KU News Release

KU special education doctoral students earn national recognition

LAWRENCE — Two University of Kansas doctoral students in special education have earned national recognition from professional associations dedicated to advancing educational standards and opportunities for students, particularly those with disabilities and exceptional needs.

Maya Israel of Lenexa has been selected as the 2007-08 Higher Education Consortium for Special Education Doctoral Student Intern. Christine Walther-Thomas, professor and chair of KU’s Department of Special Education, said the selection process for the internship is competitive among doctoral students from top special education programs throughout the United States.

Sheila Smith of Lawrence earned the 2007 Herbert J. Prehm Student Presentation Award, the highest student recognition given by the Council for Exceptional Children’s Division on Developmental Disabilities. Smith was cited for her work, “Interventions for Success at the Middle and High School Level for Individuals with Asperger Syndrome,” and received the award at the group’s annual meeting in April in Louisville, Ky. This is the second consecutive year that a KU doctoral student has won the award.

During the next academic year, Israel will work with Jane West, the government relations consultant for the American Association of Colleges for Teacher Education, consultant on federal affairs to the Higher Education Consortium for Special Education and a national leader in disability policy and advocacy. The pair will work on several No Child Left Behind-related projects.

“My main interest in the HECSE internship was the opportunity to work with Dr. Jane West, who is a national leader in disability policy and advocacy, “ Israel said. “I am hoping that working with her will allow me to learn how to effect special education policy change, which I believe is a crucial skill in the field of special education.”

Israel, a graduate of Wichita High School Southeast, received a bachelor’s degree in special education from Ottawa University and a master’s degree in special education from KU.

Before beginning the doctoral program, Israel worked for three and a half years as a special educator, co-planning and co-teaching with general educators so students with exceptionalities could be successfully integrated into the general classroom community.

Her research focus since coming to KU has been in the area of special education teacher preparation. Because of the tremendous teacher shortages, Israel said many school districts hire teachers who are not certified in special education. Some of these teachers may be working toward full special-education certification while they are actually teaching students with exceptional needs.

Israel’s doctoral project focuses on ways to connect novice special educators with veteran teachers, particularly aimed at developing a semi-structured program of mentoring through collaborative e-mail networks. She hopes the feedback plus the sharing of strategies and resources will better equip teachers to effectively develop goals and plans to address each student’s unique needs.

Smith’s work focuses on individuals with Asperger Syndrome, which causes social and academic difficulties that can interfere with ability to function in classroom settings.

“Sheila Smith has served as coordinator of the nation’s largest study on the characteristics of Asperger Syndrome, a project funded by the Organization for Autism Research,” said Brenda Smith Myles, associate professor of special education and Smith’s doctoral adviser. “In addition, she has been an instrumental part of a team that is establishing national teacher standards for educational professionals who serve students with Asperger Syndrome and autism, a project funded by the Autism Society of America.”

Smith said she was first “drawn to the idea of working with high-school-aged students with Asperger Syndrome. The students I worked with had the aptitude to do the work, but due to organizational and social issues they were not achieving success. I was able to test out some supports and work with teachers, and grades rose for these kids.”

She is coordinating the development of 60 online modules on autism spectrum disorders in partnership with the Autism Society of America and the Network of Autism Training and Technical Assistance Programs.

Students she worked with faced the added challenges of the middle and high school environments. In her doctoral project, she studied examples, then demonstrated ways to address these challenges, gave step-by-step curriculum suggestions for mainstream classroom settings and provided resources to assist teachers of students with Asperger Syndrome.

Smith received a bachelor’s degree in special education from Marywood College in Scranton, Pa., and a master’s degree in education leadership from George Mason University. She is the daughter of Robert and Mary Ellen Smith of Front Royal, Va., and a graduate of Canadaigua Academy in New York.

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