The provision of consistent high quality home- and community-based services to children with disabilities living in rural and frontier areas is a challenge. Distance, weather, geographic terrain (mountains, canyons), and shortages of pediatric early interventionists are among the challenges to ensuring appropriate and equitable services.…

The concept of attendant care--provision of personal services to severely disabled individuals--is presented. Data from a survey of about 340 out of 718 consumers of attendant care indicate the existence of a mix of consumer-oriented programs. Consumer preference for a particular program design appeared to be governed by experience. (SLD)

The paper describes Quality Service Management (QSM) as applied to the provision of services to disabled and other special needs persons. QSM is defined as a systems approach to consumer relations based on the belief that quality care may be achieved only within the context of overall services management. Differences among "quality…

Seven papers are presented from a 1982 conference on interagency collaboration in special education. Participants at the conference represented a variety of disciplines. B. McNulty and E. Soper cite 14 critical elements of successful interagency practice in chapter I, including communication, conflict resolution strategies, commitment to an…

Developed to be a standard reference guide, this glossary contains terms generally associated with program evaluation and terms specifically employed in rehabilitation program evaluation. Target audiences include rehabilitation program evaluation personnel and the consumers of evaluation information such as program administrators, counselors, and…

The institution-based model for providing services to individuals with disabilities has limitations in both developing and developed countries. The community-based rehabilitation model was positively evaluated by the World Health Organization as an alternative approach, but the evaluation is questioned on methodological and philosophical grounds.…

This document is designed to be a resource for individuals and agencies concerned with the topic of linkages between education and human services. It begins with an overview of the topic of school-linked services, including background information and project characteristics concerning the long and somewhat unconventional history of collaboration…

Visits were made to selected respite care and crisis nursery programs in order to describe the programs and services they offered to families of young children with special needs and to learn more about the families who used the services and the staff who provided them. The visits to 10 crisis nurseries and 24 respite care programs resulted in…

This study surveyed how respite care services functioned for Swedish families who have children with disabilities and compared the results with a previous study made 6 years earlier. The study was based on a questionnaire completed by 245 of Sweden's municipalities. The study examined the quantity and quality of the services and respondents' views…

This paper describes a needs assessment instrument that is intended to effectively communicate recommended practice ideas for serving children with disabilities to teachers, families, and service delivery personnel. The instrument is in the form of a quality indicators checklist and utilizes 143 statements of recommended practice. The inclusion of…

This booklet gathers and discusses best practices for supported employment in rehabilitative facilities. The first chapter reviews the need to identify best practices and examines such issues as jobs, integration, and quality of life. The second chapter describes eight programs chosen as exemplary, providing data on program goals, average wage and…

Parents (n=280) of young children disabled or at risk assessed help-giving practices of early intervention/human services program personnel. Sources of variation in parents' assessment were related to differences in program models and not parent or family characteristics, and differences in parents' personal control appraisals were attributable to…

This article reviews definitions of quality of life; explores the subjective nature of life quality for people with disabilities; relates the concept to cultural norms and universal human values and needs; explores the optimal theory of personal well-being; and surveys the source and use of research and implications for planning and evaluating…

Measures of quality are now in widespread use across states as part of quality improvement initiatives. For example, many states are currently using global measures of quality that were first developed for research and practice purposes (such as the Environmental Rating Scales) in their Quality Rating Systems (QRSs). Although global quality…

This information package offers guidelines on conducting program evaluations to improve services. Though the examples relate specifically to respite care services for families of individuals with disabilities, the information is more generally applicable. In the first of four factsheets, titled "Local Program Evaluation," the form of evaluation…