Name: Taylor Allyn

Date: Nov. 13, 2006

Section: 319-101

I. Introduction: Preparing Highly Qualified Teachers for Students with Emotional or Behavioral Disorders; The Impact of NCLB and IDEA, written by Rosenberg, Sindelar, and Hardman (2004), is the article that is being addressed in the following research. Being discussed throughout this paper will be the impact of the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) act and how it affects the qualifications needed to be an educator in special education. In addition, this paper will tell how there has been a shortage of special education teachers who are qualified to teach the special education class. Also, how universities and other institutions are allowing alternative routes to becoming a well qualified teacher for students with emotional and behavioral disorders and problems. The reader will develop an in depth understanding of what and how the NCLB act has established and the requirements it has for special education teachers. This article has been split into many parts, looking first at the NCLB act the requirements that must be met. It continues on to explain how to prepare special education educators in how to deal with everyday events in their classrooms that may challenge their will. It ends with routes that can be taken in establishing a degree in special education, defining what is needed. For organization, there are labels established, these include a section of : introduction, brief literature review, supporting experiences and application, an opinion section, and a conclusion.

II. Brief Literature. The article Preparing Highly Qualified Teachers for Students with Emotional or Behavioral Disorders; The Impact of NCLB and IDEA written by Rosenberg, Sindelar, and Hardman (2004) discusses the No Child Left Behind act (NCLB) and how it places emphasis on having well prepared teachers educating students in the special education class.

By congress passing the NCLB, it integrated the government closely with school systems. This isn’t the first act that has been passed. Dating back to 1983 with the Nation At Risk act brought education and the government closer together. Over the last 23 years, more has been established with most recently the NCLB act. The NCLB states that no child shall be left out of education and that their education will be as beneficial with their peers. If this is not seen, the educating school is believed to be at fault. This effects many special education teachers because many teachers are educated in how to educate individuals with needs significant to their development. By combining students in special education classes with those who are in advanced or headlined classes, teachers must have experience and knowledge of what to do. All teachers must meet the “highly qualified teacher” standard established by the NCLB, especially in middle and elementary institutions. Not only does this include mainstream teachers, but special education teachers also. This is difficult because of a shortage of teachers that reach this standard.

Some believe that having such high standards to qualify to be a special education will cause individuals to withdrawal from this field of education. This has been a growing concern for numerous years now. The NCLB believes that requiring the educator to fulfill the “ Highly qualified” criteria makes the person fearful of joining. The individual is unaware of the fact that there are alternative route programs that excel them to qualify to be a “highly qualified” educator.

Alternate route (AR) programs are programs designed to educate the soon to be educator in their specific field of teaching. AR programs are shorter then regular education processes. In addition, they are based more on experience in the field interested in and are less formal. They allow the individual to go into the work force more qualified after they graduate. “It was found that 27% of special education and pychlogical/behavioral disorder educators have undergone a AR program” (2004) Alternate route programs are helpful to individuals and are being adopted more readily into institutions and universities. Thus having AR programs are helping special education teachers reach the NCLB criteria needed to succeed in teaching in their field.

III. Supporting Experiences and Applications: There were many instances in the text that can be applied to experiences and individuals in my personal life. In regards to integrating special education students with mainstreamed students, I can see this in my aunts profession. Being a special education teacher at Ironton High School, she was used to having a classroom of about 25 students classified as “challenging.” As of this year, Ironton High has taken her students and put them in classes with people their own ages. Her days now consist of going to different rooms and working with her past students individually in the classroom. By Ironton applying this kind of learning, they are fulfilling No Child Left Behind criteria. This also helps my aunt because, if one or more students she had last year were doing poorly, it was related to her personal teaching.

In addition, my aunt’s daughter is about to graduate from Ohio University with a degree in special education. In addition to just getting her teaching certificate, she has been placed in an alternate route program. This program has sped up her process of getting a degree up and given her the chance to experience first hand what criteria is needed in order to educate students in this field.

IV. Affective and Opinion: This article was a lengthy one which included a numerous amount of terms that I was unaware of. Nevertheless it was a brilliantly written article, including many statistics and information regarding its subject. Content that was included was comprehensive and interesting. The writers use of sections was helpful in understanding what was taking place and helped make a transition from one topic to the other.

The writers placed much emphasis on the No Child Left Behind act, talking about its history and what laws led up to the creation of it.. It did however give insight on the situation with special education teachers quite clear and understandable. In addition, a chart regarding the lack of special education teachers throughout the decades could have been more visually appealing. Any kind of visual aspect could have made this article a more noticable article.

V. Conclusion: This article explains many factors of the No Child Left Behind act and its impact on special education teachers. The authors explain what is needed for educators to succeed and not be penalized under the NCLB. In addition it talks of how universities are making alternate route programs allowing the future educator to understand their field of interest in a hands on experience. The writers did an amazing job of explaining the all aspects needed to become a “highly qualified” educator and what routes can be used achieve this.

Reference

Rosenberg, Micheal S., Sindelar, Paul T., Hardman, Michael L. (2004), Preparing Highly Qualified Teachers for Students with Emotional or Behavioral Disorders; The Impact of NCLB and IDEA. Behavioral Disorders, 29 (3), 266-276.