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CONSIDERING RACE AND GENDER IN THE CLASSROOM: THE ROLE
OF TEACHER PERCEPTIONS IN REFERRAL FOR SPECIAL
EDUCATION

presented by

DANIELE ANNETTE EILAND

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CONSIDERING RACE AND GENDER IN THE CLASSROOM: THE ROLE OF
TEACHER PERCEPTIONS IN REFERRAL FOR SPECIAL EDUCATION

By

Daniele Annette Eiland

A DISSERTATION

Submitted to
Michigan State University
in partial fulﬁlhnent of the requirements
for the degree of

DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY
School Psychology

2008

ABSTRACT

CONSIDERING RACE AND GENDER IN THE CLASSROOM: THE ROLE OF
TEACHER PERCEPTIONS IN REFERRAL FOR SPECIAL EDUCATION

By

Daniele Annette Eiland
Referral for assessment or intervention has been cited as one of the most important
predictors of future special education eligibility (Artiles & Trent, 1994) because most
students referred for consideration of special education are eventually placed in special
education programs. There are different interpretations for this phenomenon. While
some teachers are accurate judges in the identiﬁcation of students who are in need of
intervention, others have personal beliefs that may interfere with their ability to provide
appropriate instruction to certain students. This study focuses on the extent to which
teacher efﬁcacy, student gender and student race can predict teacher referral. In this
study I will investigate factors which may inﬂuence teachers’ decisions to refer students
for special education services. In order to do so, I developed case studies in which
student characteristics (i.e., race and gender) were manipulated. I evaluated how teacher
ratings of efﬁcacy predicted teacher decisions to refer students for special education in a
case study. I hypothesized that teachers who had high efﬁcacy ratings would be less
likely to refer students for special education services regardless of the student’s
individual characteristics. Results suggest that teachers with high ratings of general
teacher efﬁcacy were more likely to refer students. Additionally, the relationship
between experience and referral decisions was signiﬁcant indicating that teachers with

experience were more likely to refer students for special education services. Although

not signiﬁcant, males were referred at slightly higher rates than females and African

American males were referred at higher rates than any other students.

Cow/ﬁght by
DANIELE A. EILAND
2008

DEDICATION

I would like to dedicate this dissertation to my children, Carmel and Joseph.
Carmel, thank you for providing perspective for my work. You have sat next to me
during this process, ﬁrst on the bed, then in the high chair and now running around with
your own laptop at just 20 months. You have been my inspiration to study for my exams
and to persevere when things got difﬁcult. I hope you will read this one day and know
that I could not have ﬁnished this journey without you.

Joseph, thank you for speeding up the process for me. Although you were not

born when I defended, you helped me focus, work hard and ﬁnish in a timely manner. I

thank God everyday for you.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

Wow, where do I begin! First, I would like to thank my sister, Zan, for her
undying love and support. Thank you for listening to me and letting me keep you up at
night. Thank you for changing your schedule to accommodate me and Carmel. Thank
you for anticipating our needs and being there without my asking. Thank you for your
calm guidance and energy.

Mom (“Gee”), thank you for encouraging me to ﬁnish this feat. Your words of
encouragement and life lessons have been helpful throughout this process. You have
given me strength by showing helping me to become a stronger woman, a professional
and most importantly a loving mother.

Dad, thank you for driving to down see us to make sure that we were okay.
Thank you for your encouragement, wisdom and your help with Carmel. We also
enjoyed all of the treats from Sams Club and Cosco. You made our weekends so
enjoyable.

To my committee, thank you for your support during this process. Dr. Baker was

an important part in my journey at MSU. I miss her terribly. When she passed away,

you provided a support network that enabled me to complete the last steps of my journey.

vi

TABLE OF CONTENTS

LIST OF TABLES .............................................................................. iv
LIST OF FIGURES ............................................................................... v
Chapter One: Introduction ........................................................................... 1
Chapter Two: Review of the Literature .......................... - .................................. 5
Conceptual Framework - Self-Efﬁcacy ........................................................ 5
Teacher Efﬁcacy .................................................................................. 8
Special Education Referral and Teacher Efficacy .......................................... 10
The Impact of Gender on Special Education Referral ...................................... 14
Overrepresentation of African Americans in Special Education ........................... 18
Research Questions and Hypotheses .......................................................... 22
Chapter Three: Methodology ...................................................................... 24
Participants ....................................................................................... 24
Procedures ........................................................................................ 26
Summary of Methodology ..................................................................... 32
Chapter Four: Results ............................................................................ 34
Descriptive Statistics .......................................................................... 34
Measure Preparation ............................................................................ 39
Examination of Research Questions and .Hypotheses .................................... 41
Chapter Five: Discussion .................................................................... 50
Teacher Efficacy as a Predictor of Special Education Referral ........................... 50
Impact of Student Characteristics on Teacher Referral for Special Education ......... 55
Moderators of teacher Efﬁcacy and Teacher Referral Decisions ......................... 58
Limitations ....................................................................................... 60
Future Directions ................................................................................ 61
Appendix One: Teacher Consent Form .......................................................... 65
Appendix Two: Teacher Letter .................................................................. 67
Appenxix Three: Teacher Information Questionnaire ......................................... 68
Appendix Four: Teacher Efﬁcacy Questionnaire ............................................... 69
Appendix F ive: Case Study with Caucasian male, Low SES ................................ 70
Appendix Six: Case Study with Caucasian male, High SES ................................. 71

vii

Appendix Seven: Case Study with Caucasian female, Low SES ........................... 72

Appendix Eight: Case Study with Caucasian female, High SES ......................... 73
Appendix Nine: Case Study with African American male, Low SES ...................... 74
Appendix Ten: Case Study with African American male, High 8138 ...................... 75
Appendix Eleven: Case Study with Aﬁ'ican American female, Low SES .............. 76
Appendix Twelve: Case Study with African American female, Low SES ................ 77

Appendix Thirteen: Welcome Letter ........................................................... 78
References ............................................................................................ 79

viii

LIST OF TABLES

Table 1 Summary of Respondents Level of Education Obtained ............................ 34
Table 2 Summary of Respondents with Teaching Experience ............................... 35
Table 3 Descriptive Data for Preservice Teachers ............................................. 37
Table 4 Descriptive Data for Experienced Teachers .......................................... 38
Table 5 Summary of Reliability of Measures ................................................... 40
Table 6 Descriptive Statistics for Case Studies ................................................ 41
Table 7 Correlations Between Measures ........................................................ 42
Table 8 Correlations Between Measures for Preservice Teachers ........................... 43
Table 9 Correlations Between Measures for Experienced Teachers ........................ 43
Table 10 AN OVA — Do student characteristics inﬂuence teacher referral decisions? ..... 45
Table 11 ANOVA — Does the gender of the teacher inﬂuence teacher referral

decisions? ........................................................................................................................... 47
Table 12 ANOVA - Does the years of experience reported by participants inﬂuence
referral decisions .................................................................................... 47

ix

LIST OF FIGURES

Figure 1: Race and Socio Economic Status Interaction ........................................ 46

Chapter One: Introduction

One of the most important decisions a classroom teacher makes is to refer a
student for individual special education evaluation. This decision initiates a process
where students are identiﬁed and tested by a team of individuals to determine eligibility
for special education services. Typically, individual students that are referred are usually
placed in special education (O’Riley, Northcraft & Sabers, 1989; MacMillan & Reschly,
1998; Hosp & Reschly, 2004).

Many factors inﬂuence a teacher’s decision to refer a student for a special
education evaluation. Some of the reasons teachers refer students are likely similar to
those that Shavelson and Borko identiﬁed in 1979. They reported that instructional
decisions are a function of a complex interaction between student characteristics, and
other factors such as resources, school politics, and pressure from staff and
administration. More recently, investigations have shifted to teacher and student
characteristics that inﬂuence the likelihood of referral.

Rate and reason for referral have been investigated in the literature for 40 years.
It is important to understand teachers’ reasons for referring students for a number of
reasons. To start, we know that teacher and student characteristics inﬂuence referral
(MacMillan & Reschly, 1998; Losen & Orﬁeld, 2002; Hosp & Reschly, 2004). Some of
the characteristics have little to do with the student’s actual abilities. For instance,
reasons stated for referral have been examined relative to the student’s gender, source of
referral, racial or ethnic background and socio economic status (Gregory, 1977; Hosp &
Reschly, 2004). Most studies report sex differences stating that a larger proportion of

males than females are referred. Most studies also report racial and ethnic differences

suggesting that Aﬁican American students are more likely to be referred. This
dissertation will examine the impact of the student’s race and gender on teacher decisions
to refer students for special education evaluations. Information regarding student and
teacher’s socio economic status will be collected for use in a separate study at a later
date.

