I have a certifications in SPED, ESL and English Language Arts. For the past 5 years I've been teaching ELA in a public international school (i.e. we are a school that works with students who were born in non-English speaking countries). Technically I've spent the past 5 years as a Regular Ed ELA teacher but would argue that most of my classrooms were really more inclusion because 1. I've always had students who were on IEPs for some language based learning disabilities or 2. I've had a bunch of students who definitely had some sort of LD but were undiagnosed. I'm in the process of applying to schools abroad and I'd like to move into Learning Resource/SPED positions. I did my teacher residency year in a substantially separate classroom and imagined that I would be a SPED ELA teacher but over the years settled into the ELA teaching life.
Am I a marketable candidate for resource positions abroad despite the fact that I haven't been doing it officially and directly for the past 5 years?
I'm also interested in hearing from someone about what Resouce/SPED positions actually look like abroad. I've read that it's more like SPED lite but what exactly does that mean?
Learning Resource/Special Ed
Reply
"Officially and Directly" are going to be the issues as youve identified.
Directly, you can always market yourself however you want, and while its appropriate to discuss your experiences and what your professional duties were (formally or informally), I think youd have a hard time selling it to the school. First, SPED is more then just the classroom, its a whole lot of support duties that occur outside the classroom. Second, the experiences you describe are no different and very similar to the experiences of most public school teachers, who have had undiagnosed conditions, or SPED students that were integrated into the general ed classroom. Its no different then trying to market your "lesson planing" as "curriculum design", in that they are common tasking requirements and experiences of any teacher. Essentially your trying to make something special out of something thats very ordinary.
Officially, who is going to support this? Is your head going to put in your reference letter that you had SPED duties and responsibilities? Is HR going to include "Special Education" in your job title and service record? What about what your school head and HR say if they were called and asked? Officially, the only thing you can really prove is that your certified in SPED, and if your school and district werent supporting you as a SPED teacher, you would have a big problem when your references were checked.
There isnt an IS anywhere (DoDDS schools being the exception, but they arent really ISs) currently that provides SPED services in compliance with US/UK/AUS/CAN law. Among them SAS (Singapore American School) probabley gets as close as they come and even they make a point to inform their parents that they dont provide SPED services in compliance with US law.
The issue is simply this, money. ISs are private/independent schools, meaning that they have to generate the revenue themselves to provide the programs that they do. In absence of government funding, SPED programs are EXTREMELY expensive on a per student basis. You have a very small group of SPED students, and you have to provide them a lot of services. Thats not a sustainable business model. So to run a SPED program a school has to pay for it, and with the exception of some small embassy grants its the parents that have to pay for a SPED program. To put it in perspective The average tuition at a tier 1 school is about $10K, for a SPEd program your looking at an average inception cost of $220K (this is the cost of creating a program without any students), with a distributive cost of $55K/n4 (this means the program doesnt roll out with less then 4 students), thats a lot of money.
Top tier schools though have a reputation and mandate to provide for the communities they serve. The question is "what price point can a school serve its students to the satisfaction of the parents, and generate revenue on those fees?" The solution is SPED lite.
As you increase the degree of disabiltiy you drastically begin to decrease the number of servicing students. The reality is that students with severe needs require more care then just SPED, they reuire a whole host of medical, psychological, social and human services, that are outside the scope of an international "expat" assignment. Simply, parents are not going to be comfortable taking an international assignment with a child requiring such a degree of care. What you see in the majority of a SPED lite programs are (primarily) mild needs students and (secondary) high functioning moderate needs (including LD/ED) students. By restricting services to this class of the student population the school can serve community and still generate revenue, simply because the resources needed to manage this classification of students is much less expensive.
Schools accomplish this by 1) There nature as private/independent schools allows them to be selective of their admissions. They can simply say "were sorry we cant admit your child, as we are unable to provide the services their educational program will require". 2) They are largely self regulated. Typcially these programs have minimal governmental regulation and oversight (such as privacy issues). They get to create the program, can change it very quickly, and typically have a monopoly on this segment of the student population.
