Perceptual Differences in Quality Standards among Teachers and Related Service Personnel Who Work with Students with Emotional/Behavioral Disorders.

Current legislation requires school personnel to identify indicators of quality instruction for all students—including students with emotional and behavioral disorders (E/BD). While competency standards provide a measure of highly qualified teachers, questions remain whether or not there are inherent differences in what is expected by teachers and related service personnel within the classroom. Given present emphasis on inclusive education and, in light of a succession of reform initiatives it is time to reexamine perceived differences in level of relative importance attached to knowledge and skills statements based on standards established by the Council for Exceptional Children between teachers and related service personnel. Perceptual Differences in Quality Standards Among Teachers and Related Service Personnel Who Work with Students with Emotional/Behavioral Disorders Among the most potentially significant aspects of recent federal legislation was the introduction of the concept of highly qualities teachers. While the importance attached to highly qualified teacher in Individuals with Disabilities Education Improvement Act (IDEA, 2004) and No Child Left Behind (NCLB, 2001) is noteworthy, emphasis on quality teacher preparation is nothing new. For the past six decades, researchers have examined critically various facets of teacher preparation in an attempt to find ways to improve classroom instruction (e.g., Bullock & Whelan, 1971; Bullock, Ellis, & Wilson, 1994; Cullinan, Epstein, & Schultz, 1986; Mackie, Kvaraceus, & Williams, 1957; Meisgeier, 1965; Scheuer, 1971; Schwartz, 1967). In fact, current interest in what defines a quality classroom teacher can be Journal of the American Academy of Special Education Professionals AASEP | Perceptual Differences in Quality Standards Among Teachers and Related Service Personnel Who Work with Students with Emotional/Behavioral Disorders 73 traced back to the turn of the century (Winzer & Mazurkek, 2002). Another milestone was a memo authored by Balow, (personal communication, 1971) and distributed by the United States Department of Education. That memo placed center stage the concept of competency-based special education teacher preparation and had a transformational effect on programs across the country (Shores, Cegelka, & Nelson, 1973). More recently, both the National Council for the Accreditation of Teacher Education (NCATE, 2005) and the Council for Exceptional Children (CEC, 2003) have spelled out the characteristics of a highly qualified teacher. Along with federal legislation, these standards reflect the movement of students with disabilities from more to less restrictive classroom settings and the importance attached to the general curriculum. The roots of competency-based instruction can be traced to the frontier days when young women who with only a high school diploma were charged with the responsibility of teaching all students at all grade levels (e.g., Whelan & Kauffman, 1999). However, the notion of highly qualified teacher did not emerge as an integral part of American society until the industrial revolution (Kauffman, 2005; Landrum & Tankersley, 2002; Martin, 1957; National Commission on Teaching and America’s Future, 1996; New York Institute for Special Education, 2002). Initially, the focus was on general education; later, it was enlarged to encompass special education as well. A succession of studies focusing on students with emotional/behavioral disorders (E/BD) emerged in the late 1920s. (e.g., Martens & Reynolds, 1932; Wickman, 1928) contributed to the establishment of professional teacher standards. These early efforts to better understand quality classroom instruction led ultimately to emphasis on teacher competency (Connor, 1976; Shores et al., 1973). The confluence of various social and political pressures, along with dramatic demographic changes served to alter the composition and subsequently the needs of students with disabilities—including students with E/BD. As the same time, researchers and others were advocating for sweeping changes in teacher preparation (e.g., Bullock et al., 1994; Bullock & Whelan, 1971; Hewett, 1966; Mackie et al., 1957; Rabinow, 1960; Scheuer, 1971; Schwartz, 1967; Zabel, 1988). In addition, national organizations, including NCATE and the CEC, began to develop a series of knowledge and skills (K/S) statements expected by first year teachers that have continued to the present (e.g., Reynolds, 1966). Institutions of higher education (IHEs) began to draw upon those statements to bolster the quality of teacher-training programs through competency-based instruction (Gable, Hendrickson, Young, & Shokoohi-Yehta, 1992; Polsgrove, 2003). Recently, the U.S. Congress authorized several pieces of legislation, a major goal of which was to boost the quality of teacher preparation. Two of the most far-reaching legislative acts were NCLB (2001) and