Maintaining School-Based Prereferral Teams: An Eight Year Study

Abstract

The establishment of prereferral intervention teams has become a recommended practice for educators to use to address the diverse needs of students within the classrooms. Although the concept of utilizing prereferral teams is widely accepted, educators are continually facing challenges at maintaining these teams within their schools. All too often, the teams are formed and operate for 1 or 2 years and then the teams are dismantled and their operations are discontinued. This article will explore the many factors that support and hinder the operations of prereferral teams. Follow-up data will be analyzed from prereferral teams within a tri-school district who have had their teams in operation for approximately 8 years. Common factors that team members stated supported and hindered their operations will be summarized.

A Survey of Response to Intervention Team Members' Effective Practices in Rural Elementary Schools

“…Special educators reported significantly more knowledge of the intervention team process than general education teachers reported. Previous studies have identified the following characteristics necessary for intervention teams to effectively assist students who are struggling: (a) all teachers on the team have knowledge of the intervention team process, (b) teachers consider all team members as equal in their expertise, and (c) teachers understand their role in the process (Burns et al, 2008;Hammond & Ingalls, 1999;Spear-Swerling & Cheesman, 2012). The significance identified can be attributed to special education teacher-specialized training in working with students who are struggling to identify needs and provide modifications and accommodations (Spear-Swerling & Cheesman, 2012).…”

Ethical Practices and Parental Participation in Rural Special Education

“…A primary reason for less participation is that rural parents have to travel considerably further distances to par ticipate in the special education process. Additionally, the lack of adequate resources and services makes it difficult for rural school districts to build and maintain ongoing collaborative relationships with parents (Hammond & Ingalls, 1999;Hammond et al, 1995;Ingalls & Hammond, 1996;Ingalls, Hammond, Dupoux, E., & Baeza, 2006). Additionally, these authors noted rural key professional stakeholders, such as school psychologists, speech and language pathologists and other related service providers, were often times assigned to schools that were not close in proximity, thus making collaboration with team members much more difficult Research has also shown that parental participation in the IEP process has yet to be one of equality and, in many cases, the relationships between parents and educator is, in fact, quite tenuous (Deslandes, Royer, Potvin, & Leclerc, 1999;Friend, 2005;Rock, 2000;Simpson, 1996).…”

“…Educators tend to dominate the meetings and parental input is not sought or fostered (Dabkowski, 2004;Turnbull & Turnbull, 1997). Additionally, parents in rural areas have less resources, such as parent support centers, educational libraries and parental advocates at their disposal making them even more susceptible to this type of professional dominance at meetings (Hammond & Ingalls, 1999).…”

Elementary School Teachers’ Experiences Regarding the Prereferral Process

“…However, the initial identification phase is of great importance in terms of focusing on all the students in traditional classrooms and identifying the students at risk (Noll, Kamps and Seaborn, 1993;Sindelar, Griffin, Smith and Watanabe, 1992). Following the initial process of identifying the students who are considered to be in the risk group, the pre-referral process begins (Hammond and Ingalls, 1999).…”

“…Referrals without any assessment or a written report point to the increase in the number of students diagnosed (Young and Gaughan, 2010) and thus to the related precautions to be taken. In our country, it is seen that the number of studies on the pre-referral process is limited (Tunc, 2011); that there is no governmental obligation to form pre-referral teams and that the documents sent before diagnosis by teachers to the Guidance and Research Centre (GRC) includes an intervention plan or the results of the implementation of the intervention plan (Bozkurt, 2009).Systematic interventions before the pre-referral process demonstrate that the number of applicant students will decrease (Hammond and Ingalls, 1999;Noll, Kamps and Seaborn, 1993;Young and Gaughan, 2010;Weishaar, Weishaar and Budt, 2002), and it could be stated that in our country, no systematic interventions are done for students found in the risk group. Without doubt, the key role in the development and implementation of interventions, or before the referral, belongs to teachers (Carter and Sugai, 1989;Dunn, 2006).…”