Key Deﬁnitions

It is important to clearly deﬁne the variables in the present study to provide a
frame of reference for the reader. Referral for special education services is the focus of
this study. Special education means specially designed individualized or group
instruction or special services or programs to meet the unique needs of students with
disabilities. Referral is deﬁned as a teacher suspecting that a student has a disability that
warrants a multidisciplinary team’s attention to determine eligibility for special education
services.

Teacher efﬁcacy is an independent variable in this study. Brieﬂy, teacher efﬁcacy
is deﬁned as the extent to which teachers believe they can inﬂuence how well students
learn (Guskey & Passaro, 1994). Teacher efﬁcacy is often considered as either general
teacher efﬁcacy or personal teacher efﬁcacy (Ashton & Webb, 1986; Gibson & Dembo,
1984). Teachers’ attributing student struggles to external factors such as family
violence, substance abuse in the home, the value placed on education in the home and
economic factors is referred to as general teacher efﬁcacy (Tschannen-Moran, Woolfolk-
Hoy & Hoy, 1998). Personal teacher efﬁcacy is more speciﬁc, it refers to the teacher’s
beliefs about their own abilities to affect student outcomes. I expect that teacher ratings

of both personal and general teacher efﬁcacy will be related to referral decisions. I

expect that teachers with high ratings of GTE will refer because they feel that external
factors are more inﬂuential than the teacher. I also expect that teachers with high ratings
of PTE will not refer students because they will be able to work with the students
themselves.

Race and gender are the student characteristics that will be examined. Race will
describe an ethnic group, tribe, or other set of individuals descended from a common
ancestor. The race of the student is provided in the case study. Gender refers to the
sexual distinction between male and female. The gender of the student is also provided
in the case study.

Finally overrepresentation is deﬁned as a disproportionate representation of
certain groups in a category. For instance, there is a problem if 20% of the special
education population in a Michigan elementary school are Aﬁican American because
Aﬁican American’s only make up 14.3% of the population in the state of Michigan (U .8.
Census Bureau, 2005). This is an example of the overrepresentation of Aﬁican
Americans in special educaiton at that school.

Issues Surrounding Referral for Special Education

I Special education services are intended to provide academic and behavioral
intervention to students with disabilities. Federal laws such as the Individuals with
Disabilities Education Improvement Act (IDEA, 2004), include guidelines for referral
and placement, unbiased assessment procedures and multidisciplinary teams have been

put into place to ensure appropriate placement in special education classes.

Referral to special education has been recognized as an important step of the

assessment process because large percentages of referred students are tested, and large

percentages of tested students are determined to be eligible for special education services
(Y sseldyke & Algozzine, 1983). One study found that about 92% of students who are
referred are evaluated, and about 73% of evaluated students are placed in special
education (Algozzine, Christensen, & Ysseldyke 1982). Moreover, these rates were
reexamined 13 years later and were found to be consistent with earlier results: 90 to 92%
of referred students were tested, and 70 to 74% of tested students were determined to be
eligible (Y sseldyke, Vanderwood, & Shriner, 1997). Moreover, most referrals are
initiated by teachers (Harris, Gray, Rees-McGee, Carroll, & Zaremba, 1987; Hyde,
1975). Thus, regardless of procedural guidelines and safeguards, a classroom teacher’s
referral decision is probably most responsible for the eventual placement of students into

special education programs.

Given that teacher referral is important in determining eligibility, questions have
been raised as to whether bias exists in the referral process. It is well established that
Aﬁican American students (Argulewica & Sanchez, 1983; Shinn, Tindal, & Spira, 1987)
and males (Rifﬂe, 1983; Robbins, Mercer, & Meyers, 1967; Shinn, Tindal, & Spira,
1987) are referred and placed into special education classes in disproportionate numbers.
Additionally questions have been raised about teacher characteristics that inﬂuence
referral such as teacher efﬁcacy. In many schools there are key teachers who refer
students at higher rates than others. Teacher efﬁcacy is one variable that explains the

differences.

Chapter Two: Review of the Literature
Conceptual Framework

Albert Bandura’s theory of perceived self-efﬁcacy (Bandura, 1977, 1993) is a
usable conceptual framework for studying the impact of individual student characteristics
on teacher referral decisions. Bandura was one of the ﬁrst to provide empirical support
for the idea that people can exercise a level of control over their thoughts, feelings, and
actions (Bandura, 1993). Perceived self-efﬁcacy refers to “beliefs in ones capabilities to
organize and execute the courses of action required to produce given attainments”

(Bandura, 1997, p.3).

In his theory, Bandura argues that "what people think, believe, and feel affects
how they behave" (Bandura, 1986, p. 25). This means that people (i.e. teachers) must
believe that their actions can produce the outcomes they desire. If they do not, they will
have little motive to act or to persevere in the face of difﬁculties such as working in
unfamiliar situations. Some unfamiliar situations that teachers encounter include
working with students who are different . The child may be from a different ethnic

background or a different gender.

Persistence of effort is a major component of efﬁcacy. A high level of self—
efﬁcacy reﬂects an individual’s strong belief in his or her ability to handle task demands
and events, whereas low self-efﬁcacy involves weak beliefs about one’s ability to

succeed. According to the theory (Bandura, 1986), individuals with a high level of self

efﬁcacy will tend to approach challenging tasks with less anxiety than individuals with a

low level of self efﬁcacy.

Self-efﬁcacy beliefs are the result of learning processes. Social relationships play
an important role in these learning processes, which are based on four different sources of

information (Bandura, 1997; Browers & Tomic, 2000):

(1) Performance accomplishments, through direct personal experience

(2) Vicarious experiences that alter efﬁcacy beliefs by watching others

performing similar tasks

(3) Verbal persuasion in which others can guide individuals to believe in their

own capabilities and

(4) Physiological arousal that indicate one’s vulnerability to dysfunction.

The routes by which self-efﬁcacy expectations are acquired are presented in order of
importance; with performance accomplishments being the most powerful means by
which a person may develop judgments concerning their capabilities. Perceptions
concerning self-efﬁcacy are constantly inﬂuenced by new information ﬁ'om the

environment; these perceptions then inﬂuence human behavior.

Self-efﬁcacy beliefs also vary along three dimensions (Bandura, 1997; Browers &

Tomic, 2000; Maddux, 1995):

(l) Magnitude, which refers to the level a person believes him or herself capable

of performing

(2) Generality, which refers to the extent to which changes in self efﬁcacy beliefs

extend to other situations and behaviors and

(3) Strength, which refers to the resoluteness of people’s conviction that he or she

can perform a behavior in question.

Self-efﬁcacy beliefs may have either a positive or negative inﬂuence on behavior. That
is, a person’s expectations concerning their capabilities may either enhance or inhibit
performance. In general, persons with high self-efﬁcacy will seek out those situations in
which they feel competent and expect success. They are able to work hard and excel at
tasks without doubts. On the other hand, person’s with low self-efﬁcacy tend to avoid
situations that they believe will exceed their capabilities and tend to perceive the task as

more difﬁcult than it really is.

Self-efﬁcacy beliefs inﬂuence human functioning through four mediating

processes (Bandura, 1997; Maddux, 1995):

(1) they inﬂuence the goals that people set for themselves and the strategies

people envision for attaining those goals

(2) They inﬂuence the motivation for people to persist in the face of obstacles,

(3) They inﬂuence how people feel about themselves when they attempt to reach

their goals, and

(4) They inﬂuence the situations people select in terms of challenges.

Self efﬁcacy theory has inspired a tremendous body of research that is applicable to

teaching and learning.

Teacher Eﬂicacy

The extent to which teachers believe they can inﬂuence how well students learn is
referred to as teacher efﬁcacy (Guskey & Passaro, 1994). Teacher efﬁcacy is often
considered as either general teacher efﬁcacy or personal teacher efﬁcacy (Ashton &
Webb, 1986; Gibson & Dembo, 1984). Teachers’ attributing student struggles to
external factors such as family violence, substance abuse in the home, the value placed on
education in the home and economic factors is referred to as general teacher efﬁcacy
(Tschannen-Moran, Woolfolk-Hoy & Hoy, 1998). One would expect that this group of
teachers would be less likely to work with students on their own. Personal teacher
efﬁcacy is more speciﬁc, it refers to the teacher’s beliefs about their own abilities to
affect student outcomes. This is important because teachers may have a high sense of
general efﬁcacy but still doubt their personal ability to perform the necessary activities in
order to produce the desired outcome (Ghaith & Shaaban, 1999). Schools have
increasingly diverse populations of students (Y sseldyke, Dawson, Lehr, Reschly, &
Reynolds, 1997) and teachers must develop tools to work with different types of learners
and groups of students. As such, it is important to investigate variables inﬂuencing the
teacher’s beliefs about efﬁcacy increasing the likelihood that students of different

ethnicities, gender and ability levels will be encouraged to meet their ﬁrll potential.

