There are many barriers to collaborative planning between music educators and special education paraprofessionals (SEPs). While allocated collaborative planning time would be best, the reality for many music educators and SEPs is that they are not given this time. I provide three alternatives to collaborative planning that were suggested by music…

We use over 25 years of longitudinal data from Washington state to provide a descriptive portrait of the paraeducator workforce in the state. Paraeducators are more racially and ethnically diverse than special education teachers, particularly in the last decade, and tend to be less experienced. They also have full-time salaries that are about half…

Paraprofessional support is increasingly implemented in schools as part of inclusive school development in many countries, primarily for students with Special Educational Needs. Educational research has shown growing interest in paraprofessional support in inclusive schools, focusing on the conceptual design and professionalization of this…

The purpose of the study was to develop a preliminary instrument to ascertain the perceived competence, autonomy, and relatedness of special education paraprofessionals in elementary physical education. The Physical Education Competence Scale for Paraprofessionals (PECSP) was created from a list of paraprofessional competencies and with expert…

Purpose: In this paper we investigate school district staffing challenges during the 2021-22 school year, the second school year of the COVID-19 pandemic. Research Methods/Approach: We use novel data from Washington state collected by scraping websites for job postings during the 2021-22 school year; the districts represented in the study serve…

The purpose of this quantitative correlational study is to determine if a relationship exists between paraeducator perceived self-efficacy and the transformational leadership behaviors of building trust, acting with integrity, encouraging others, encouraging innovative thinking, and coaching and developing people displayed by the special education…

Due to a variety of factors, many paraeducators receive little to no opportunities to advance their professional skills. Asynchronous online learning opportunities offer a flexible way for districts to provide paraeducators opportunities to advance their knowledge, although little is known about what online resources are available, their features,…

Across the United States, many districts find themselves short on bilingual teachers. More than half of the states face a shortage of such teachers, with shortages most acute in states that provide bilingual education to the greatest numbers of English learners. Bilingual and dual-language education have proven to have a positive effect on the…

Trends in the supplementary aids and services (SAS) written in individualized education programs (IEPs) for students with significant disabilities (a) in different educational placements, (b) with and without behavior support plans (BSP), and (c) with and without complex communication needs (CCN) are examined using multivariate analysis of…

Public school leaders struggle to find teachers to fill the vacancies in America's classrooms. The teacher shortage crisis is a result of many overlapping causes which include the disparity in resources to attract potential teachers, a declining enrollment in teacher preparatory programs, a lack of teachers certified to teach critical shortage…

Significant international attention has been paid to teachers' attitudes and the variables affecting them, as these are considered crucial for successful inclusive education. This article reports on an investigation of Early Childhood Care and Education (ECCE) teachers' attitudes to the inclusion of children with special educational needs (SEN) in…

Intervention fidelity is crucial in ensuring efficient and quality support for students in need. Some coaching strategies have evidenced positive impacts on intervention fidelity and virtual coaching has been emerging in recent years, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic. However, current literature is still limited in examining the effects of…

Purpose: This survey study examined factors that may influence interprofessional collaboration in schools to support children with oral and written language impairments, namely, knowledge, collaborative beliefs and practices, and resources. Method: A survey was conducted across 319 school-based professionals, in a partnering public school…

Background: Teaching assistants (TAs) are taking increasing responsibility for the learning of pupils. A key instructional skill for TAs is the ability to scaffold learning. Aim: To explore the interactions of TAs in relation to scaffolding as a theory of instruction. Methods: Observational data in the form of video were collected. Conversation…

The purpose of the present study was to assess the impact of coaching with performance feedback from teachers on accuracy of paraeducators' momentary time sampling (MTS) data of students' on-task behavior. Two lead teachers and three paraeducators participated in the study. The relation between coaching and accuracy of the data collection was…