of the program comes from the lack of attention spent on distinguishing what is effective support/not. The SBT team in the previously mentioned experience demonstrate the immediate problem that McBride describes by implying that the amount of (or lack thereof) execution/operation policy reflects that effectiveness the SBT would actually hold.
In regards to a solution, the SBT team, continued to follow through with that particular flow of identification criteria (grade based) for currently enrolled students but also began to create blocks of class/support for students to find themselves in the resource room instead of the classroom themselves. The students would not be fully withdrawn as they would still have 2-3 classes a day depending on the level of support/how many credits their current situation would allow them to sacrifice. In doing this the school began to take on teacher recommendations for students who were "on their radar" for any number of reasons-namely learning/behavior based. The school was still developing an understanding for SEL (Social Emotional Learning at that time). In creating an administration block for supporting withdrawn students and a support block for teachers who were not fully enrolled in classes for each block; also opening the block up to inviting subject specialists to come in on a voluntary basis to assist as needed or even just coming in to build rapport and good associations for students with the school environment.
Furthermore the article discussed the issue of measurable criteria included in the IPP/IEP's which is a legitimate concern. In regards to promoting student success it is not as simple as putting on a piece of A4 paper that a "student will" or a "student should" complete "Task A" by such and such a time. The reality is there needs to be reasonable goals and timelines set up for effective completion and follow-up by fellow staff, parents and observation of the school board itself in cases of review. In my experience I was never formally shown and or told how to effectively complete/submit a document to A) Identify a student (usually this document was introduced as document that was given to a student who was failing and to hand it to all parties); and B) Support student success. The document our SBT utilized in the beginning was attached for your observation but you can see here and example of what McBride was talking about. The school here does have all parties information necessary but is lacking the essential parts which is follow-up. This document proves superior to some of the sample counterparts one may see elsewhere around the province of BC for the reason that it holds some criteria that one may see in the IEP/IPP-however if a teacher looks at the way the document is used by teachers, its clear that the document is just a wasted paper unless utilized by the SBT. Usually when given out, it is not referred to ever again-no debrief, no closing, its as if its an exit/entrance ticket to the case pile for the SBT team.
The SBT team has long since ran professional development experiences for staff to introduce how to make the document effective, the problem faced after teachers learned of the true implications of (what we call an "I-Report") are now that there are so many of these documents that wholeheartedly go out, but have no real bearing on the student's failure or actual performance in the class. In some cases it is effective, in other cases it feels like busy work to teachers.
To overcome this feeling of busy work that teachers feel when given this would be a couple different things, A) Proper integration/withdrawal of students who are developing English Literacy skills vs. students who are simply learning English as a second language; B) Have the head SERT take on responsibility for follow-up in 1-1 meetings with teachers of a student in a group discussion/interview style of meeting; C) Establish specific criteria for each department/class what situations really constitute the delivery of an "I-Report" for a student (is the student really in need of extra supports; modification; accommodations? or was the student simply away due to the death of a family member and will be back and ready to participate in time?).
https://www.teachers.ab.ca/News%20Room/ata%20news/Volume%2042/Number%2016/In%20the%20News/Pages/Teachers%20overwhelmed%20by%20IPPs.aspx