Tschannen-Moran, Woolfolk Boy and Hey (1998) proposed an integrated model
which reﬂects the cyclical nature of teacher efﬁcacy. A nice example of this model is
when a teacher encounters a situation with a student. If the situation is one in which they
were previously unsuccessful, they may be more likely to refer the child to external
support rather then trying to deal with a new situation [themselves]. An example of a
new situation is working in a new setting with a different population. In this situation
low levels of efﬁcacy lead to lower levels of effort and persistence when working with
that child, which will lead to a deterioration in the teacher’s and potentially the student’s

performance [which in turn may lead to lower efﬁcacy].

Within this model, teachers’ efﬁcacy judgments are the result of the interaction
between a personal appraisal of the relative importance of factors that make teaching
difﬁcult on the one hand and an assessment of self-perceptions of personal teaching
capabilities on the other (Tschannen—Moran et a1, 1998). To make these assessments,
teachers draw information from four sources: enactive mastery experiences, vicarious
experiences, verbal persuasion and physiological arousal. The consequences of teacher
efﬁcacy — the goals teachers set for themselves, the effort they put into reaching those
goals, and their persistence when facing difﬁculties inﬂuence teachers’ performance
levels, which in turn serve as new sources of efﬁcacy information (Tschannen-Moran et
a1, 1998). The cyclical nature of teacher efﬁcacy implies that lower levels of efﬁcacy lead
to lower levels of effort and persistence, which lead to a deterioration in performance,

which in turn lead to lower efﬁcacy.

Teacher efﬁcacy is important to understand because it predicts a number of
student variables (Ross, 1998). Teachers with a high sense of efﬁcacy have a positive
attitude about teaching and believe they can inﬂuence student learning. Highly
efﬁcacious teachers also report improved student outcomes including; higher student
achievement (Ross, 1992), and school effectiveness (W oolfolk & Hoy, 1993). Highly
efﬁcacious teachers report more positive referral data including; a willingness to provide
interventions to students (Fuchs, Fuchs & Bishop, 1992), more success when
implementing new programs (Guskey, 1988), fewer student referrals for special
education (Meijer & Foster, 1988) and more success with effective classroom

management strategies (Woolfolk, Rosoff & Hoy, 1990).

Special Education Referral and Teacher Efﬁcacy

The process of identiﬁcation and referral for intervention of students with special
needs can vary in schools, from a very informal process to a very formal one. In many
schools, teachers complete a referral form indicating the student’s problem, strategies
attempted to alleviate the problem and which specialist the teacher feels would be
helpful. The specialist presents the form at a weekly or monthly meeting and the form is

used to allocate services or prioritize student needs.

In recent years, the process whereby children identiﬁed at risk are referred for
formal evaluation has changed (MacMillan, Grescharn, Lopez, & Bocian, 1996). Before
a child is referred for formal evaluation, efforts are made to remedy the child’s learning
or behavior difﬁculties in the general education setting. This intermediate step has been

called “prereferral intervention” and subsurnes a variety of modiﬁcations designed to

10

keep the children in general education (MacMillan et al, 1996). A child moves on to the
next step - special education — only when they fail to respond to the interventions
provided during the pre-referral stage. The child is then formally evaluated for special

education services.

All processes of identiﬁcation in schools rely on teacher identiﬁcation and
subsequent referral of student needs (Campbell, 2003). Teachers are expected to not only
understand the complexity of students’ problems but are also expected to refer to the
correct specialist or program. However, teachers are not often trained in identiﬁcation of
complex student problems. Beattie (1985) indicated that a vast majority of referred
children, up to approximately 85%, are eventually found eligible for special education.
More recently, Naquin (1999) also found that teachers referred 6% of students who did
not warrant referral. These high referral to placement rates are an indication that changes
should be made. One place to start is with the classroom teachers. Why are teachers
referring students at such high rates? Is it a lack of training or a do teacher beliefs play a

role?

As many as three out of four students referred for psycho-educational assessment
were identiﬁed as in need of special education services, with even higher rates
occasionally reported (Shepard & Smith, 1983). After 5 years of federally funded
research at the University of Minnesota Institute for Research in Learning Disabilities on
assessment and the decision-making process, Ysseldyke, Thurlow, Gladen, Wesson,

Algozzine & Deno (1983) concluded:

ll

The special education decision making process is one in which a student is
referred, often for vague and subjective reasons; automatically tested,
often with technically inadequate devices; usually placed by a team
meeting; and is the object of decisions made less on data than on
subjective teacher or student variables and on inconsistent and

indefensible criteria. (p. 87)

Ysseldyke et a1 (1983) stated their claim over two decades ago and today the
problem persists. Still, a relatively small number of researchers have studied the impact
of teacher characteristics on decisions to refer students for special education services.
Algozzine and Ysseldyke (1986) have suggested that the teacher’s role in referral making
is central: “Teachers typically refer students who demonstrate bothersome behaviors in
the classroom. . .and the teacher’s reason for referral is a good predictor of subsequent
class placement” (p.395). Artiles and Trent (1994) agree that referral for assessment is
one of the most important predictors of future special education eligibility because most
children referred are eventually placed in special education programs. One suggestion
for interpretation of the strong relationship between referral and eligibility is the presence
of conﬁrmatory bias (O’Reilly, Northcraft, & Sabers, 1989). This term refers to the
tendency of an evaluator to conﬁrm or draw conclusions that align with the teacher’s

referral request (Hosp & Reschly, 2002).

As noted, there are factors that have a greater impact on special education referral
decisions than individual student characteristics (O’Reilly et a1, 1989; Hosp & Reschly,

2002). This information implies that the same student may be referred for special

12

education by one teacher and not another because not all teachers are equally troubled by
a given behavior; that is, they demonstrate varying tolerability of problem behavior
(Meijer & Foster, 1988). This information also implies that a student may qualify for
special education services at one school and not another. Identiﬁcation of teacher
characteristics that diﬁerentiate relatively tolerant ﬁ'om intolerant teachers would seem to

represent an important step in understanding the referral process.

Research suggests that efﬁcacy beliefs inﬂuence teachers’ decisions about
instructional changes including the use of time and choice of classroom management
strategy (Gibson & Dembo, 1984; Woolfolk, Rosoff, & Hoy, 1990). Soodak & Podell
(1993) indicate that teacher efﬁcacy is a critical belief underlying teachers’ decision
making. Regular educators with a greater sense of personal efﬁcacy were more likely to
perceive the regular education placement as being appropriate for students having
difﬁculties. Teachers must feel conﬁdent in their own teaching and conﬁdent in the.
effects of teaching in general to agree to retain students with problems in regular

education.

Teacher efﬁcacy can inﬂuence a teacher’s behavior regarding choices made,
effort expended and perseverance under adverse conditions. Teachers’ with low feelings
of efﬁcacy (low PTE) usually develop feelings of personal helplessness (Ashton &
Webb, 1986). Low PTE teachers can be described as those who are unsure about their
own ability to teach low achieving students. Low PTE teachers believe that their low
achieving students could learn if they had better teachers. Low PTE teachers are most

likely to have low professional self esteem and experience a high degree of stress when

13

their students perform poorly because they internalize low achievement as their inability
to teach these students (Ashton & Webb, 1988). Whether the teacher is high or low in
teacher efﬁcacy, the importance of the regular education teachers’ determining the need
and appropriateness of referral for special education services is paramount (N aquin,

1999).

The Impact of Gender on Special Education ReferrJal

Males and females comprise equal proportions of the school-aged population but
almost two-thirds of children ages 6 through 17 who are served under the Individuals
with Disabilities Education Act are male (Ofﬁce of Special Education Programs, 2001 ).
It is unclear if females are under-identiﬁed for special education, if males are over-
identiﬁed, or if real differences exist in the prevalence of disability between males and
females (Ofﬁce of Special Education Programs, 1998). There is research indicating that
commonalities exist among individuals with disabilities, however little recent research
has addressed differences based on gender alone.

