Training District Personnel as Peer Consultants and Inservice Leaders: Implementation and Evaluation of a Training Program

For the past three years, Furman University has offered training for special educators to develop skills as peer inservice providers and as peer consultants to general education personnel. By means of a personnel preparation grant, School Initiated Teacher Education (SITE) Outreach has involved 61 special education teachers, speech therapists, and curriculum specialists in a series of three graduate level courses designed to address development of skills in inservice content and presentation and peer consultation. Evaluation data were collected to determine the impact of the training program, perceived benefits to the participants, and the receptiveness of the participating school districts in terms of the incorporation of peer inservice and consultation activities into the ongoing instructional program. Findings revealed an increased stress on consultation in job descriptions and a clear preference for individual, informal meetings to conduct consultation activities for most teachers. (Author/CL)