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Initiative # 3E: Regional Task Force Summer Action Grants for “Effective Practices Symposia on Supports for the Academic and Behavioral Performances of Learners Purposes A Summer Action Grant is awarded to the Regional TF to design and deliver, in cooperation with the SPDG Regional Field Facilitator (if identified) and network personnel, and with the engagement of regional high-need schools and regional effective practice schools, an “Effective Practices Symposium.” This symposium will: study the planning, implementation, and evaluation of practices in instruction, delivery of special education programs and services, and academic and behavioral supports for learners with disabilities that fit along a continuum from “research-based” to “expert judgment”; establish alliances that can extend beyond the tasks of planning and providing the symposium among teacher educators, SPDG identified high-need schools, identified effective practice schools, and regional technical assistance and professional development providers; involve preservice teachers in these activities, providing support to them in the challenge of learning about and using academic and behavioral supports; and produce an inventory of effective practices that are in use locally; display that inventory on the HESC website where it can be viewed statewide. Actions to Be Taken The Regional TF will form a planning group working with the SPDG Regional Field Facilitator (if identified) and structure, including regional technical assistance and SEQA personnel, to plan a summer 2007 symposium. The focus of the summer symposium will be effective academic and behavioral supports (such as UDL, RTI, and other locally identified practices) for learners with disabilities, taking advantage of documented practices that are successfully employed in local, collaborating, successful schools. Educators from effective practice schools will be solicited as participants in planning and implementation of these activities. Preservice teachers from regional teacher preparation institutions will be invited to participate in the symposium. Participants in the symposium will study the effective practices, the type of evidence used to determine the effectiveness of the practices; they will develop a strategy for ongoing implementation of the identified effective practices and evaluating impact during the subsequent school year. Records of participation and copies of products will be retained as documentation of the program and its outcomes. The practices will be added to the inventory of effective practices on the HESC website. The planning group will summarize and evaluate the summer symposium. [My Proposals] |  [Approved Proposals]