Further, whereas substantial attention focused on the disproportionate number of
African Americans in special education, the even more egregious overrepresentation of
male students was overlooked, although a few (Lambert, 1981; Richardson, Katz, &
Koller, 1986) have periodically commented on gender differences in identiﬁcation rates
(MacMillan et a1., 1996). Lambert, in fact, observed that at the time of the initial Larry P.
v. Riles (1971, 1979, 1984) hearing, the enrollment data for the Educabally Mentally
Retarded category suggested greater sexism than racism. The higher identiﬁcation rates
for males in special education for students who have mild disabilities has been attributed

by some to arise from differences in the deportment of males and females (MacMillan et

14

al., 1996). In other words, male and female students exhibiting similar low achievement
are not equally at risk for referral by their teacher. Rather, the male student who is more
inclined to exhibit externalizing behaviors is more likely to be referred by the regular
classroom teacher. In the 19605 and early 19705, such referral almost inevitably led to
formal psychological evaluation for special education eligibility (MacMillan et al., 1996).

Wehmeyer & Schwartz (2001) studied the inﬂuence of gender in referral for
special education through a review of 695 student ﬁles. They also suggest that males are
not necessarily overrepresented in the special education population but, instead, females
who could beneﬁt from special education services are underrepresented, possibly due to
gender bias.

A three part theory has been developed to explain the disproportionate
representation of males in special education (W ehmeyer & Schwartz, 2001; Ofﬁce of
Special Education Programs, 1998). First, overrepresentation of males is attributable to
biological factors suggesting that boys are more vulnerable to disorders that are
genetically determined and predisposed to have a speciﬁc learning disability. This
dissertation will not focus on biology. Second, boys have higher levels of activity overall
which makes them more likely to act out or misbehave in classroom settings.
Additionally, some suggest that the disproportionate numbers of males in special
education is a function of behavioral problems (W ehmeyer & Schwartz, 2001). Third,
researchers in gender equity propose that the disproportionate number of males is due to
inﬂuences of gender bias on the referral, classiﬁcation, and placement process where bias
refers to an inclination toward taking a position or teaching conclusions about a person

based on their sex or gender (Wehmeyer & Schwartz, 2001; Ofﬁce of Special Education

15

Programs, 1998). It is important to take a closer look by explaining the three parts to this
theory to understand the issues involved when attempting to understand why so many
male students have been qualiﬁed for special education services.

Behavior. The role of behavior-both student behavior and teacher perception of
behavior in the referral process is the focus of most research addressing male
overrepresentation in special education (Andrews, Wisniewski & Mulick, 1997).
Researchers have consistently noted for some time that boys have a more difﬁcult time
conforming to school-based expectations for behavior, independent of disability status or
disability category. Wehmeyer and Schwartz (2001) suggest that boys are more likely to
have higher activity levels and exhibit behaviors that do not conform with classroom
regimens. This inability to conform to classroom regimens results in an increased
likelihood that teachers will refer boys to special education.

Bias. Biases based on stereotypes about gender and gender roles in our society
can take many forms, including referral biases (Andrews et a1, 1997; Wemeyer &
Schwartz, 2001). Gender bias in the classroom comes in many forms including teacher
decisions to call on boys more than girls in classroom discussions (Andrews et al, 1997),
encouraging more assertive behavior in boys (Andrews et a1, 1997), evaluating papers
differently based‘ on gender by evaluating boys papers for creativity and girls for neatness
(Andrews et al, 1997), and giving boys the time and help to solve problems on their own
while helping girls along by simply telling them the correct answers (Andrews et al,
1997 ). At ﬁrst glance it is easy to blame individual teachers for their biases. But when
critically examined, it appears that teachers tend to hold the same gender biases,

expectations and sex role stereotypes that are held by society. Teachers bring these

16

biases and ideas to the school setting in the same way that others bring them to their
workplace.

An additional idea that further compounds the problem of sex role stereotyping is
the fact that most teachers are women, especially at the elementary level when most
children are initially referred for special education services (Cook & Boe, 1995). Male
students may be referred and found eligible for special education at higher rates than
female students due to gender differences between male students and female teachers or
differences between the dominant school culture and male behavior (Cook & Boe, 1995).

Gender bias in school referral is not a new phenomenon. Gregory (1977)
conducted a study where teachers were given identical descriptions of individual
children. They found that teachers were more likely to refer boys for evaluation than
girls. Similarly, the Ofﬁce of Special Education Programs (1998) suggest that as long
ago as 1976, evidence suggested a bias in teachers’ evaluation of students’ need for
special education based on student’s gender.

Although questions still remain concerning the reasons why males are
disproportionately represented in special education, it appears that the disproportion is
greatest among students with learning disabilities and emotional disturbances (Ofﬁce of
Special Education Programs, 2001). Some argue that assessment tools do not capture
internalizing problems such as depression, suicidal ideation or attempts and that female
students have higher rates of depression (Oswald, Best, Coutinho & Nagle, 2003).
Proponents of this view argue that teachers’ have a higher tolerance for withdrawal or

depression reducing females' referral for evaluation and eligibility. Female students who

17

do receive services under the emotionally impaired category usually exhibit externalizing
behaviors typically associated with boys (Oswald, Coutinho, Best & Singh, 2003).

One line of inquiry has investigated whether referral decisions by regular
classroom teachers are gender biased. Findings from this research are somewhat mixed.
Zucker and colleagues (Prieto & Zucker, 1981; Zucker & Prieto, 197 7; Zicker, Prieto, &
Rutherford, 1979) used vignettes describing hypothetical children and then manipulated
their ethnicity and gender when presenting the cases to teachers. Gender was not found
to inﬂuence teachers’ ratings. In a study by Shinn, Tindal, and Spira (1987), however
gender biases were presented as plausible explanations for referral behavior of
elementary school students with severe reading deﬁciencies.

Overrgrresentation of African Americans in Special Education

Despite nearly thirty years of litigation, debate and initiatives (Artiles, Aguirre-
Munoz & Abedi, 1998) concern about the overrepresentation of African Americans in
special education continues to exist. In 2003, the Individuals with Disabilities Education
Act (IDEA) served 9 percent of all US. children between the ages of 3 and 21 who were
enrolled in public elementary and secondary schools. American Indian/Alaska Native and
Aﬁican American children were more likely than other racial/ethnic groups to receive
services under the IDEA. About 12 percent of American Indian/Alaska Native children
and 11 percent of Aﬁican American children received IDEA services in 2003, compared
to 8 percent of Caucasian children, 8 percent of Hispanic children, and 4 percent of

Asian/Paciﬁc Islander children (NCES, 2005).

18

The largest portion of students in special education continues to be those
identiﬁed as having learning disabilities (Ofﬁce of Special Education Programs, 2001).
Robertson, Kushner, Starks, & Drescher (1994) examined the percentage of students with
learning disabilities by ethnic group and found that a higher percentage of Aﬁican
American students were identiﬁed as having learning disabilities in 10 of the 15 cities
that they studied (Robertson et al, 1994). Signiﬁcant predictors of learning disability
identiﬁcation for Aﬁ'ican American students were smaller families, a higher perception of
social status, and a lower level of family structure or rules (Robertson et al, 1994).
Interestingly, factors that did not predict placement within any ethnic group were student
perception of school risk and protective factors, parent expectations and behavioral
history (Robertson et a1, 1994). This information is especially interesting because much
of the literature points to behavioral factors when attempting to understand the
disproportionate representation of minority students in special education, speciﬁcally
African Americans.

Artiles and colleagues (1998) described the persistence of disproportionate
representation along a continuum ranging ﬁom discriminatory professional practices to
perceived innate deﬁcits of minority children. They recognized that both problematic
eligibility practices and sociopolitical factors such as school violence and school
disciplinary practices, may inﬂuence disproportionate representation of Aﬁican
American students in special education. Coutinho and Oswald (2000) offered two
hypotheses regarding the causes of overrepresentation of minority students in special
education helping to explain the idea of problematic eligibility practices mentioned by

Artiles and colleagues (1998). The two hypotheses are (1) the processes that are used to

19

measure and interpret the ability, achievement and behavior of students (i.e. referral,
assessment, eligibility) may work differently across ethnic groups, leading to
disproportionate representation of African American students (Coutinho & Oswald,
2000); (2) the underlying distribution of educational disability may vary across ethnic
groups as a result of social and demographic inﬂuences that represent risk factors for
disabilities (Coutinho & Oswald, 2000).

The ﬁrst hypothesis conceptualizes disproportionate representation as a
sociopolitical historical problem where public education systems have a cultural bias that
incorrectly and disproportionately targets minority students during referral (Artiles &
Trent, 1995). This idea suggests that there is a disconnection between home and school
that leads to inappropriate teacher referral of Aﬁican American students.

The second hypothesis is that minority groups may be differentially susceptible to
educational disability due to social and demographic factors (Coutinho & Oswald, 2000).
Some of the social and demographic factors to consider include poverty, school and
community factors, and access to appropriate general education instruction. Oswald et a1.
(1999) conducted a study and reported that a set of community, and school-related
variables accounted for a signiﬁcant portion of the variability in school districts’
identiﬁcation rates of Aﬁican American students as having disabilities.

