Principals Don’t Always Understand Special Education. That’s a Problem

One main responsibility for principals: supporting their teachers. But some special education teachers, who deal with heavy caseloads, mountains of paperwork, and individualized expectations feel like their school leader doesn’t quite understand what’s happening in their classrooms.

This was something that Jodee Prudente, a principal at Washoe County school district in Reno, Nev., had heard when she began teaching special education early in her career.

Teachers were saying, “The people who supervise and evaluate me don’t know and understand what I’m supposed to be doing with the student population,” said Prudente. “From there, it was, well, do they? Let’s find out.”

Prudente paired up with MaryAnn Demchak, a professor of special education at the University of Nevada, to study whether principals in rural Nevada understood how special education teachers led their classrooms, and learn how principals felt about the kind of support they provided to special education teachers.

The study, published earlier this year in the journal The Rural Educator, used the Autism and Low Incidence Classroom Observation Tool—which contains indicators about a student’s progress and equips teachers with ways to adapt a program to better fit the student—to see whether principals understood how an indicator worked, its importance, and how capable they felt as school leaders to evaluate both those indicators and the special education teacher.

For example, a quality indicator in special education is how a student uses high- or low-tech assistive technology.

The results indicated that principals’ “perception of themselves is that they may not be confident in their ability to provide feedback across every indicator,” Prudente said.

Based on Prudente’s experience in special education, she wasn’t surprised.

As of 2012, just eight states required principals to receive specific special education training, with their preparation program covering mostly legal requirements, one study found.

This lack of training for principals can make special education teachers feel less supported at work and contribute to the high turnover rate in their field.

“Principals are the leaders within their buildings, and they are responsible for ensuring that all students are learning and reaching their outcomes, and how they facilitate instruction in the classroom for all students is critical,” said Carole Clancy, the bureau director of special education at the Pennsylvania Department of Education.

“If you have a principal that doesn’t understand special education or understand the criticalness of instruction of all students, they may not be equipped to do the job,” she said.

The role of principals in special education

Sometimes, principals have to sit in on individualized education program meetings, and they also have to supervise and provide feedback to their special education teachers.

Natasha Veale, the dean of the School of Social Sciences and Education at Greensboro College in North Carolina, interviewed several principals across the state on their special education training for her dissertation, which later became the book, How to Retain Special Education Teachers.

During the interviews, Veale said, principals poured out their thoughts and experiences in supporting special education teachers. They were eager to have this conversation, which hasn’t been at the forefront of school leadership, Veale said.

Principals expressed wanting better relationships with their special education teachers and more professional development in this area.

“The self-efficacy for their ability to be leaders was sometimes low … in that area because they may recognize that they may have a lack of knowledge of special education,” said Veale.

Oftentimes, existing special education training focuses on either legal education or how to create an inclusive environment for these students, when it should be both, said Cathi Davis, the principal of Ruby Bridges Elementary School in Clearview, Wash.

“That organically creates some real dichotomies in leaders’ minds,” she said. “I think that separating special education from the overall educational experience of students leads us to a path where we don’t work together, and we don’t provide a complete experience for students.”

What principals can do to better support special ed. teachers

Veale said principals can seek outside support, in addition to the professional development provided to them at the district or state level.

“They would have to seek out information about the different disability areas and the different needs of the students in order to effectively run the special education programs,” she said.

Pennsylvania is one state working to meet that need.

In 2007, the National Institute for School Leaders began working with the Pennsylvania Training and Technical Assistance Network to develop special education modules. The training, which launched in 2009, is now known as Principals Understanding Leadership in Special Education or PULSE.

PULSE is a three-day training. Principals earn 30 hours of PD credit on topics that range from the legal needs of special education to best practices for instruction and inclusion of students and families with educational partners.

“This is just one tool in the toolbox for principals that have a very demanding job to help them know what they need to know to support them to do the job that they need to do,” Clancy said.

While the PULSE course is optional, Pennsylvania requires its principals to complete competencies in special education during their preparation programs, which contributes to its popularity, said Clancy. The course has been completed by about 800 principals in the past nine years, she said.

While it’s important to have well-trained special education teachers, the results can be better with the support of well-trained principals, said Clancy.

“I can only imagine that having principals feel confident and equipped to do their job and support students with disabilities can help us meet the outcomes, and help our students meet their outcomes,” she said.