Preservice teachers often have low post-school expectations for students with intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD), although the stated goal of special education is to increase those very outcomes. However, setting high expectations and learning the accompanying soft skills is a complex skill set to include in special education…

A service-learning pilot project involving occupational therapy (OT) students and individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD) is described. The purpose of this pilot project, developed using Transformative Learning Theory, was to determine if service-learning could be a viable approach to provide in-depth learning in areas…

A four-week global interdisciplinary service-learning project to Botswana, was developed to increase cultural humility and cross-cultural communication skills in 12 current and future educators of children with autism and developmental disabilities. Participants worked alongside peer educators in eight different special education units across…

The purpose of the current study was to address the research question, "Does direct contact with individuals with developmental disabilities positively alter college student attitudes toward people with developmental disabilities?" Subjects were undergraduate students from various majors who participated in an alternative spring break…

When integrated into pre-service education programs, service learning has the potential to influence teacher candidates' pedagogy, professional dispositions, commitment to teaching, and sensitivity to student differences. Teacher candidates may make biased assumptions about an individual with a particular disability label based upon what they…

Community engagement courses are becoming common in the discipline of information systems. In this paper the author analyzes the benefits and the challenges of an e-Portfolio in a course engaging students with a community of individuals with developmental and intellectual disabilities. The case study in the paper finds generally higher engagement…

Previous research suggests that high quality contact between people from different groups is a relatively consistent way of decreasing stereotypes and prejudices. The authors determined that a very short-term, service-learning project with people with developmental disabilities (DD) could reduce college students' fear of this population. In…

A pilot project brought 17 high school students with developmental disabilities to a college campus for job sampling. Participants were mentored by 23 college students. Preliminary data indicate the project had benefits for young adults with and without disabilities and supported the use of a community-based service-learning model. (Contains…