January 12, 1999
In the 1990s, attention has turned a bit more toward helping those students become adults capable of dealing with the nitty-gritty problems of everyday life.
University of Kansas researchers Mary Morningstar and Jeannie Kleinhammer-Tramill can tell you why.
Morningstar, KU courtesy assistant professor of special education, said, "A big national study in 1990 found that five years after school had ended for them the majority of kids with disabilities still were living at home."
"A study in six Kansas school districts in the middle of the decade," said Kleinhammer-Tramill, associate director of the KU Institute for Educational Research and Public Service, "showed that about 50 percent of the graduates were working but they were at poverty level. They weren't self-supporting."
In fall 1998, the two women received a U.S. Department of Education outreach grant to verse faculty at other Kansas Board of Regents schools, and in eight other Midwestern states, on how to prepare public school educators so they can help students with disabilities make a smoother transition to life after school.
The grant is for $540,000 over three years.
In 1990, federal law required that schools help students with disabilities plan for life after graduation, beginning when those students age 16.
Morningstar became involved in the Transition Systems Change Project in Kansas. It provided in-service training to teachers on how to help their kids get ready.
"Then we did a survey of all the universities and colleges in Kansas that prepare special education teachers to find out what kind of courses and activities they were using to prepare teachers to help students with transitions," Morningstar said. "Nobody was doing anything consistently."
"A single class within a course might be devoted to the issue," Kleinhammer-Tramill said.
At KU, meanwhile, Morningstar and Kleinhammer-Tramill worked with Wayne Sailor and Gary Clark, of the Department of Special Education, to establish a certification program in secondary transition for master's degree students in special education.
They also conducted focus groups with special education students -- those with behavior disorders, learning or physical disabilities and mental retardation, for example -- to find out what students thought they needed.
After interviewing about 70 kids, Morningstar learned "that they are extremely optimistic about the future, but few are prepared for meeting it."
Students said parenting and consumer math classes helped them. "They didn't cite algebra or geometry or the sciences. They wanted to get out on a job, not just spend time in class. They wanted to learn about social relationships."
Kleinhammer-Tramill added, "Kids with disabilities must have access to academics, too, but all students would benefit if we stressed real-life applications."
Under the new grant, KU will offer the regents schools -- which already have expressed interest -- a series of options. First, they will help any school to replicate the KU master's level certification program.
Second, they will help the schools to adopt some, but not all, of the courses in the KU program or else acquire KU teaching materials to integrate into their own courses.
Third, the schools will have the opportunity to use KU materials in electronic or instructional TV formats.
The grant also will help Kleinhammer-Tramill and Morningstar to offer a summer faculty development workshop and to enlarge their current website.
The researchers say that their ultimate goal is for students with disabilities to participate fully in community life, including work, leisure, homemaking and postsecondary education.
Morningstar said, "One of the things we teach in our master's program is that we have to stop thinking about these students in terms of the four F's: folding [laundry], filth [janitorial services], food services and flowers [landscaping and mowing].
"Our expectation has been that those are the only types of jobs that people with disabilities can have."
Kleinhammer-Tramill said, "A recent reauthorization of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act prompts people to have higher expectations."
Universities and colleges in the following states will be contacted about importing what KU researchers have learned: Minnesota, Iowa, Missouri, Arkansas, Oklahoma, New Mexico, Colorado and Nebraska.
Story by Roger Martin, (785) 864-7239