The statistics and literature conﬁrm that overrepresentation of males and Aﬁican
American students in special education is a pervasive problem in our schools. Although
it is important to consider the commonalities in the literature it is also important to

consider future directions and to make changes to current practices.

20

The literature suggests that teachers are unwilling to spend excessive amounts of
time providing interventions for students (Gutkin, Singer, & Brown, 1980). There is also
research demonstrating that teachers are more willing to implement interventions when
they are personally involved in the interventions themselves (vs. referring for outside
support; Gutkin, 1980; Gutkin, Singer & Brown, 1980). In 2001, 5,775,722 students
were eligible for special education services. This represents almost 10% of the total
population. (Ofﬁce of Special Education Programs, 2002). Although these numbers
reﬂect eligible students, referral for assessment has been cited as one of the most
important predictors of future special education eligibility (Artiles & Trent, 1994)
because most children referred are eventually placed in special education programs. One
suggestion for interpretation of the strong relationship between referral and eligibility is
the presence of conﬁrmatory bias (O’Reilly et al., 1989). This term refers to the tendency
of an evaluator to conﬁrm or draw conclusions that align with the referral teams request
(Hosp & Reschly, 2002). Although conﬁrmatory bias is a separate line of research, it is
important to understand teachers’ reasons for referring students prior to the evaluation
phase.

One reason that students are referred for evaluation is the teacher’s feelings of
efﬁcacy for working with that particular student. When teachers’ do not feel efﬁcacious,
they will make arrangements to avoid that particular student (Guskey, 1988). This can be
done by referring the student to special education or by removing the student from the
classroom. However it is important to note that teachers may not even be aware of the

motivation for their decisions to refer. Teachers’ feelings of efﬁcacy can be addressed

21

with changes in training. It is important that teachers are armed with the knowledge and
skills to work with diverse groups of students.
Summary

In theory, special education was conceived to provide much needed educational
support that was not being provided in general education for students with disabilities. In
its original and subsequent conceptualization, special education was not a place or
location but rather a service delivery structure (Blanchett, Mumford, & Beachum, 2005).
For many Aﬁican Americans and males, special education has become a place that looks
like a form of segregation from the mainstream. These children are educated in
classrooms that are separate from their peers and often do not interact with the general
population of students.

The overuse of special education for Aﬁican Americans and males constitute a
serious problem demanding remediation. Race and gender are characteristics of students
that cannot and will not change. The literature on teacher efﬁcacy however suggests a
strong relation between teacher efﬁcacy and teachers’ decisions to refer students to
special education (Soodak & Podell, 1993; Soodak & Podell, 1994; Lehman, Soodak, &
Podell, 1998) and this is a trait that can change. If teachers are provided with experiences
where they interact with culturally, ethnically, linguistically and academically diverse
groups of children during their early years of teaching, they will have positive
experiences as sources of efﬁcacy information for the future.

Research Questions and Hypotheses

Question One: Is teacher eﬂicacy related to teacher decisions to refer?

22

I hypothesize that teacher feelings of efﬁcacy is related to teacher decisions to
' refer students for special education services.

Question Two: Are student characteristics such as student race and gender related to
teachers’ decisions to refer students?

First, I hypothesize that teachers will refer Aﬁican American students at higher
rates than Caucasian students.

Second, I hypothesize that teachers will refer male students at higher rates than
female students. I expect that Aﬁican American males will be referred at higher rates
than all other students.

Question Three: Are years of experience related to their decision to refer students for
special education services?

I expect that teachers with more experience will refer students at higher rates
when compared to teachers with less experience.

Question Four: Do student characteristics such as race and gender moderate the
relationship between teacher eﬂicacy and teacher ’s decisions to refer?

I expect that teacher ratings of efﬁcacy will be related to their decisions to refer
students for special education services. I hypothesize that teachers’ with high ratings of
efﬁcacy will be less likely to refer students based on the race and gender of the student

when compared to teachers’ with low ratings of efﬁcacy.

23

Chapter Three: Methodology

This dissertation examines how referral for special education has an inﬂuence on
non- academic factors. Speciﬁcally, the study examines the inﬂuence of student and
teacher characteristics. The student characteristics that were examined included race and
gender. I also examined the inﬂuence of teacher beliefs on teacher decisions to refer
students for special education services.

Data were collected using an experimental case study methodology where conditions
of student demographic characteristics were manipulated. The case study method was
selected for a variety of reasons. First, case study methodology had been used in the
previous teacher efﬁcacy literature (Gregory, 197 7; Soodak & Podell, 1993). Soodak and
Podell (1993) investigated regular and special educators who were assigned a case study
describing a 3rd grade student. The case studies were identical except for changes in the
suggested etiology of the student’s academic difﬁculties and socio economic status
(Soodak & Podell, 1993). After reading the case study, teachers were asked the degree to
which they agreed with the student’s current placement in a regular class and the decision
to refer the student to special education. The second reason that case study methodology
was chosen is because it enabled the researcher to manipulate a single variable while
leaving everything else in the case study untouched.

Participants

Participants were recruited by contacting faculty administrators in two programs
in the College of Education at a Midwestern university. After an email contact was made,
the investigator sent a description of the study to each administrator. The information

was presented at a staff meeting for approval. Approval was received.

24

Sample size was calculated using Tabachnick and F iddell’s formula (1996). The
formula is: N > 50 + 8m (m = number of independent variables). Thus, I needed at least
50 + 8(5) or 90 participants. However once data collection was initially collected the 90
participants did not provide enough power for the analysis. As such, additional
participants were recruited. There were 248 participants in the total sample providing
additional power to the analyses. Demographic information regarding participants is
located in the results section of this dissertation.

Preservice Teachers. Preservice teachers were recruited for this study because I
was interested in understanding how student characteristics impacted teachers’ referral
decisions. Since the majority of the teacher efficacy literature utilizes preservice teachers
I decided to include preservice teachers as participants. In addition, I hypothesized that
the teachers’ level of experience would impact their perceptions.

All of the participants in the study were students who attended the large university
in the Midwest. All of the students were enrolled in courses in the College of Education.
Some of the preservice teachers were full time students majoring in Education and others
were taking the course as an elective. This sample included 179 teachers (72% of the

entire sample).

Experienced Teachers. This group of teachers included teacher education
students in the Master of Arts in Education program at the same university. This group
was included because I expected that they would view students differently compared to
the preservice teachers’ who did not have experience working in a school. There sample

included 64 teachers with experience (26% of the entire sample).

25

Procedures

Data collection included a number of steps and procedures. Steps included pilot
testing and revising the case study. Further steps included gaining the dissertation
committee and the University Committee on Research Involving Human Subjects
(UCRIHS) approval. Then, data collection commenced followed by data entry into an
SPSS data set.

First, the study included a case study that was pilot tested with expert readers in
the School Psychology program at Michigan State University. These readers were
selected because they were accessible to the researcher and because they are familiar with
research and case study methodology. The readers were asked to read each case study
and to provide feedback regarding its clarity and the socio economic status (SES) of the
student in the case study. Although the present investigation did not focus on SES, the
data were intended to be considered in post-hoe analyses. The readers were asked “Is the
case study clear? What is the SES of the student in the case study?” The experts were in
100 percent agreement about the clarity and the socio economic status of the students in
the case studies.

Information Distribution. After ﬁnal UCRIHS approval, two sets of packets were
developed, one packet for the students attending classes on campus and one set for
students attending classes in an online classroom. Two separate sets of packets were
needed because the students in the online programs did not have direct access to the
investigator. These students had additional directions added to their packets.

Teacher Procedures

26

Instructors of the preservice teacher education courses were contacted during the
summer and fall months. They were asked to respond if they were willing to have the
investigator come to their classroom at the end of the class period. The investigator
presented information to students about the purpose of the dissertation and the need for
their participation. The students were assured that the dissertation was completely
separate from their course grade and that their participation was voluntary. The students
who agreed signed consent and completed all measures. Most participants were recruited
through this method. There was only one participant that participated from the online
program.

The set of packets were taken to classrooms for distribution. Included in each
packet were the Teacher Consent Letter (Appendix One), the Teacher Letter (Appendix
Two), Teacher Information Questionnaire (Appendix Three), and one of the eight Case
Studies (Appendix Four through Appendix Twelve). These forms were placed in a
manila envelope. The envelopes were passed out to participants in random order to
control for order effects. The investigator waited in each classroom until each participant
completed and returned the packets. On average, the investigator spent 20 minutes
collecting data in each classroom.

