Issue No.5 - Faculty of Education - The University of Hong Kong

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4 Welcoming Speech at the IASE Opening Ceremony By Prof. Nirmala Rao, Acting Dean, Faculty of Education, the University of Hong Kong CASE News 啟訊 It is my privilege and honor as the Dean of the Faculty of Education of the University of Hong Kong to welcome distinguished guests, Board members of IASE, Conference delegates to Hong Kong and to the 10 th Biennial Conference of the International Association of Special Education (IASE). IASE is a world renowned professional organization with members coming from countries all over the world. We are indeed honored and proud to have been chosen by them as the co-organizer of the Conference and as the venue for promoting professional exchange and stimulating international collaboration in the pursuit of excellence and higher quality in special education. Hong Kong is blessed with a unique and extraordinary location in history and geography in the development of special education. Historically, its long association with the United Kingdom provided practitioners with free and easy access to the wealth of research and advanced practice in the western world, while our renewed link with China after 1997 inspires us to search for innovative means to match current world trend to the developing system in China. Geographically it lies favorably in the heart of the Asian region and is the perfect hub where East and West meet. On such a fertile and favorable land Hong Kong has witnessed and progressed through many stages of development in policy and practice in special education and has been constantly sensitive and responsive to world trend in service paradigm. Our history of special education can be traced back for more than a hundred years with the establishment of schools for students with visual and hearing disabilities. Our first special school for physically disabled children dates back to more than 50 years ago, and since 1960 a special unit in the Education Department (now called Education Bureau) has been designated special responsibilities to look into the development and quality of education services for children with special needs. Our teacher education for specialist teachers in special needs education began as early as the sixties and has now moved up to graduate and post-graduate levels. With a steadily growing professional core dedicated to the advancement in special education, Hong Kong has been responsible for developing many innovative approaches in education services for children with special needs and for channeling advanced concepts and practice from developing countries to the Asian regions. We cherish this challenging role of bridging the East with the West and in disseminating our modifications of successful models to our colleagues in Mainland China and in the neighboring countries. International conferences are one effective means to facilitate such regional and international collaboration and exchanges. I am sure that with such a community of high-power and high-quality professionals gathering here in Hong Kong for the IASE Conference events, new visions, new perspectives and new missions will be generated, mapped and brought back to delegates’ homelands to sow the seeds of further advancement in the education for children with special needs. It is in this context of mutual fertilization and communal collaboration that I want to welcome our delegates again to the University of Hong Kong. While you indulge in the professional exchanges in the serenity of the University Campus, do not forget to venture out to witness and experience the excitements and beauty of the dazzling Pearl of the Orient, which is Hong Kong. Finally may I end by conveying my sincere wish to the Conference for its success and smooth running. It has taken IASE 20 years to choose Hong Kong as their host venue. I hope we do not have to wait another 20 years for the next one.
Volume 3, No. 1 第三期第一號 5 Feature Article ( From the Keynote Speech of the IASE Conference) Identifying and Supporting Students At Risk: Recommendations for Three-tiered Models of Support By Dr. Kathleen Lynne Lane, Department of Special Education, Vanderbilt University Dr. Kathleen Lynne Lane is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Special Education at the Vanderbilt University and an investigator in the Vanderbilt Kennedy Center. She is the primary investigator of Project WRITE, a Goal Area 2 Grant funded through the Institute for Educational Sciences. Project WRITE will examine the efficacy of writing interventions for students with emotional and behavioral disorders who are also poor writers. She is also the Principal Investigator of an OSEP directed project studying positive behavior support at the high school level and the Principal Investigator of a field-initiated project studying prevention of behavior disorders at the elementary level. She serves on 5 editorial boards including Exceptional Children, The Journal of Special Education, and Journal of Emotional and Behavioral Disorders. Dr. Lane has authored three books and published over 60 refereed journal articles and book chapters. Introduction Up to 20% of school age children have behavior patterns suggestive of emotional and behavioral disorders (EBD;Walker, Ramsey & Gresham, 2004). Although most often recognized for their externalizing behaviors (e.g. coercive and aggressive tendencies; impaired social interactions), students with EBD may also have internalizing behaviors (e.g. anxiety, depression, and somatic complaints). Without the necessary interventions and supports, these youngsters pose serious challenges to the school system as well as society as a whole (Kauffman, 2005). For example, students with EBD have high rates of academic failure and impaired interpersonal relationships while in school (Trout, Nordness, Pierce & Epstein, 2003; Wagner & Davis, 2006) and they continue to struggle beyond the school setting as evidenced by high rates of unemployment, negative employment experiences and continued need for mental health services (Bullis & Yovanoff, 2006). Given that students with EBD struggle academically, socially and behaviorally, it is important that schools address the multiple needs of students with and at risk for EBD. It is particularly essential because many students with EBD will not qualify for special educational services under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Improvement Act (IDEIA, 2004). In fact, less than 1% of the school age population is served in the emotionally disturbed category. Consequently, it is necessary for schools to be prepared to support students with and at risk for EBD in the general education setting . Three-tier Models of Positive Behavior Support Fortunately, there has been a movement towards emphasizing the school as an agent of change, within the context of three-tiered models of positive behavior support (Horner & Sugai, 2000). These models contain primary, secondary and tertiary levels of prevention. As part of the primary plan, school-wide expectations are taught explicitly and students are given an opportunity to practice and receive reinforcement for meeting these expectations. Students who are non-responsive go on to receive targeted supports in the form of secondary or tertiary prevention efforts. These models contain the necessary components to (a) prevent the development of behavior problems that may lead to EBD and (b) respond to existing instances of EBD with secondary and tertiary prevention efforts (Lane, 2007) However, many of the three-tier models currently in place are incomplete in two ways. First, often these models do not employ validated systematic screenings to identify students requiring more focused supports. Second, too often the secondary and tertiary prevention supports employed have not been validated to meet the academic and behavioral needs of students with EBD. Moving forward, it is imperative that researchers and practitioners should work to complete three-tiered models by addressing both of these absences (Lane, 2007). Systematic Screenings Central to the three-tiered model is the identification of “who needs more” – namely, systematic, data-based identification of students who are not responding to primary prevention efforts. Rather than relying primarily on teacher nominations to identify students with behavioral patterns that warrant additional support, I recommend that models be modified to included psychometrically-sound, systematic screening tools. Presently there are a number of cost effective, feasible, and valid screening tools available for use at the elementary level such as the followings: Systematic Screening for Behavior Disorders (SSBD Walker & Severson, 1992), the Student Risk Screening Scale (Drummond, 1994), and the Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ Goodman, 1997). Yet, these are but a few screening tools available for use at the middle and high school levels. The SDQ is one such measure available for (continued on next page)
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