The objective of this article is to examine the degree to which different U.S. states have a special education teaching workforce that is racially/ethnically representative of students with disabilities in their state. Using the Teacher-Student Parity Index (TSPI), a standardized metric for comparing representation across states with different…

Students with disabilities are served by both special and general educators, yet teachers often feel unprepared to meet the needs of these students in their classrooms. Using data from a nationally representative survey, we examined the sufficiency of teachers' access to supports available for meeting the needs of students with high-incidence…

In the early decades of the twentieth century the question of mental disabilities was widely discussed in Italy, while the first special schools for the intellectually impaired were set up. An important role was played by the Franciscan friar Agostino Gemelli (1878-1959), a physician, renowned psychologist, and founder in 1921 of the Catholic…

This study investigates the performance of special education teacher candidates on key professional standards. Specifically, latent class analysis was used to identify latent (hidden) classes of teacher candidates based on their performance on professional standards measured by the "Special Education Teacher Test" for teacher…

Descriptive and qualitative research was used to explore teacher training, teachers' perceptions, and instructional practice for writing in inclusive middle school science (n = 22) and social studies (n = 27) classrooms. Data sources for the two parallel studies included questionnaires and interviews with 49 participating teachers as well as four…

Small special education programs (SSEPs) are composed of limited faculty tasked with educating interns dispersed across large geographical areas (Reid, 1994). These needs underscore a call for more flexible educational program options. Moreover, Kebritchi et al. (2017) found professors in higher education institutions sought a variety of…

Students who exhibit emotional and behavioral disorders (EBD) typically have high frequencies of disruptive and noncompliant behavior including physical and verbal aggression (VA). Physical aggression attracts great concern from school professionals yet VA is often overlooked, despite being a highly pervasive and harmful social act. We surveyed…

Including students with special needs in the general education classroom requires that teachers adapt their approaches to teaching to meet all students' needs. However, general education teachers are not always fully aware how best to serve special populations. This study examines what skills and knowledge special education educators feel that…

More than 725,000 of California's K-12 students qualified for special education services in 2018-19, but they entered a system that is often ill equipped to serve them. This brief summarizes the findings from 13 research publications produced as part of the PACE Policy Research Panel "Special Education: Organizing Schools to Serve Students…

Clinical teacher preparation programs often incorporate reflective practices to promote critical thinking and professional growth. The purpose of this study was to determine whether special education teacher candidates' reflective abilities changed from repeated exposure to reflective practice as they completed two field experiences. We sought to…

A review of current self-study research related to teacher education policy in the United States indicates that at local, university, and state levels teacher educators are affected emotionally and professionally by policy and, in most cases, feel that policy is something done "to" teacher educators as opposed to something to which they…

We report results of a national survey of secondary teachers who teach special education and/or English language arts in the United States. A total of 50 teachers from 27 different states completed the survey. In the survey, we asked teachers about their experience delivering distance and in-person instruction during the COVID-19 pandemic. We…

The time is now for integrating discussions of inclusive practice with professional development and school leadership, moving away from the normative view of inclusion as situated within special education and teacher preparation programmes. This study describes a triad professional development model that included an integrated professional…

Although special education professionals are primarily responsible for the well-being of students with intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD), these professionals often lack training in determining whether a child with IDD is experiencing pain. Pain that is not assessed or managed restricts student access to learning. This systematic…

Challenging behaviors are one of the basic problems that all pre- and in-service teachers have to be prepared to deal with in schools. In Thailand, it was found that challenging behaviors of students with disabilities had an effect on teachers' stress because many teachers perceived that they were lacking the knowledge and skills to deal with…