Online Participants

A second set materials were developed for participants who participated in an
online format. The materials were similar to the ones for preservice teachers with the
exception of a welcome letter (Appendix 13). Instructors for each course were contacted
and a brief description was placed on the course website. Six online packets were sent

through the university email system as a Word attachment to the identiﬁed students. A

27

follow up email was sent to the ﬁve participants who did not respond 3 days after the
packets were sent. The follow up email served as the ﬁrst reminder to turn in all
materials in a timely fashion. A second reminder email was sent to the same ﬁve
participants 1 week after the packets were emailed. None of the participants responded to
the second reminder. As a result they were not included in the study. The one online
participant responded to the study within one week.

Measures

Teacher Decisions to Refer to Special Education. The predictor variable was measured
by four questions. The participants were asked to respond on a 4 point Likert type scale.
They circled a one for “deﬁnitely not” and four for “deﬁnitely would”. The questions
were: (a) How likely would you be to continue to work with this student in the regular
education classroom? (b) How likely would you be to refer this student for assistance
outside of the classroom for special education services? (c) In your opinion (as the
regular classroom teacher), is this student a candidate for special education? ((1) Would
this student receive a better education in a special education classroom with a special
education teacher? The questions were summed for the analysis of the research
questions. After examining the psychometric properties of the scale, the ﬁrst question (a)
was dropped. Dropping the ﬁrst question increased the alpha level of the scale. Each of
the remaining three questions were summed to make the scale. As such, there were a
total of 12 possible for each participant. This method is slightly different from the
current literature in that the previous literature examining teacher referral decisions

utilized a one item question to determine teacher decisions (Soodak & Podell, 1993).

28

Case Study. Teachers read a case study of 196 words describing a 3rd grade student
who, although generally well behaved, was having signiﬁcant academic difﬁculty in
reading and was unable to concentrate. The case study included a brief description of the
special education process. The description was: “There is a continuum of help available
for students with problems. Teachers can do everything from working with the student
themselves to referring them to specialists including special education”. The purpose of
the description was to give all participants a similar deﬁnition on which to draw
conclusions about the students in the case studies.

The case studies were identical except for variations in the race, gender and socio
economic status (low or high) of the child. In the low socio economic status (SES)
condition, subjects read that the student’s father and mother were unemployed and that
the student lived in a housing development. In the high SES condition, the student’s
father and mother were described as an executive at a local ﬁrm and a doctor,
respectively.

Teacher Eﬂicacy Scale. Teachers’ sense of efficacy was measured through the
shortened version of the Gibson and Dembo short form Teacher Efﬁcacy Scale (Gibson
& Dembo, 1984) adapted by Woolfolk and Boy (1993). This scale consisted of personal
teacher efﬁcacy (PTE) and general teacher efﬁcacy (GTE) items as well as the two
original Rand items. The original RAND items come from the ﬁrst measure of teacher
efﬁcacy. At that time teachers’ efﬁcacy scores were based on their answers to the two
items only. For the present study, the PTE and GTE items were selected because they
had the highest factor loadings in the earlier research. Example GTE items are: “If

students aren’t disciplined at home, they aren’t likely to accept any discipline” and “If

29

parents would do more for their children, I could do more.” Example PTE items are: “If a
student did not remember information I gave in a previous lesson, I would know how to
increase his/her retention in the next lesson” and “When I really try, I can get through to
most difficult students.” Participants responded to 16 six-point agree/disagree statements
on a Likert-type scale. Nine statements dealt with personal teaching efﬁcacy and the
remaining seven dealt with general teaching efﬁcacy. For both of the dimensions, the
higher the score (the closer to 6), the more efﬁcacious. Factorial validity of the scale has
been established by two factors that are linked to Bandura’s two-factor model of self-
efﬁcacy (Bandura, 1986). Internal consistencies (coefﬁcient alpha reliabilities) were 0.80
for the personal teaching efﬁcacy factor, and 0.68 for the general teaching efficacy factor.

Teacher information questionnaire. Teachers in the study completed an 8-item
questionnaire that was used for this study. The questions on this measure assessed the
teacher’s education, experience, attitude toward inclusion, and general demographic
information. Demographic information pertaining to participants’ current educational
status (undergraduate or graduate student), intended major and year (for preservice
teachers), grade level taught (for graduate students), teacher race or ethnicity, teacher
gender, teacher education level and school location were also collected from the

participants.

Data Analyses Plan

Question One: Is teacher eﬁicacy related to teacher decisions to refer?
The relationship between teacher efﬁcacy and teacher referral decisions was

analyzed by running a correlation between teacher efﬁcacy and the question at the end of

30

the case study. I expected to ﬁnd that personal teacher efﬁcacy was negatively related to
the teacher’s decision to refer, and general teaching efﬁcacy was positively related to
teacher’s decision to refer students for special education services.

Question Two: Are student characteristics such as student race and gender
related to teachers ’ decisions to refer students?

The analysis for the second research question required an analysis of variance
(ANOVA). First, I hypothesized that teachers would refer Aﬁican American students at
higher rates. Second, I hypothesize that teachers will refer male students at higher rates.
Research Question #3: Are years of experience related to their decision to refer students
for special education services?

The third research question was analyzed with an AN OVA to determine the
difference between the level of experience reported by teachers and their decisions to
refer students for special education services.

Two groups were created for this analysis (1) preservice teachers with no teaching
experience and (2) experienced teachers with working experience in the teaching
profession. I expected to ﬁnd that teachers with experience would refer students at
higher rates when compared to teachers without experience.

Question Four: Do student characteristics moderate the relationship between teacher
eﬂicacy and teacher ’s decisions to refer?

A t-test between groups was utilized for analyzing the present hypothesis. For
this question I was trying to determine the relationship between general and personal
teaching efﬁcacy and the teacher’s decisions to refer students. This was accomplished in

two steps. First, the teacher efﬁcacy questionnaire was divided into two including (1) a

31

recoded variable for personal teacher efﬁcacy to include teachers’ with ratings both
above and below the mean and (2) recoded variables for general teacher efﬁcacy to
include teachers’ with ratings both above and below the mean. The purpose of this step
was to separate teachers’ with high and/or low ratings of both personal and general
teacher efﬁcacy and to analyze the inﬂuence of the teacher ratings of students in each
case study based on the race and gender of each student.

The second step included running independent t tests on each variable. There
were two variables for each of the four groups (1) high personal teacher efﬁcacy and race
(2) low personal teacher efﬁcacy and race (3) high personal teacher efficacy and gender
(4) low personal teacher efficacy and gender (5) high general teacher efﬁcacy and race
(2) low general teacher efficacy and race (3) high general teacher efﬁcacy and gender (4)
low general teacher efficacy and gender. I hypothesized that teachers’ with high ratings
of personal teaching efﬁcacy would be less likely to refer students based on their race and

gender.

Summary of the Methods

Case study methodology was used to examine how the characteristics of the
student and the teacher inﬂuence referral decisions. First, UCRIHS approval was sought.
Following scale development and UCRIHS approval, pre service teachers’ were recruited
from Michigan State University. The independent variables were written into the case
study. The student characteristics including race, gender and socio economic status were
supplied in the case study. Again, I expected that student characteristics would be related

to teacher decisions to refer.

32

Participants were recruited by contacting faculty in two teacher preparation
program courses in the College of Education. After an email contact was made, the
investigator sent a description of the study to each administrator. The administrator then
presented the information at a staff meeting for approval.

Following pilot testing and program assent, University Committee on Research

Involving Human Subjects (UCRIHS) approval was obtained.

33

Chapter Four: Results

This chapter includes two sections. First the descriptive statistics are presented
and then the psychometric properties of the measures are detailed. In the second section,
the four hypothesis are examined using correlations, t-tests, and Analysis of Variance
(ANOVA)

Descriptive Statistics

Descriptive statistics were computed for the entire sample. The participants were
representative of the population at the university. The sample was 82.8% Caucasian
(N=217), 3.1% Aﬁican American (N=8), 1.9% Hispanic (N=5), 2.3% Asian (N=6), .8%
Middle Eastern (N =2) and .4% Native American (N=1) and .4% of the sample reported
being of mixed race or bi-racial (N =1 ). Some participants did not report their race.

The total sample was 74.4% female (N=195) and 16.8% male (N=44). Some
participants chose not to report their gender.

The participants reported the highest degree obtained. The majority of the sample
reported that they were college undergraduate students (N =1 71). A summary of these
data is available in Table 1.

Table 1

Summary of Respondents Level of Education Obtained

 

 

Education Level Obtained Number Percentage of Sample
High School 171 69
BA. 33 13.3

34

Table 1 Continued

BS. 24 9.7
MA. 14 5.6
Ph.D. 3 1 .2
Lifelong Learner 2 .8
Missing 1 .04
Total 248 100

 

Students at the university were classiﬁed as Lifelong Learners if they attended the
University but were not pursuing a University degree.

