Results suggests telepractice is a promising service delivery approach in the treatment of individuals with ASD that warrants additional research. Guidelines for practitioners and potential directions for future research are discussed.

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I examine the role that administrators play in facilitating the development, adoption, use, and evaluation of scientifically based interventions within the school culture to support the educational outcomes of students with learning disabilities (LD). Two ways of transforming the administrative role to support science in the schoolhouse are presented; one considers the importance of including language in future legislation that acknowledges the role of administrators in school reform, and the other focuses on establishing a national research agenda addressing issues of leadership and special education. I argue that these 2 venues should serve to identify and to stimulate the use of evidence-based administrative practices that ultimately increase educational outcomes for students with LD, improve teacher instruction, and transform the leadership mission.

Perspectives of principal leadership behavior contribute to how principals and other school leaders understand the role of the principal in an era of significant educational reforms. A Q methodology was used with 30 principals, assistant principals, and other educational administrators working in a variety of roles and different types of districts to ascertain how the perceptions of the school leaders align with reform mandates. Data analysis identified one component that accounted for 41% of the variance observed in the ways that these administrators sorted 21 statements about principal leadership behavior. The quantitative analysis was completed as the first stage of the data analysis; the qualitative data were analyzed to triangulate and cross-check the results of the Q sort. The level of agreement among the participants demonstrates a shared understanding of the role of the principal and suggests that principal leadership aligns with the models of site-based management and instructional leadership that support educational reform.

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PurposeThe intent of this article is to broaden one’s understanding of program evaluation methods that are responsive to disability and take into account various approaches to leadership within a special education context. Program evaluations for special education have often been relegated to compliance reviews and results-driven accountability measures. By promoting approaches to leadership that embrace responsive evaluation approaches and are inclusive of stakeholders from often disenfranchised groups, findings may emerge that otherwise might not be visible with traditional approaches.Design/methodology/approachA synthesis of the evaluation literature from leading journals, books and edited volumes is used to capture salient concepts necessary for understanding the degree to which evaluation and approaches respond to disability and culture. Additionally, the literature on leadership approaches is summarized and presented for the purpose of demonstrating how situational and transitional approaches to leadership may enhance the selection and use of evaluation approaches that are inclusive of and responsive to disability and culture.FindingsFrom this analysis emerged four over-arching approaches to evaluation, each varying in degree of responsiveness to disability and culture. Further, when examining how evaluation interfaces with leadership, some approaches were found to be better aligned with particular evaluation processes and differed in responsiveness to disability and culture.Research limitations/implicationsTo date, little research has been conducted on the interface between leadership and evaluation approaches or on the degree to which leaders' implementation of responsive evaluation approaches results in improved outcomes for students with disabilities and those from underrepresented backgrounds. This article provides a conceptual framework for future research examining the degree to which one’s assumptions about the interface between leadership and responsive evaluation approaches can be demonstrated empirically.Practical implicationsFour recommendations are provided for leaders: the need to employ multiple evaluation methods that align their purposes, questions and methods; the need to recognize the possibilities and limits of evaluation approaches in light of their responsiveness to disability and culture; the utility of situational and transitional approaches to leadership in the evaluation process; and the critical importance of including stakeholders from diverse backgrounds in the evaluation process.Originality/valueVaried approaches to evaluation in educational settings have been extensively studied and discussed. However, few articles have examined the responsiveness of evaluations to the unique conditions that disability and cultural differences represent. The contribution of this article offers a situated synthesis of approaches to evaluation, specifically contextualized within a leadership framework, to better understand how evaluation approaches impact those with disabilities and cultural differences and the inclusion of broad groups of stakeholders. As such, this article lays the foundation for a comparative international conversation exploring how evaluation and leadership approaches responsively interface with disability and culture through inclusion and enfranchisement of stakeholders.

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