Describes the South Dakota Rural Special Education Personnel Model which emphasizes retraining rural special educators as special education generalists. The project attacks three major impediments to personnel recruitment/retention, i.e., lack of community resources, inappropriate preservice preparation, and poor relationship with administrators…

Several problems exist with the rural knowledge base as it is traditionally conceived: (1) there is no useful rural definition with the diverse rural reality; (2) rural is undervalued as reflected in teacher education and training and in the stereotyping of regions in the country; (3) issues of sparsity, scarcity and size are disregarded, and (4)…

Existing models of supported employment (individual placement, mobile crew, enclave, and benchwork models) have limited utility in rural areas. The Black Hills Special Services Cooperative (Sturgis, South Dakota) developed an entrepreneurial model that addresses the lack of rural employers and transportation problems by creating new businesses…

Operating under a grant, the University for Man (UFM) in Manhattan, Kansas, tested the transferability of the UFM free university/community education model using four existing statewide delivery systems (public libraries, a private college consortium, a state cooperative extension service, an office of rural affairs) in five states: Kentucky,…

The design of a needs assessment model to establish the existing status and requirements of general and special education in eight small rural South Dakota districts interested in forming an education cooperative involved: (1) synthesizing major areas of need into workable components; (2) designing a needs assessment instrument based upon these…

The Black Hills Special Services Cooperative provides innovative and model practices for serving individuals with disabilities in a rural area of South Dakota. This article reviews the program's history and background, curriculum development, evaluation, and transitional and supported employment utilizing an entrepreneurial model of partnerships…