IDEA (2004). NCLB (2001) introduced highly qualified teacher promoting a paradigm shift that would erase the legacy of an inadequate teaching force. The net result was that policy makers, teacher educators, and school personnel were charged with the daunting challenge of reaffirming quality indicators of effective teachers within educational programs for students with E/BD (Neel, Cessna, Borock, & Bechard, 2003). One of the more formidable challenges regarding identification of what precisely constitutes a highly qualified teacher relates to longstanding desperate theoretical assumptions and resulting expectations for teachers and related service personnel. Wickman (1928) was among the first to investigate perceptual differences between those who taught students with maladaptive behaviors (currently considered to be students with E/BD) and clinicians who served students outside of the classroom. Wickman suggested that the field look critically at teacher preparation and clinical casework experiences of support personnel to resolve contrasting perspectives of teachers and clinicians. Journal of the American Academy of Special Education Professionals 74 Perceptual Differences in Quality Standards Among Teachers and Related Service Personnel Who Work with Students with Emotional/Behavioral Disorders | AASEP Unfortunately, efforts to promote collaboration and coordination among teachers and related service personnel remained dormant until some decades later (e.g., Braun & Lasher, 1973; Friend, 2000). At the close of World War II, the burgeoning number of individuals identified as manifesting some kind of disability (e.g., Bullock & Menendez, 1999; Menninger Institute, 2005) prompted a surge of interest in the field of special education (e.g., Armstrong, 2003; Reynolds & Birch, 1977). The upswing in the population of children and adolescents with disabilities changed the trajectory of special education, resulting in an increased tolerance of individual differences (Armstrong, 2002). In sum, knowledge that emerged from decades of research, along with a heightened sense of social consciousness and increased federal support (e.g., Bullock, 2004; Reynolds & Birch, 1977; Wilson, Flooded, & Ferine-Mundy, 2001), had a profound impact on the field of special education. Historically, within our “two-box” system of public education—one for general education students and the other for special education students, special educators enjoyed a tremendous amount of autonomy--especially in classrooms for students with more severe behavior problems (Morse, Cutler, & Fink, 1964). Separated from their regular education counterparts, teachers of students with E/BD received limited administrative or other support (Balow, 1966). As Morse et al. (1964) documented, many special education programs for students with E/BD reflected a multidisciplinary approach to education and treatment. Within these settings, some clinical support personal were of the opinion that teachers should share some of the responsibility for dealing with student’s personality problems, while others felt that involvement in this area would cause more harm than good (Thomas, 1967). However, Project Re-Ed, developed by Nicholas Hobbs in the early 1960s (Braun & Lasher, 1973; Hobbs, 1983) triggered renewed efforts to repair the philosophical rift between special education teachers and clinicians. Subsequent legislation (1965; 1975) helped to lower longstanding barriers to greater professional collaboration and, at the same time, to address various aspects of teacher preparation (e.g., PL 89-36 [National Technical Institute of the Deaf Act of 1965]; PL 89-329 [Higher Education Act of 1965]; PL 94-142 [Education of All Handicapped Children Act of 1975]; PL 102-119 [Individuals with Disabilities Education Act Amendments of 1991]; PL 105-17 [Individuals with Disabilities Education Act Amendments of 1997]; PL 108-446 [Individuals with Disabilities Education Improvement Act of 2004]. Across time, neither major reform efforts nor national or state-level initiatives on behalf of students with E/BD did much to resolve perceptual differences among teachers and related service personnel. For example, Knitzer, Steinberg, and Fleisch (1990) reaffirmed the strained relationship between teachers and mental health professionals previously reported by Cullinan, et al. (1986). Knitzer and her colleague’s (1990) condemned the poor educational services for students with E/BD and asserted that there was a desperate need for highly qualified professionals who possessed the knowledge and skills to address their unique needs. With the recent passage of NCLB (2001), we witnessed a renewed push for consistent standards that define effective classroom practices (Interstate New Teacher Assessment and Support Consortium [INTASC], 2001). In an effort to develop objective measures of effective teaching, INTASC merged into a single document the two lists of teacher knowledge/skill standards for special education and general education. The special education core values were