A Longitudinal Analysis of Shifting Policy Landscapes in Special and General Education Reform

Abstract

O ver a 10-year period, three separate, but related, statelevel policy initiatives were implemented in Vermont in an effort to reform special and general education through improving student performance and increasing the capacity of general education to support students in general education classrooms to the greatest extent possible. The first of these, known as Act 230, was designed to increase the capacity of general education teachers to serve students with disabilities and those at risk of academic failure in their classrooms, thereby reducing a perceived overreliance on the special education system (Kane et al., 1995). At the heart of the legislation was a mandate for the establishment of a comprehensive system of supports known as the Educational Support System (ESS) and within it, an interdisciplinary team known as the Educational Support Team (EST) that functioned as a prereferral team and a link to services and interventions available through the ESS. Other essential elements of Act 230 included (a) new and more restrictive eligi-81

The Sustainability of Inclusive School Reform

“…Previous work on the sustainability of both classroom specific and schoolwide reforms (Huberman & Miles, 1984;Klingner et al, 2001) emphasized the importance of the match between a reform and the policy context in which it is implemented. Furney et al (2003) concluded that high-stakes assessment was a poor policy context for classroom-specific reforms; our findings suggest that high-stakes assessment also proved to be a poor context for inclusion, a schoolwide reform. The third principal began at SMS a year before school grades were first awarded, as pressure to perform was being ratcheted up.…”

Is Inclusion an Illusion? An Examination of National and State Trends Toward the Education of Students with Learning Disabilities in General Education Classrooms

“…Evidence regarding the extent to which students with LD are being educated in inclusive settings provides critical information regarding how well the mandates from IDEA (e.g., LRE and access to the general education curriculum) are being implemented. Indeed, if these mandates result in little change in placement practices across states, it may be necessary to examine how policies might be altered to more effectively ensure that these mandates are successfully implemented (Furney, Hasazi, Clark/Keefe, & Hartnett, 2003;Roach et al, 2002). For example, Roach et al (2002) and the Consortium on Inclusive Schooling Practices (1996) suggested that systematically examining current state and local district policies can help shed light on placement practices.…”

A Framework for Inclusive Educational Delivery Systems

“…Conversely, the silos tend to disconnect most students who receive specialized supports under the IDEA from the general curriculum (Lombardi, 1999;Sailor, Doolittle, Bradley, & Danielson, 2009). Moreover, these students often receive instruction from teachers who, though qualified in special education methods, have little or no up-to-date contact with general education curriculum content (Brownell, Ross, Colón, & McCallum, 2005;Furney, Hasazi, Clark-Keefe, & Hartnett, 2003;McLeskey & Billingsley, 2008), but are still expected to participate in annual state assessments aligned to it. Indeed, some research attributes, at least in part, low performance in schools to education silos (Duncombe & Yinger, 2007;Timar & Roza, 2010).…”