The sample included students who were not currently teaching (71.7%) There
was 1 substitute teacher in the sample. This participant’s data was included in the
analysis of experienced teachers. Experienced was deﬁned as any participant with 1 year
or more of teaching experience. Preservice was deﬁned as a participant with an
undergraduate classiﬁcation in the College of Education. None of the preservice
participants reported ever teaching in a school.

Respondents provided information about the number of years of teaching
experience. A large percentage of the teachers’ reported teaching from 1 to 3 years
(20%). Fifty participants reported having 4 to 6 years of teaching experience. Six
participants reported having 7 to 18 years of teaching experience. A summary of these

data are presented in Table 2.

35

Table 2

Summary of Respondents with Teaching Experience

 

 

Education Level Obtained Number Percentage of Sample
1 to 3 years 46 18.5%

Table 2 Continued

4 to 6 years 13 5.2%

7 to 18 years 6 2.4%

No Experience 183 73.8%

Total 248 100%

 

Preservice Teachers

Preservice teachers were recruited ﬁom an introductory teacher education course.
None of the teachers had experience in the teaching profession. The sample included 179
preservice teachers (72% of the total sample). Most of the preservice teachers were
Caucasian (86%) although teachers from a range of racial and ethnic groups participated.
In particular, 3.9% of the sample was African American (N=7), 1.7% of the preservice
teachers were Asian (N=3), 1.1% of the sample was Middle Eastern (N=2) and .6% of the
preservice teachers reported “other” (N =1 ). Eight of the preservice participants chose not
to report their race.

The preservice sample included mostly female students (N=l35, 75.4%). There
were 37 male students in this portion of the sample (20.7%). The gender makeup of the
sample was reﬂective of the university teacher education program. Two participants
chose not to report their gender. The gender makeup was also representative of the

previous research on teacher efﬁcacy.

36

The preservice teachers reported information about their class level and majors.

There were eight participants that reported their class as “undergraduate” rather than

detailing their speciﬁc class level. Some of the students reported that they were unsure of

their major, especially the students who were freshman. Six preservice teachers reported

Special Education as their major (3%). All of these data are detailed in Table 3.

Table 3

Descriptive Data for Preservice Teachers

 

 

Number (N) Percentage of Pre Percentage of Entire
Service Teachers Sample
School Yr. 59 Freshman 33% Freshman 23.8% Freshman
60 Sophomore 33.5% Sophomore 24.2% Sophomore
27 Junior 15.1% Junior 10.9% Junior
33 Senior 18.5% Senior 13.3% Senior
Race 153 Caucasian 85.5% Caucasian 61.7% Caucasian
7 Aﬁican American 3.9% Aﬁican American .2% Aﬁican
American
3 Asian 1.7% Asian .1% Asian
5 Hispanic 2.8% Hispanic .2% Hispanic
1 Middle Eastern .6% Middle Eastern <.1% Middle Eastern
1 Other .6% Other <.1% Other
Gender 135 Female 75.4% Female 54.4% Female
37 Male 20.7% Male 14.9% Male
SE Major 6 3% .2%

37

Experienced Teachers

The experienced teachers were recruited from Masters level courses. A majority
of the experienced sample was Caucasian (92.2%; N=59) although teachers from a range
of racial and ethnic groups participated. In particular, 1.6% of the experienced teachers
were African American (N=1), 1.6% of the experienced teachers were mixed with
African American and Caucasian ancestry (N=1), 2.8% of the sample was Hispanic and
4.7% of the experienced teachers were Asian (N=3). Most participants reported their
race.

The sample of experienced teachers included mostly female students (87.5%;
N=56). There were six male students in this portion of the sample (9.4%). Some
experienced teachers chose not to report their race.

The experienced teachers reported information about the classes that were
teaching currently. The majority of the sample taught students in General Education
classrooms. Others reported that they were Special Education teachers (N =7). All of
these data are detailed in Table 4.

Table 4

Descriptive Data for Experienced Teachers

 

 

Number (N) Percentage of Percentage of
Experienced Teachers Entire Sample
School Yr. 27 BA. 42.2%
20 8.8. 31.3%
14 Masters 21.9% 23%
3 Doctoral 4.7% 24%
Race 59 Caucasian 92.2% 72.4%

38

Table 4 Continued

1 Aﬁican American 1.6%

3 Asian 4.7%
1 Mixed Race ' 1.6%
Gender 56 Female 87.5% Female
6 Male 9.4% Male
SE Major 7 11%

23% Female

.02% Male

Measure Preparation

The ﬁrst aim of this study was the creation and validation of the Teacher Efﬁcacy

Measure. Pearson correlation coefﬁcients were calculated for the scale items. This

procedure determined the strength and direction of linear relationships between the two

variables. The two variables are General Teacher Efﬁcacy and Personal Teacher

Efficacy (Gibson & Dembo, 1984; Woolfolk & Hoy, 1993).

The Teacher Efﬁcacy scale was used for this study. Two dimensions in this scale

emerge, Personal Teacher Efﬁcacy (PTE) and General Teacher Efﬁcacy (GTE). Factorial

validity of the scale has been established by two factors that are linked to Bandura’s two-

factor model of self-efﬁcacy (Bandura, 1986). Internal consistencies (coefﬁcient alpha

reliabilities) were 0.80 for the personal teaching efﬁcacy factor, and 0.68 for the general

teaching efﬁcacy factor. Please refer to table 5.

39

Table 5

Summary of Reliability of Measures

 

 

Scale Title Number Published Study
Of Items Reliability Reliability
Existing Measures
Teacher Efﬁcacy PTE 5 .80 .80
Teacher Efﬁcacy GTE 5 .68 .68
Teacher Referral Referral 3 N/A .71
(Not a published scale)

The second aim of this study was the creation and validation of questions at the
end of each case study. After an analysis of each question, I decided to drop the ﬁrst
question, “How likely would you be to continue to work with this student in the regular
education classroom”. The purpose of the measure was to assess the likelihood of the
student being referred to special education. This question appeared to be redundant.
The psychometric properties of the scale were measured with Cronbach’s alpha.
Cronbach's alpha measures how well a set of items (or variables) measures a single
unidimensional latent construct. When data have a multidimensional structure,
Cronbach's alpha will usually be low. Cronbach’s alpha for the three case study questions
(a,b, and c) was .71. The widely-accepted social science cut-off is that alpha should be
.70 or higher for a set of items to be considered a scale.

Originally there were 8 case studies describing a (1) poor Caucasian male (2)
wealthy Caucasian male (3) poor Caucasian female (4) wealthy Caucasian female (5)
poor Aﬁican American male (6) wealthy African American male (7) poor Aﬁican

American female and (8) wealthy African American female. Because socio economic

4o

status was not a variable examined by this dissertation the case studies were combined. 1
combined case (1) and (2) to reﬂect a Caucasian male; case (3) and (4) to reﬂect a
Caucasian female, case (5) and (6) to reﬂect an African American male and cases (7) and
(8) to reﬂect an Aﬁican American female. Please refer to Table 6 for descriptives
detailing the number of participants that completed each case study.

Table 6

Descriptive Statistics for Case Studies

 

 

Case Frequency Percent
Caucasian male 63 25.4
Caucasian female 64 25.8
African American male 59 23.8
Aﬁ'ican American female 62 25
Totals 248 100

 

Analysis of Research Questions and Hypotheses
Question One: Is teacher eﬂicacy related to teacher decisions to refer?

The relationship between teacher efﬁcacy and teacher referral decisions was
analyzed by running a correlation between teacher efﬁcacy and the question at the end of
the case study regarding special education referral choices. The analysis was run with the
two separate dimensions of teacher efﬁcacy, general teacher efﬁcacy and personal
teacher efﬁcacy.

General teaching efﬁcacy was signiﬁcantly correlated with teacher referral
decisions (r=-.149, p<.05). General teaching efﬁcacy refers to the teachers attributing

student difficulties to external factors, outside of the teacher’s control. The negative

41

correlation suggests that teachers with high ratings of general teaching efﬁcacy were less
likely to refer students for special education assistance and more likely to work with the
student in the general education classroom setting.

Personal teaching efﬁcacy was signiﬁcantly correlated with teacher referral
decisions (r=.292, p<.001). The positive correlation suggests that teachers with high
ratings of personal teaching efﬁcacy were more likely to refer students for special
education services. Personal teaching efﬁcacy refers to the teacher’s beliefs about their
own abilities to affect student outcomes. The details of this analysis are provided in
Table 7.

