Improving Transition Services
through Personnel Preparation
Michelle Parker-Katz and Lisa S. Cushing
University of Illinois at Chicago
Presentation at the annual meetings of the Teacher Education Division of the CEC,
Grand Rapids, MI
November 2012
Project SET: Transition is defined as
…the movement of students from school to adult life
with a research-based focus on quality of life in the
major areas of:
Post-secondary education and/or training
Employment
Independent Living
Need for Personnel Preparation
A lack of special educators prepared with specific
abilities in secondary transition to facilitate students’
successful movement from high school to adult life is a
significant variable in poor adult outcomes for students
with disabilities (Benitez, Morningstar, & Frey, 2009;
Morningstar, Kim, & Clark, 2008; Blalock, KochharBryant, Test, Kohler, White, Lehmann, Bassett & Patton,
2003).
Issues in
Personnel Preparation for Transition
The content of personnel training about transition is difficult to conceptualize
and codify in that such knowledge is at the nexus of special education
content, adult services content, career and vocational studies, and
rehabilitation (Kim & Dymond, 2010; Kochhar-Bryant, 2003).
Teachers less prepared to offer transition support in urban schools, moreover,
often work with high concentrations of minority students living in poverty and
attending the lowest performing schools (Pesky & Haycock, 2006).
We lack a professional network that even loosely links community agencies
with schools and universities (Adams & Dunn, 2004; Shaw, 2006).
What is Project SET?
• Five-year federal grant from U.S. Department of Education, Office of Special
Education Programs
• Goal: prepare 56 highly qualified special educators to earn state of Illinois LBS2
certification as Transition Specialists
• Outcome: personnel with knowledge about transition and leadership skills to
improve transition services especially for high-need youth with disabilities and their
families
• How: three-fold process of 1) development of curriculum and program for
personnel training, 2) development and building of a network of related personnel
in schools, higher education, community, and state of Illinois, 3) evaluation and
research about the goals and outcomes
Project SET 2012 – 2017
Prepare 56 transition specialists in the following each year through this
routine:
Revise recruitment and admission as needed; build additional curriculum and
program work by aligning national and state standards; admit each cohort to
begin 3-sequence program in summer; graduate and entitle to the state
certificate each summer after
- Develop and present first annual Get Set Conference June 2013
- Begin year-long “Scholars in Residence” for early career support of
transition specialists. Aim is to support all graduates through in-school
and online work, and to prepare them to mentor the current SET
cohort
SET Personnel Training: Coursework
Summer
Fall
Spring
SPED 515: Transition
SPED 516: Transition Planning
Planning and Vocational
and Vocational Programming for
Programming for Students Students with Disabilities, Part 2
with Disabilities, Part 1
SPED 578: Internship:
Classroom-Based/
Community-Based Inquiry
SPED 522: Advanced
Procedures in Special
Educators as Consultants
DHD 535: Advocacy and
Empowerment in Disability
SPED 448: Leadership
Seminar
SPED 510: Advanced Curricular
Adaptations for Learners with
Significant and Multiple
Disabilities
OR
SPED 512: Curricular and Social
Adaptations for Working with
Learners with High Incidence
Disabilities
SPED 448: Leadership
Seminar
SPED 448: Leadership Seminar
**Scholars will participate in two additional semesters of “Specialists in
Residency” which includes peer mentoring and on-the-job support**
Community
Conversations
Dynamic networks of
conversation and
knowledge-sharing are
focused on critical
questions about a
mutually important
issue.
Brown, J., Isaacs, D., World Café Community,
Wheatley, M. J., & Senge, P. (2005). The World Café.
San Francisco: Berrett-Koehler Publishers, Inc.
SET Community Conversations
Organizing conversations with fellow
school personnel, students, families,
adult service agency personnel,
community organizations, employers,
and post-secondary education
personnel to discuss topics such as:
www.theworldcafe.com
 How can we, as a community, increase, promote and support employment
and self-employment opportunities for individuals with disabilities?
 What steps can we take to develop a more collaborative, person-centered
planning process?
 How can we work together to create a collaborative team to explore/create
links to provide community-based experiences for young adults in the 18-22
year old phase of transition to post-secondary life.
SET Personnel Training: Cohort 1
Demographics
SET Personnel Training: Cohort 1
Years Teaching
SET Network: Building a sustainable network of
relationships in Chicago and IL
Higher
Education
Community
Agencies/
State Organizations
Schools
Project SET Research
Research Questions
Sample Measures
Does participation in and completion • Illinois Transition Competency survey
• Interviews- pretest/posttest & yearly after
of Project SET improve scholars'
graduation
knowledge and skills in transition
• Archival data (Percent of scholars passing
competencies?
the LBS2 transition exam)
• Artifacts of work
Does participation in and completion • Interviews
• Archival and demographic data
of Project SET improve scholars'
• Artifacts
leadership and mentoring skills?
Does participation in and completion
of Project SET increase scholars'
ability to generalize evidence-based
practices and transition
competencies to their schools,
districts and/or communities?
