Promoting self-determination is critical to enabling young people to achieve education-related goals and positive postschool employment, community participation, and quality of life outcomes. By developing skills associated with self-determination such as choice-making, decision-making, problem solving, goal setting and attainment, planning, self-management, self-advocacy, self-awareness, and self-knowledge, students with disabilities are better prepared to make purposeful decisions and choices. We conducted a meta-analysis of the literature on interventions to promote self-determination and associated skills with students with disabilities in the school context. We analyzed the types of interventions, populations of students with whom they were implemented, outcomes, and rigor of research. Results demonstrated that interventions to promote self-determination can be effective for students across grade levels, disability labels, and settings. There remains a need for increased focus on promoting self-determination within inclusive, general education settings with students with and without disabilities and of diverse backgrounds. Future researchers should also focus on the rigor of methodological design and associated reporting when conducting school-based research. Additional implications for research and practice are discussed.

Focused attention to the Common Core State Standards (CCSS) and college and career readiness (CCR) has been attributed to increased secondary school reform efforts directed at ensuring all students graduate high school prepared for adulthood. To successfully experience college and careers, students must have the knowledge, skills, and experiences associated with engagement in core academics, as well as essential nonacademic competencies such as growth mindsets, problem-solving, and interpersonal engagement. This study sought out insights and perspectives from national experts to understand the skills, opportunities, and supports needed to ensure students with severe disabilities are college and career ready. The study offers research results focused on initial insights supportive of inclusive postsecondary outcomes for youth with severe disabilities.

Supported decision making has received increased attention as an alternative to guardianship and a means to enable people with intellectual and developmental disabilities to exercise their right to legal capacity. Assessments are needed that can used by people with disabilities and their systems of supports to identify and plan for needed supports to enable decision making. This article describes the steps taken to develop such an assessment tool, the Supported Decision Making Inventory System (SDMIS), and initial feedback received from self-advocates with intellectual disability. The three sections of the SDMIS (Supported Decision Making Personal Factors Inventory, Supported Decision Making Environmental Demands Inventory, and Decision Making Autonomy Inventory) are described and implications for future research, policy, and practice are discussed.

The aim of this study is to evaluate 1st-5th grades curriculum objectives with regards to multicultural education principles in Turkey. To achieve this goal, document analysis of qualitative method was used. The curriculum standards of compulsory courses were examined by using Castagno's (2009) framework that offers six approaches for multicultural education. According to the results of this study, the total number of 2.44% objectives has been found related to multicultural education principles. There are not any objectives related with education for assimilation and education for social action approaches. When the number of objectives has been examined, it has been found that these programs answer education for amalgamation (0.51%), pluralism (0.93%), cross-cultural competence (0.89%), and critical awareness (0.67%) approaches. Overall, the programs do not include any objectives for education, for assimilation and social action; however, the curriculum did not appear to be designed to reflect the key principles of multicultural education.

No abstract

Purpose This article reviews existing literature on positive psychology, supported decision-making (SDM), employment, and disability. It examines interventions and assessments that have been empirically evaluated for the enhancement of decision-making and overall well-being of people with disabilities. Additionally, conceptual themes present in the literature were explored. Methods A systematic review was conducted across two databases (ERIC and PsychINFO) using various combination of keywords of 'disabilit*', work rehabilitation and employment terms, positive psychology terms, and SDM components. Seven database searches were conducted with diverse combinations of keywords, which identified 1425 results in total to be screened for relevance using their titles and abstracts. Database search was supplemented with hand searches of oft-cited journals, ancestral search, and supplemental search from grey literature. Results Only four studies were identified in the literature targeting SDM and positive psychology related constructs in the employment and job development context. Results across the studies indicated small to moderate impacts of the assessment and interventions on decision-making and engagement outcomes. Conceptually there are thematic areas of potential overlap, although they are limited in the explicit integration of theory in supported decision-making, positive psychology, disability, and employment. Conclusion Results suggest a need for additional scholarship in this area that focuses on theory development and integration as well as empirical work. Such work should examine the potential utility of considering positive psychological interventions when planning for SDM in the context of career development activities to enhance positive outcomes related to decision-making, self-determination, and other positive psychological constructs.

No abstract