Best Practices in School Psychology: Peabody Reintegration Project.

The debate about whether special education should abolish or conserve its cascade of services model has produced conservationists, who believe in a case-by-case approach to integration by which movement into less restrictive 'ettings is planned, implemented, and evaluated individually, and abolitionists, who work for full inclusion of all students with disabilities into regular classrooms. Because case-by-case reintegration embodies the individualization principle and is supported by federal law, it is the approach used by the Peabody Reintegration Project at Vanderbilt University (Tennessee). This project uses curriculum-based measurement and transenvironmental programming to boost students' achievement levels in reading and math to a point commensurate with mainstream expectations. The reintegration process then begins, involving recruiting the players, identifying the competition, scouting with a classroom inventory, developing the game plan, executing the gam:, plan in special education, deciding to reintegrate, and executing the game plan in the mainstream. Evaluation revealed that mainstreamed students' gains slowed down or stopped after reintegration. Classwide peer tutoring was implemented to make the mainstream setting more responsive to reintegration students and provide the individualization necessary for continued academic growth. Annotations for three bibliographic resources are appended. (Contains approximately 80 references.) (JDD) *********************************************************************** * Reproductions supplied by EDRS are the best that can be made * from the original document. . *********************************************************************** Best Practices in School Psychology: Peabody Reintegration Project Douglas Fuchs, Samuel Dempsey, Holley Roberts, and Anja Kintsch George Peabody College of Vanderbilt University U.S. DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION Office of Educational Research and Improvement ECM ATIONAL RESOURCES INFORMATION CENTER (ERIC) TMs document has been reproduced as received from the person or organization originating it O Minor changes have been made to improve reproduction Quality Points of view nr opinions stated in this dccu. ment do not necessarily represent official OERi position or policy Preparation of this chapter was supported in part by the Office of Special Education Programs in the U.S. Department of Education (Grant No. H023C10086-93) and by the National Institute of Child Health and Human l.velopment (Core Grant HD15052). The chapter does not necessarily reflect the position or policy of the funding agencies, and official endorsement by them should be inferred. We thank the special and regular education teachers who have worked with us on our reintegration project; and Sue Dutka, Jill Howard, Wendy Locke, Patricia Mathes, and Marcia Stewart, whose help has been invaluable during project implementation. Inquiries should be addressed to Douglas Fuchs, Department of Special Education, Box 328 George Peabody College, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN 37203. Running head: PEABODY REINTEGRATION PERMISSION TO REPRODUCE THIS MATERIAL HAS BEEN GRANTED BY is GL t 47 I TO THE EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES INFORMATION CENTER (ERIC)