Reinventing Schools Research Project: Collaborative Research Project on the Merger of General and Special Education School Reforms. Final Report--Executive Summary (Long Version)

This final report describes the activities and outcomes of a federally-funded project that investigated how the inclusion of students with severe and other disabilities merges with larger efforts of educators, administrators, and parents to restructure and reform schools, and how to influence the directions of that merger. The project explored how school personnel blend together their reform agendas of both general and special education in 25 schools in 3 districts, and validated a set of procures of redesigning curriculum/teaching, ensuring student learning outcomes, and fostering student membership for maximally diverse groups of learners, including learners with severe disabilities. Results from the research indicate that durable change in the core of educational practice to include all students, involves three areas where action and attention is shifting: (1) from a focus on teaching to a focus on learning; (2) from a reliance on individual teacher practice to group practices; and (3) from an effort to "deliver service" to one of "providing learner supports." Attachments to the report include school products, articles and project products, including articles on inclusion and modules for designing classroom curriculum for personalized learning, and a problem-finding and problem-solving strategy. (Contains 53 references.) (CR)