As the United States' first disability-specific leadership academy in state government, the Leadership Academy for Excellence in Disability Services is a year-long competency-based training experience designed for employees who manage programs that impact the lives of Tennesseans with intellectual and developmental disabilities and their families.…

Intellectual disability (ID) is assumed to be a dynamic phenomenon influenced by personal and environmental factors. During the 18 months of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic, most day centers remained open for adults with ID who lived with their families (most of them with severe/profound [S/P] ID) but were closed to those who lived in…

Funders of social interventions that address complex child and family welfare concerns for highly vulnerable populations are increasingly seeking cost-effective and rapid mixed method evaluations of their services. This paper describes a mind mapping approach that was used to collect valid and reliable qualitative data from large numbers of…

Background: Research suggests physicians may harbour paternalistic attitudes towards people with intellectual and developmental disabilities and lack the knowledge and skills to work with them. This study examined the impact of a brief intellectual and developmental disability curriculum intervention on these outcomes. Methods: First-year medical…

Services for children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and their families have evolved with the advent of the Medicaid waiver, leading to more family-based coordination of care. Evaluating family involvement, the current investigation compared 230 families of children with ASD receiving Medicaid waiver services to a propensity-score matched…

Detrimental circumstances (e.g., poverty, homelessness) may affect parents, parenting, and children. These circumstances may lead to children being labeled "at risk" for school failure. To ameliorate this risk, more school and school earlier (e.g., Head Start) is offered. To improve child outcomes, Head Start teachers are expected to…

This study explored the experiences of Head Start parents who were becoming involved in their pre-school-age children's Individualized Education Program (IEP) process. Seven participants from the rural Midwest engaged in focus group (n = 2) or interview (n = 1) format discussions regarding barriers to involvement in the IEP process and…

Fathers make important contributions to children's learning and development; however, schools and community organizations consistently report challenges to engaging fathers in their work. As part of a larger community-based participatory research project, a local fatherhood coalition created and distributed a survey to learn how various…

Purpose: The purpose of this study was twofold: (a) to describe how the language diversity (i.e., the within-group variability in dual-language skills) of Latino dual-language learner (DLL) preschoolers was related to their science readiness skills and (b) to describe the importance of language of science instruction for Spanish-dominant children.…

Super Parents is a group-based, Extension-led parenting program developed to enhance the parent-child relationship. Implemented by trained Head Start staff using the train-the-trainer model, this effort is achieved by teaching positive parenting practices, increasing parents' knowledge of child development, instructing parents in activities and…

Background: Scholars in the fields of early childhood education (ECE) and multicultural education have argued that preschools are key sites in which children learn about race and racism. However, there is little research on how teachers negotiate conflicting tensions and enact antiracist approaches within Head Start (HS) classrooms that use…

Effective parenting experiences of individuals during the childhood years within micro-ecological environments are pivotal to cultivating good parenting practices in later adulthood. This study explored the parenting practices based on upbringing and the connections these practices had on children's proclivity to wayward and wandering behaviours.…

Contribution: This study contributes to scientific literature by detailing the impact of specific factors on the privacy concerns of citizens living in an African city. Findings: The findings reveal that the more that impersonal data is collected by the Smart City of Cape Town, the lower the privacy concerns of the digital natives. The findings…

This article describes a university service-learning program with preservice teachers who volunteered as tutors to teach in an adult GED program. The adult participants were involved in a local drug court program, which is a branch in the criminal justice system. Project Literacy Instruction to Further Education (Project LIFE) was developed by the…

Since 2015, more than 560,000 South Sudanese primary school children have received psychosocial support (PSS) through the USAID-funded Integrated Essential Emergency Education Services program implemented by UNICEF. Several South Sudan-based nongovernmental organizations partnered with UNICEF to train local teachers to implement the PSS activities…