Date of Award

Spring 5-1-2006

Document Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

Department

Educational Leadership

First Advisor

Robert L. Boyd

Second Advisor

Maurice Miller

Third Advisor

Stephen Gruenert

Abstract

A school's transition to include more special education students in regular classrooms is a fundamental change that impacts all faculty, staff, and students. The purpose of this study was to consider inclusion of middle school special education students in regular classrooms from the perspective of principals, special education teachers and regular education teachers. From these three perspectives, best practices for inclusion, barriers and supports to inclusion, and the principal's role as change agent when moving a middle school towards inclusion were investigated. One-hundred Indiana middle schools were randomly selected. Surveys were sent to the principal, one special education and one regular education teacher at each of those schools. Fifty-nine principals, 55 regular education teachers, and 70 special education teachers from 91 schools responded. The surveys collected demographic data and addressed four theoretical constructs that were developed from a review of the literature and included (1) Principal's Role, (2) Organizational Support, (3) Best Practices and (4) Barriers. SPSS software was used to compute the data collected from the surveys. A factorial ANOV A model was used. Four construct variables, each having a number of questions associated with them, were combined over a construct into a composite dependent variable, with a total of four dependent variables for four constructs: (l) Principal's Role, (2) Organizational Support, (3) Best Practices and (4) Barriers. All three groups were in agreement regarding best practices, but neither teacher group was in agreement with the principals with regard to the principal's role, organizational support and barriers.

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