So whats a typical SPED lite program, this is my experience (and it differs from other contributors on this site. Its usually a large tier 1 school, with an american curriculum (which may also be an IB program). The SPEd department will consist of a LS (learning Support) or SEN (Special Educational Needs) coordinator, who will be part of the junior admin team. The coordinator will work closely with the school counselor, and serve as the point of contact for outside third . professionals (doctors, psychologists, social workers). The faculty will consist (depending on the size) of full time resource teachers who provide "pull out" service. they usually work in a resource classroom, and may work one on one of in small groups of students. Typically you will have 1 full time teacher for primary and another for secondary, though of course there could be more. In addition you will have a number of part time teachers (though could be full time) of teacher aids/assistants who will provide "inclusion services" (part time is what really saves the school money (part time means no foreign recruited package, and local hires are much cheaper. jane student might only need services for literature and social studies class. no reason to have an inclusion teacher in the classroom for art, PE, etc if its not needed).
Where you will see the major differences is in documentation, procedures and classroom issues. Basically, no ARD committees, or endless amounts of paperwork. Before a SPED student is admitted the administration will send the application and supporting outside reports to the SEN coordinator, who will conduct a screening interview with the parents/student. Depending on the services the school provides, if the student can be accommodated by the schools service plan then they will privide an IEP or Action Plan to the parents (through senior administration) describing what services and limits the school will provide and what the fees will be (sometimes parents just leave). If the parents accepts then the student enters the standard placement path, with modification for the students IEP (for instance some students are served for some classes by being placed in a higher/lower grade classroom, though the IEp may indicate no more then one grade lower).
At this point the students SEN teacher will likely have a conference with the parent either prior too or shortly after the student is placed. On the first day the SEN teacher will meet with the student and introduce them to their inclusion teacher(s) and go over the students schedule, etc. the students general ed teachers will be notified, and any special instructions given. Heres where one of the big differences is, typically the general ed teacher has a much more limited purpose in the classroom with the student. The support (inclusion) teacher or resource teacher does the heavy lifting. Usually the student has outside instruction/tutoring time. You may be asked to give the resource teacher a copy of an exam to be administered, etc. The interruption in the classroom is very minimal.
The second main difference is paperwork and documentation requirements. The general ed teacher will typically not be required to do any more paperwork then what they already do for there non SPED students. The SEN teacher will typically do a weekly report, but its a brief report, a few observation, and an update on the students progress. Thats really it.
Usually every couple months the SEN coordinator will review the progress of the student and schedule a conference with the parents, which may often be a telephone conference. They will discuss the students progress and possible modifications to the students IEP. Thats about it. There are no ARD committees and rules and regulatory procedures. The SEN faculty may have a monthly meeting, though once a term or 8 weeks is more common.
Generally speaking chronically, the hot diagnosis are Dyslexia (which include a lot of other mild learning disabilities) and ADHD (which include a lot of other emotional disabilities). Acutely, the SEN department will see acute depression (life events) and muscle skeletal injuries (broken bones, etc).
Directly, you can always market yourself however you want, and while its appropriate to discuss your experiences and what your professional duties were (formally or informally), I think youd have a hard time selling it to the school. First, SPED is more then just the classroom, its a whole lot of support duties that occur outside the classroom. Second, the experiences you describe are no different and very similar to the experiences of most public school teachers, who have had undiagnosed conditions, or SPED students that were integrated into the general ed classroom. Its no different then trying to market your "lesson planing" as "curriculum design", in that they are common tasking requirements and experiences of any teacher. Essentially your trying to make something special out of something thats very ordinary.
Officially, who is going to support this? Is your head going to put in your reference letter that you had SPED duties and responsibilities? Is HR going to include "Special Education" in your job title and service record? What about what your school head and HR say if they were called and asked? Officially, the only thing you can really prove is that your certified in SPED, and if your school and district werent supporting you as a SPED teacher, you would have a big problem when your references were checked.
There isnt an IS anywhere (DoDDS schools being the exception, but they arent really ISs) currently that provides SPED services in compliance with US/UK/AUS/CAN law. Among them SAS (Singapore American School) probabley gets as close as they come and even they make a point to inform their parents that they dont provide SPED services in compliance with US law.
The issue is simply this, money. ISs are private/independent schools, meaning that they have to generate the revenue themselves to provide the programs that they do. In absence of government funding, SPED programs are EXTREMELY expensive on a per student basis. You have a very small group of SPED students, and you have to provide them a lot of services. Thats not a sustainable business model. So to run a SPED program a school has to pay for it, and with the exception of some small embassy grants its the parents that have to pay for a SPED program. To put it in perspective The average tuition at a tier 1 school is about $10K, for a SPEd program your looking at an average inception cost of $220K (this is the cost of creating a program without any students), with a distributive cost of $55K/n4 (this means the program doesnt roll out with less then 4 students), thats a lot of money.
