THE STORY OF RESTRUCTURING THE INSTRUCTIONAL SUPPORT TEAM
Tammy S. Cavanaugh, Ed.D.
University of Pittsburgh, 2006
Dr. Charles J. Gorman, Advisor ___
This study provides the story of one school districts experiences with a mandated program, the Instructional Support Team (IST), which was initiated with external funds. The program was implemented and validated to meet regulatory requirements and designed to provide support services to students in need. Eventually, the funding was removed and the mandate lifted; however, the concept remained. Local Education Agencies were provided the option to sustain the support services as validated or restructure the program. The district in this study restructured the program and sustained many of the support services. The purpose of the study was to provide an in-depth analysis of the accomplishments, obstacles, and future implications of the current screening team that were lifted from the IST concept when funds were removed and what were the implications of the change for student support services.
A major accomplishment was sustaining many of the support services for children even with the elimination of funding and the position of the IST instructor. Other accomplishments included ongoing collaboration with parents, teachers, and outside agencies. This was done in an attempt to meet student needs in the least restrictive environment (LRE). As long as the needs of the student were met, the student was maintained in the general education setting. The continued use of technology and curriculum integration in every elementary classroom provided
classroom provided opportunity for students to work at their own instructional level. A Study Buddy Program was developed in one elementary building to assist in providing individualized student assistance.
The obstacles included expediently fulfilling many of the activities of the IST instructor, time management, and not as much individual student or instructor assistance.
This study illustrates that change is ongoing and redefines many concepts in a system. Successful implementation does not predict the continuation of a program initiated with external funds. However, this district was able to sustain many of the student support services by restructuring the IST.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:PITT/oai:PITTETD:etd-12192006-141904 |
| Date | 29 January 2007 |
| Creators | Cavanaugh, Tammy S. |
| Contributors | Dr. Charles Gorman, Mr. Robert Nagy, Dr. Charlene Trovato, Dr. Maureen McClure |
| Publisher | University of Pittsburgh |
| Source Sets | University of Pittsburgh |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Source | http://etd.library.pitt.edu/ETD/available/etd-12192006-141904/ |
| Rights | unrestricted, I hereby certify that, if appropriate, I have obtained and attached hereto a written permission statement from the owner(s) of each third party copyrighted matter to be included in my thesis, dissertation, or project report, allowing distribution as specified below. I certify that the version I submitted is the same as that approved by my advisory committee. I hereby grant to University of Pittsburgh or its agents the non-exclusive license to archive and make accessible, under the conditions specified below, my thesis, dissertation, or project report in whole or in part in all forms of media, now or hereafter known. I retain all other ownership rights to the copyright of the thesis, dissertation or project report. I also retain the right to use in future works (such as articles or books) all or part of this thesis, dissertation, or project report. |
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