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Monday, March 14, 2011

sample discussion of answers from interview/fgd by Yap and Adorio

Role of division office towards SPED-inclusive education

School-based management brought with it structural and role changes in the way
schools are managed. In answer to the question on how the SPED-IE programs are supported by the division office and how their roles and support changed due to SBM, all respondents acknowledged the contribution of the TEEP-IE project. SBM funds allowed the divisions to support training of school heads and teachers in IE. Yet, there were divisions where no training on IE was conducted.

Only two of the divisions in the study had consistently conducted training in IE for
principals and teachers. One division sent at least 20 teachers every school year since 2004 for training in SPED. One division supervisor on the other hand, developed a monitoring and
evaluation instrument to guide SPED programs in her area.

Stakeholder evaluation of their SPED-IE Program

The study also determined how stakeholders (school principals, teachers, and parents) evaluated their programs to include students with special needs and what quality indicators the schools used.

Individualized education plan (IEP). The IEP is the hallmark of special education. It contains the current skills of the student, goals for the year and specific instructional objectives for the year. The IEP is ideally prepared with input from a multidisciplinary team composed of the SPED teacher, the guidance counselor, the regular teacher, the parents, the student (for older children) and other specialists providing services for the child. However, in
the research locale, this team had hardly been formed. Therefore, the task of preparing IEPs for each SPED student was done by the SPED teachers. Sixty percent of school heads considered the attainment of the IEP goals and objectives an appropriate gauge of the success of their SPED program. Thus special education is considered effective when a student attained the goals and objectives as specified in the IEP. Conceptually, the IEP as the measure of effectiveness of special education is considered sound. “Effective special education would be
what produces results for the student, as measured by whether or not the student has achieved or made progress toward his or her own individualized goals and objectives as well as broader
system goals or outcomes” (McLaughlin,1993).

Another way schools measured SPED program effectiveness was parent satisfaction of
the progress of their child. A mother of 12 year old twins with disability expressed her satisfaction with the SPED program in her school with these words:

…as they grow up and go to school, I feel proud of them because even if they
are like that, they can do many things and that’s because they are attending
this school. Sometimes, they can do more than what my normal children can.

A very satisfied mother whose son started in a special class and was fully
mainstreamed in a secondary school wrote:

I am very lucky that BSC has a special education center to cater to the needs
of my child. Before he had tantrums… now he socializes with people. Before
he doesn’t like to be in a crowd. In the six years of stay at BSC he has
improved in his academics as well as in his behavior. He was mainstreamed to
a regular school after six years. During his first year, he was partially
mainstreamed at BES. On the 2nd year, he was fully mainstreamed. He
graduated at BES and now he is a second year high school student in a private
school.

The DepEd objective of increasing enrollment of SPED students in the TEEP schools
has generally been realized. The teachers reported 453 students identified with learning disability, mental retardation, and developmental delay from 2003 to 2007 among students enrolled in their respective schools. Another 115 new students with special needs were recruited and enrolled in their SPED programs. These students were then provided with IEPs.
Educational services depended on what the school could provide, i.e. pull out system, special class, or after school remediation.

In answer to the question on how the school heads envision inclusive education in their schools 60% of the principals expressed positive attitude toward the incorporation of SPED-IE in their schools. One principal who had just organized SPED-IE in her school said:

SY 2006-2007 was the first year of SPED ‘pull out system’. Some parents
don’t like to hear that their son/daughter was SPED recipient, however, this
year 2007-2008, some parents even recommend their child for the SPED class.
Since this has just started, LGU and DepEd officials should help in the
financial aspect of this program since it is a great help to our pupils who really
need our attention. (Principal A)

We envision that these children in our care will be given the best possible basic
education because we know some of them are very difficult to teach. Serving
these children takes a lot of patience and including them in school is our
concern and risk. We do believe that we can improve their lifestyle, and also
other children will learn to show concern and understand their differences.
Through this program we will be able to accept our role as teachers that the less
privileged should also be given equal attention (Principal H).

Another principal believes that SPED-IE is improving the performance of special
students in her school.

Although being new to this program, I have noticed that its implementation to
the Central School made a great impact on the improvement of academic
standing and reading abilities of students/pupils with special needs. In our
school, we identified these pupils with Mild Mental Retardation (MMR) found
in the classroom and we use the pull out system in mentoring them (Principal
I). There is still much to do in maintaining and sustaining SPED-IE in public elementary schools. Principal B wrote a very insightful comment on the implementation of SPED-IE:

The success of the implementation of SPED-IE in regular schools depends on
the attitudes of the regular teacher in accepting the special child. If the regular
teachers who are willing to be part of the SPED-IE program would have proper
training, I’m sure that the improvement of the learning outcomes of a school
would be successful. Not all regular teachers are oriented or trained about the
SPED-IE program, thus they have negative attitude in having a special learner
in their classroom (Principal B).

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