•
•
•
•
Repeated measures with surveys
Interviews
Focus group interviews
Archival data-ITPs (baseline, as a scholar,
mentor and yearly probes)
Project SET Research
Research Questions
Measures
Does the scholars' participation in
and completion of Project SET
improve transition outcomes for
scholars’ students with disabilities
and their families?
• Pretest/posttest social validity surveys on
students with disabilities and families of
scholars
• Interviews and focus groups
• Archival data from ITP over time
Does the scholars' participation in
and completion of Project SET
positively impact SET community
stakeholders in terms of their
collaboration, direct services and
personnel development?
• Repeated measures
• Pretest/posttest stakeholder social validity
surveys
• Interviews
Does the scholars' participation in
and completion of Project SET
positively impact partner school
districts?
• Pretest/posttest partner social validity surveys
• Interviews
• Repeated measures over time Archival –i.e.,
promotion of SET scholars, length of tenure
SET Research Design and Methods
Surveys and Interviews (individual and focus groups)
 Items drawn from IL State Standards for Transition Specialists, Council
for Exceptional Children (CEC) Transition Specialist Standards, Division
on Career Development & Transition (DCDT) Transition Specialist
Standards
 All instruments will enable longitudinal collection of data over the
five+ year period of Project SET.
 Surveys being developed for community partners, and for students and
their families of those candidates who complete Project SET. Interview
protocols are developed for Project SET students and community
agency personnel.
June 2012 Baseline Data: Review
Illinois Competency Survey
 There are a total of 47 competencies associated with 7 standards.
 Standards and competencies incorporate Illinois State Standards,
DCTC and CEC.
 The survey is meant to be a self assessment of each competency.
 Item responses used a 5-point Likert type scale (1 = “I have yet to
learn about …” to 5 =demonstrates proficiency at the leadership level
Section
Items
Average
Minimum
Maximum SD
1: Foundations
5
11.07
5
18
3.99
2: Characteristics
of Learners
3: Assessment
3
8.79
5
12
1.72
8
17.57
9
25
4.57
4: Planning for
Instruction
5: Learning
Environment
6: Collaborative
Relationships
7: Professional/
Ethical Practices
Overall
8
19.93
11
28
4.16
6
14.5
7
22
4.09
13
23.64
14
39
8.30
4
8.79
4
14
2.49
47
104.29
62
141
23.26
Per Item
---
2.22
1.32
3
0.50
June 2012 Baseline Data: Review
Scholar Initial Interview (before entry into the program)
Four questions: What do you anticipate learning; any current challenges and/or barriers
to doing transition in your setting(s); anticipate how participation in Project SET might
impact work with students and families, anticipate how Project SET might impact
partnerships with community stakeholders
Initial Analyses
What do you anticipate learning in Project SET that could help you build on what you
do and meet your professional goals?
Enhance collaboration; provide better information to students, families, case managers;
be an advocate for students; stronger and better advocate for students as they exit the
high school setting; consider the curriculum and instruction that could lead to better
outcomes; develop better IEP goals
 Participants see these sorts of needs in their knowledge and skills as well as in their
work settings.
Project SET: Further Information
Project SET website at www.projectset.ed.uic.edu
Tabs include:
•Information about the program of study
•Information about “Partners and Community
Connections”
•Events
•Resources (national, state and local to Chicago
•Publications and project research dissemination
References
Adams, C. L. & Dunn, R. (2005). The status of transition services for secondary students with disabilities in Illinois: Interagency coordinating council annual
report for 2004-2005 to the governor and general assemble. Retrieved October 18, 2010 from
http://www.isbe.net/iicc/pdf/2004-2005_annual_report.pdf.
Benitez, D. T., Morningstar, M. E., & Frey, B. B. (2009). A multistate survey of special
education teachers’ perceptions of their transition competencies. Career Development for Exceptional Individuals, 32 (1), 6-16.
Blalock, G., Kochhar-Bryant, C. A., Test, D. W., Kohler, P., White, W., Lehmann, J., Bassett, D., & Patton, J. (2003). The need for comprehensive personnel
preparation in transition and career development: A position statement of the division on career development and transition. Career Development for
Exceptional Individuals, 26, 207-226.
Kim, R. & Dymond, S.K. (2010). Special education teachers’ perceptions of benefits, barriers, and components of community-based vocational instruction.
Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities, 48(5), 313–329.
Kochhar-Bryant, C. (2003). Building transition capacity through personnel development: Analysis of 35 State Improvement Grants. Career Development for
Exceptional Individuals, 26, 161–184.
Morningstar, M.E., Kim, K., Clark, G.M. (2008). Competencies of practitioners evaluating a transition personnel preparation program. Teacher Education and
Special Education, 31(1), 47 – 58. doi: 10.1177/088840640803100105
Pesky, H. G., & Haycock, K. (2006). Teaching inequality: How poor and minority students are shortchanged on teacher quality. Washington, DC: Education
Trust.
Shaw, S. (2006). Legal and policy perspectives on transition assessment and documentation. Career Development for Exceptional Individuals, 29(2), 108-113.
doi: 10.1177/08857288060290020201