RECRUITING TEACHERS AND COOPERATING

IN TEACHER EDUCATION

Since the supply of properly prepared teachers in the field of special education. is especially limited, the State director should participate actively both in recruitment efforts and in the preservice education of teachers. To be able to participate he needs competence in the preparation of special education teachers and a knowledge of the essential preparation required of them. By knowing the goals, techniques, materials, and equipment needed in each special area, and particularly by being informed on recent developments and improvements, he can add to the effectiveness of the programs now in operation. He should have the ability to work with private and State-supported teacher education institutions in order to help them to improve their programs and should be able to evaluate fairly, accurately, and without bias the potentialities of institutions seeking to enter the field.

By close experience with institutions of higher education, the State director should be able to understand the problems of these institutions. He should have the ability to set clear and reasonable goals in teacher education and help the institutions to reach their goals despite all handicaps. The administrator should be free from prejudices and deliberate in his judgments, setting high professional standards above all else.

ENCOURAGING INSERVICE GROWTH OF TEACHERS

The inservice training of teachers in the field of special education is of major importance, both because of rapid technological changes and because of much inadequate training at the preservice level. Much of the work of the State personnel centers in the upgrading of teachers in service through extension and campus classes, teacher workshops in local school systems, and faculty meetings throughout the State. The State leader should be an effective "teacher of teachers” in order to bring to these meetings the inspiration and enthusiasm which will appeal to the group. He should be familiar with the latest materials and techniques of instruction and with the most up-to-date literature in each field. He should have access to and be familiar with modern research in the field of education and in medicine, physical therapy, and other disciplines bearing upon the education of handicapped children.

The administrator of a State program of special education should be adept at organizing workshops and other types of inservice meetings for special education. personnel; and he should possess the skill, the enthusiasm, and the imagination necessary to make these meetings successful. He must have the ability to select. organize, and make available the teaching materials, mechanical and other, which will add to the growth of teachers on the job. Furthermore, he should be skilled in adult education in order to work with parent groups and in organizing workshops and other resources for parent education. Only to the extent that parents

Making pottery is a creative and satisfying experience for these retarded children.

become partners with the schools will the work of the special teachers reach its maximum goal.

Besides knowing the local facilities for preparing special education personnel, the State leader should be well informed on out-of-State resources for teacher education in order that he may give sound advice to those seeking specialized preparation and may guide them to the best programs for their particular needs.

Increasingly, States are recognizing that the program of education for exceptional children is a total one and that it should be directed by educational personnel. As a result, the responsibility for the operation of residential facilities for the blind and the deaf is, in many States, being shifted from institutional to State department of education agencies. With this transition have come certain new responsibilities for the director of special education. In order to carry his responsibilities, the State director of special education should know the educational needs of handicapped children and the services available in day and residential schools sufficiently well to set up effective evaluative procedures for selective placement of children.

In order to be accepted in a leadership role as the coordinator and, perhaps, administrator of all educational services for the handicapped children of a State, the State director should have intimate knowledge of educational programs in both day and residential schools for exceptional children. Since the operation of residential schools involves housing, feeding, and caring for children 24 hours a

day, the State director should understand the problems involved and their relationships to the educational program.

There is increasing evidence that educational programs of the residential schools are becoming more closely geared to public school programs in an effort to better serve the needs of the handicapped child. The State administrator should understand the need for freer interchange of pupils between these two educational units and work as a liaison person to facilitate the free transfer of pupils to best meet their needs. To do so, he should be able to convince the public school administrator and teacher of the feasibility of educating selected children with handicapping conditions in the day school classes and at the same time cooperate with residential school personnel in providing for those who require 24-hour care. If he himself is convinced of the soundness of the program he espouses, he should have the courage to put it into operation and the leadership qualities necessary to make it work.

From his training and experience, the State worker should be familiar with the many problems encountered by those boys and girls, a large part of whose childhood and youth is spent in a residential school environment—the comparative isolation from the world, the often limited social contacts, the sometimes routinized program, and the long periods of separation from family and close friends Understanding these, the State worker should know what needs to be done to better the circumstances and how to work with residential personnel in order to lessen the unfortunate conditions which sometimes exist in residential schools.

Many excellent examples could be cited throughout the country in which every effort is being made to make the residential school a real home for the child Such schools perform a highly useful function which today can be performed by no other agency.

MAINTAINING INTERAGENCY RELATIONSHIPS

In every State and in every community many individuals and agencies, both public and private, are interested in and working for the exceptional children of the area. Among them are social, educational, medical, and health agencies whose overlapping responsibilities and interests sometimes unknowingly work to the disadvantage of the child rather than to his advantage. Some leadership must be available if these various interests are to avoid serious overlappings, omissions, or inefficiency. Frequently the State director of special education is in the most strategic position to serve as the coordinating link between these various services. Accurate knowledge and leadership ability, together with tact, patience, wisdom, and judgment are again essential. Even more, perhaps, the State worker should be capable of objectivity and be free from prejudices. He should understand human nature and the motivations which lead to action in certain directions rather than in others. He should be especially well-informed on the goals and objectives of the various agencies at work and their methods of operation so that he can best serve the handicapped children of his State.

Courtesy, Palm Beach County Schools, Fla.

Home teachers serve children unable to attend school.

PREPARING PUBLICATIONS

As leader of the educational program for exceptional children in his State, the director should coordinate, edit, and prepare for distribution a wide variety of publications in various areas of special education. While the writing may often be delegated to others, the final responsibility is his, and he should be equipped to deal with it. He should be able to recognize the need for certain types of materials and select those which he and his staff have the ability to prepare. He should be able to organize and plan the content of such publications, to edit the material, to advise and encourage the writer, and at times even participate in the writing. This work requires proficiency in organization, composition, syntax, and other skills necessary in producing a finished product which is interestingly writ ten, technically accurate, and grammatically correct.

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SELECTING AND DIRECTING PERSONNEL

In many programs of special education, there is at the State level a corps of assistants, each of whom is a specialist in a certain area of exceptionality. In order to select these assistants, the State director should be a good judge of men and women and should be able to develop adequate criteria upon which to base his selections. The ability to draw up such criteria requires a sound knowledge of each area of specialization and of the competencies needed by workers in [

each field. He should know the kinds of services which the worker will be expected to perform and the qualities needed in order to perform those services effectively.

Furthermore, he should be able to select staff members who will work together as a team in order that they may make each area complement the other in developing a well-rounded program. If his State does not have a civil service system, he should have the courage to resist political pressures in making his appoint ments and be willing to resist any effort to let appointments be made other than on merit.

When his corps of assistants is assembled, the director should possess the personal qualities of leadership which will enable him to weld the group into an effective, dynamic organization. He should be able to delegate authority and to hold the group to high standards of performance, allowing freedom for ingenuity and individuality, yet keeping the entire group devoted to the accomplishment of clearly and sharply defined goals.

SPONSORING AND DIRECTING RESEARCH

The administrator should be an expert consumer of research and, at times, an active participant in research projects. He should keep abreast of current research findings as they relate to the education of exceptional children and should have sufficient understanding of research methodology to evaluate the validity and significance of such studies.

The State leader has a role to play in the establishment of continuing active research programs which are likely to give local communities and the State accurate knowledge of the needs, of the validity of established or proposed procedures, and of the success of various programs. He should open avenues of communication which will lead to joint research undertakings; he should encourage the interest of university personnel and research foundations in the problems most pressing of solution and most fruitful of investigation.

Competencies Needed by State Specialists

In the foregoing pages, the major emphasis was placed upon the competencies needed by State leaders who are responsible for the administration of the State program although much that was said could be applied with equal relevance to