Top tier schools though have a reputation and mandate to provide for the communities they serve. The question is "what price point can a school serve its students to the satisfaction of the parents, and generate revenue on those fees?" The solution is SPED lite.
As you increase the degree of disabiltiy you drastically begin to decrease the number of servicing students. The reality is that students with severe needs require more care then just SPED, they reuire a whole host of medical, psychological, social and human services, that are outside the scope of an international "expat" assignment. Simply, parents are not going to be comfortable taking an international assignment with a child requiring such a degree of care. What you see in the majority of a SPED lite programs are (primarily) mild needs students and (secondary) high functioning moderate needs (including LD/ED) students. By restricting services to this class of the student population the school can serve community and still generate revenue, simply because the resources needed to manage this classification of students is much less expensive.
Schools accomplish this by 1) There nature as private/independent schools allows them to be selective of their admissions. They can simply say "were sorry we cant admit your child, as we are unable to provide the services their educational program will require". 2) They are largely self regulated. Typcially these programs have minimal governmental regulation and oversight (such as privacy issues). They get to create the program, can change it very quickly, and typically have a monopoly on this segment of the student population.
So whats a typical SPED lite program, this is my experience (and it differs from other contributors on this site. Its usually a large tier 1 school, with an american curriculum (which may also be an IB program). The SPEd department will consist of a LS (learning Support) or SEN (Special Educational Needs) coordinator, who will be part of the junior admin team. The coordinator will work closely with the school counselor, and serve as the point of contact for outside third . professionals (doctors, psychologists, social workers). The faculty will consist (depending on the size) of full time resource teachers who provide "pull out" service. they usually work in a resource classroom, and may work one on one of in small groups of students. Typically you will have 1 full time teacher for primary and another for secondary, though of course there could be more. In addition you will have a number of part time teachers (though could be full time) of teacher aids/assistants who will provide "inclusion services" (part time is what really saves the school money (part time means no foreign recruited package, and local hires are much cheaper. jane student might only need services for literature and social studies class. no reason to have an inclusion teacher in the classroom for art, PE, etc if its not needed).
Where you will see the major differences is in documentation, procedures and classroom issues. Basically, no ARD committees, or endless amounts of paperwork. Before a SPED student is admitted the administration will send the application and supporting outside reports to the SEN coordinator, who will conduct a screening interview with the parents/student. Depending on the services the school provides, if the student can be accommodated by the schools service plan then they will privide an IEP or Action Plan to the parents (through senior administration) describing what services and limits the school will provide and what the fees will be (sometimes parents just leave). If the parents accepts then the student enters the standard placement path, with modification for the students IEP (for instance some students are served for some classes by being placed in a higher/lower grade classroom, though the IEp may indicate no more then one grade lower).
At this point the students SEN teacher will likely have a conference with the parent either prior too or shortly after the student is placed. On the first day the SEN teacher will meet with the student and introduce them to their inclusion teacher(s) and go over the students schedule, etc. the students general ed teachers will be notified, and any special instructions given. Heres where one of the big differences is, typically the general ed teacher has a much more limited purpose in the classroom with the student. The support (inclusion) teacher or resource teacher does the heavy lifting. Usually the student has outside instruction/tutoring time. You may be asked to give the resource teacher a copy of an exam to be administered, etc. The interruption in the classroom is very minimal.
The second main difference is paperwork and documentation requirements. The general ed teacher will typically not be required to do any more paperwork then what they already do for there non SPED students. The SEN teacher will typically do a weekly report, but its a brief report, a few observation, and an update on the students progress. Thats really it.
Usually every couple months the SEN coordinator will review the progress of the student and schedule a conference with the parents, which may often be a telephone conference. They will discuss the students progress and possible modifications to the students IEP. Thats about it. There are no ARD committees and rules and regulatory procedures. The SEN faculty may have a monthly meeting, though once a term or 8 weeks is more common.
Generally speaking chronically, the hot diagnosis are Dyslexia (which include a lot of other mild learning disabilities) and ADHD (which include a lot of other emotional disabilities). Acutely, the SEN department will see acute depression (life events) and muscle skeletal injuries (broken bones, etc).