‘Landmark’ course launched for special education

‘Landmark’ course launched for special education

Jenny Tippett's son was eight years old when the so-called mainstreaming law was passed allowing children with disabilities and special needs to attend state schools.

However, it was not until he was 14 that he was diagnosed with Asperger's syndrome and began to receive help. Prior to that he was bullied and teased by pupils and misunderstood by teachers who thought he was lazy and non-compliant.

Today he is a a successful, happy 29-year-old who works fulltime for a government agency and his mother, who works in special education, has just enrolled in a new Postgraduate Diploma in Specialist Teaching that aims to overcome the barriers special needs and gifted children still face in large parts of the education system.

The two-year diploma, being offered this year by the University's College of Education at Albany, aims to dramatically boost the delivery of special education, which a government review in 2009 found was being offered successfully by only half of New Zealand’s schools.

Mrs Tippett, from New Plymouth, is one of 180 special education teachers enrolled for the diploma. Already qualified, with a Master of Education degree, she is doing the programme “so that no other children replicate my son’s experiences at school”.

“He started school with enthusiasm – he was exceptionally bright and a high achiever in some areas, like reading, but he couldn’t write. Teachers thought he was lazy and non-compliant. He was socially clumsy, and was a truant a lot of the time because of bullying and teasing. The change of attitude and understanding he received at the end of his schooling made a huge difference. He was able to sit exams in the seventh form with the help of a writer.”

The University is working in partnership with the Ministry of Education and the University of Canterbury to provide the programme in alignment with the Government campaign launched last year, called Success for all – every school, every child.

Ministry special education strategy group manager Brian Coffey says that in the past two decades a new generation of parents has come to have greater expectations that special needs children will be able to participate and achieve. “Underachievement in special education has been a function of low expectations in the past,” Mr Coffey says.

Massey Associate Professor Jill Bevan-Brown, who helped develop the course, says it should enable all schools to successfully deliver special education. Dr Bevan-Brown, from the College of Education, says the programme is designed to reduce the isolation that can exist between specialists who work in the area of special and inclusive education.

College Pro-Vice Chancellor Professor James Chapman says it represents an “innovative landmark” in New Zealand special and inclusive education. “Nationally and internationally-recognised experts in a range of special and inclusive education fields have contributed to the development of this new programme.”

Programme coordinator Dr Mandia Mentis says developments include an online teaching resource to complement block courses, increased cultural responsive to pupils from diverse backgrounds, and a focus on inter-professional collaboration. Six specialist areas covered in the programme are learning and behaviour, autistic spectrum disorder, blind and vision impairment, gifted and talented, deaf and hearing impairment and early intervention.

The first intake for the two-year qualification has 180 special education teachers enrolled. They will undertake a programme focussing on inter-professional practice and developing research-based knowledge to build teaching capacity, which experts say is a major breakthrough for children with disabilities and special needs, as well as gifted children.

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