Table 7: Correlations Between Measures for the entire sample

 

 

Measure 1 2 3

1. General Teacher ------- -.014* -.023*
Efﬁcacy

2. Personal Teacher ------- .000**
Efﬁcacy

3. SE Referral -------

 

* signiﬁcant at the .05 level
** signiﬁcant at the .01 level

An additional analysis was used to determine the relationship between the two
Teacher Efﬁcacy factors, special education referral decisions and the two groups of
teachers (preservice and experienced). The additional analysis required some variable
recoding. A variable was recoded to separate the preservice ﬁ'om the experienced
teachers. Participants who were recruited from the undergraduate, preservice teaching
class were classiﬁed as inexperienced teachers. The participants who were recruited

from the graduate courses were classiﬁed as experienced teachers.

42

Signiﬁcant correlations were noted for preservice teachers. Personal Teacher
Efﬁcacy was signiﬁcantly correlated with preservice teacher referral decisions (r=.250,
p<.001). The positive correlation suggests that preservice teachers with high ratings of
personal teaching efﬁcacy were more likely to refer students for special education
services. Signiﬁcant correlations were also noted between general teacher efﬁcacy and
personal teacher efﬁcacy (r=-.158, p<.05). Table 8 is provided to display the results of
the correlations between the three variables.

Table 8: Correlations Between Measures for Preservice Teachers

 

 

Measure 1 2 3

1. General Teacher ------- -.158* -.131
Efﬁcacy

2. Personal Teacher ------- .250**
Efﬁcacy

3. SE Referral -------

 

* signiﬁcant at the .05 level
** signiﬁcant at the .01 level

No signiﬁcant correlations were noted between the three variables when the
analysis was run with experienced teachers only. The results are displayed in Table 9.

Table 9: Correlations Between Measures for Experienced Teachers

 

 

Measure 1 2 3

1. General Teacher ------- -.084 -.173
Efficacy

2. Personal Teacher ------- .228
Efficacy

3. SE Referral .......

 

43

Table 9 Continued

* signiﬁcant at the .05 level
** signiﬁcant at the .01 level

To gain additional information, I examined the means and standard deviations of
all three variables. Results suggest that the experienced teachers rated themselves higher
in general teaching efﬁcacy (M=18.4, SD=4.6) compared to the preservice teachers
(M=17.6, SD=4.1). The preservice teachers rated themselves higher in personal teaching
efﬁcacy (M=12.7, SD=3.8) compared to the experienced teachers (M=10.1, SD=3.3).
Overall, the preservice teachers were slightly more likely to refer students for special
education services (M=6.9, SD=2) compared to the experienced teachers (M=6, SD=1.4).
A high score on the referral scale means that teachers were more likely to refer the

student in the case study for special education services.

Question Two: Are student characteristics such as student race and gender related to
teachers’ decisions to refer students?

The analysis for the second research question required a two way Analysis of
Variance (ANOVA). I analyzed racial differences by utilizing ‘decision to refer’ as an
outcome variable and race as the grouping variable.

The race of the student in the case study was not related to teacher referral
decisions (F (1,241) =.266, p=.606). An examination of the means shows that teachers
rated the Aﬁican American students (M=6.69, SD=1.71) similarly when compared to the
Caucasian students (M=6.56, SD=2.08). The Aﬁican American students had a slightly

higher referral rate but not high enough to gain signiﬁcance.

The gender of the student in the case study was not related to teacher referral

decisions (F (1,241)=.526, p=.469). The mean referral rating for the male students

(M=6.7179, SD=1.91) was slightly higher than the mean referral rating for female

students (M=6.54, SD=1.89).

Due to the lack of signiﬁcance, a three way ANOVA was utilized to gain more

information. Interestingly, the race of the student in the case study had an impact on

referral decisions when socio economic status was included in the formula. The

interaction is provided below in Table 10.

Table 10: AN OVA — Do student characteristics inﬂuence teacher referral decisions?

 

 

SS df Mean Square F Sig
Corrected Model 2.871a 7 .410 1.289 .256
Intercept 1049.723 1 1049.723 3299.302 .000
Student race .112 1 .112 .352 .553
Student gender .074 1 .074 .233 .630
Student SES 1.036 1 1.036 3.257 .072
Student race+ .050 1 .050 .156 .693
Student gender
Student race+ 1.502 1 1.502 4.719 .031
Student SES
Student gender + .016 1 .016 .052 .820
Student SES
Student race+ .051 l .051 .162 .688
Gender+SES
Error 76.041 239 .318

45

Table 10 Continued

Total

1128.682 247

Corrected Total 78.91 3 246

 

The African American students who were described as having a low socio economic

status were referred at higher rates. Please refer to Figure 1.

Figure 1: Interaction between student race and student socio economic status

 

MoanRaferralRatIng

 

7.4

7.2

was»
Ac».a>~r

9’
N

High SES

0)

5.8 ;

 

5.6
1 2

Caucasian African American

 

 

Lastly, the gender of the teacher had a slight inﬂuence on the teachers decision to

refer students for Special education services (F=2.337, p=.074). Male teachers were more

likely to refer students for special education services (M=6.91, SD=2.03) compared to

female teachers (M=6.52, SD=1.86), with p < .10. Please refer to Table 9.

46

Table 11: ANOVA — Does the gender of the teacher inﬂuence teacher referral decisions?

 

 

SS df Mean Square F Sig
Between Groups 25.105 3 8.368 2.337 .074
Within Groups 823.580 230 3.581
Total 848.685 233

 

Research Question #3: Are years of experience related to decisions to refer students for
special education services?

The third research question was analyzed with an AN OVA to determine the
difference between the level of education reported by teachers and their decisions to refer
students for special education services.

Two groups were created for this analysis (1) preservice teachers with no teaching
experience (M=6, SD=1.4) and (2) experienced teachers with working experience in the
teaching profession (M=6.8, SD=2). Results of the ANOVA reveal a signiﬁcant
relationship between the current teaching status of the participant and the teacher’s
referral decision (F (1, 23 8)=8.5, p=.004). The teachers with experience in the
profession were more likely to refer students for special education services. See Table 12
for results of the analysis.

Table 12: ANOVA —- Does the years of experience reported by the participant inﬂuence
referral decisions?

 

 

SS df Mean Square F Sig
Between Groups 29.395 1 29.395 8.509 .004*
Within Groups 822.204 238 3.455

47

Table 12 Continued

Total 851.599 239

 

Question Four: Do student characteristics moderate the relationship between teacher
eﬂicacy and teacher’s decisions to refer?

A t-test between groups was utilized for analyzing my hypothesis that teachers
with high efﬁcacy would be less likely to be affected by gender and racial characteristics
when determining whether or not to refer a child for potential special education services.
For this question I attempted to determine the relationship between general and personal
teaching efﬁcacy and the teachers’ decisions to refer students of different genders and
races. This was accomplished in two steps. First, teachers were coded as being either
high or low in terms of general teaching efﬁcacy, and either high or low in terms of
personal teaching efﬁcacy. The mean rating for general teacher efﬁcacy was
(M=l 7.7836, SD=4.25) and the mean rating for personal teacher efﬁcacy was
(M=11.9811, SD=3.83). These means were the cut-points used to deﬁne a teacher as
either high or low in terms of general and personal efﬁcacy. The purpose of this step was
to separate teachers with high and/or low ratings of both personal and general teacher
efﬁcacy so that I could then examine whether there were differences in referral by race
and gender within the high and low efﬁcacy groups.

The second step included running independent t tests to examine differences by
race and gender within each efﬁcacy group. The analyses run are highlighted below:

(1) differences in referral by race within the high personal teaching efﬁcacy group (2)
differences in referral by race within the low personal teacher efﬁcacy group (3)

differences in referral by gender within the high personal teacher efﬁcacy group (4)

48

differences in referral by gender within the low personal teacher efficacy group (5)
differences by race within the high general teacher efﬁcacy group (6) differences by race
within the low general teacher efﬁcacy group (7) difference by gender within the high
general teacher efﬁcacy group (8) differences by gender within the low general teacher
efﬁcacy group.

Signiﬁcant results were found between teachers who rated themselves high in
general teacher efﬁcacy and student race (t=1.7(113), p=.05). Teachers who felt that
external factors had a larger impact than their own teaching were more likely to refer
Aﬁican American students for special education services. Differences in means were
noted between teachers with low ratings of general teacher efﬁcacy and referral decisions
based on student race. However the differences were not signiﬁcant. Teachers with low
ratings of general teacher efficacy were slightly more likely to refer Caucasian students
for special education services (M=7.1, SD=2.2) compared to African American students
(M=6.8, SD=1.7).

Teacher with high ratings of personal teacher efﬁcacy were slightly more likely to
refer African American students (M=6.3, SD=1.5) compared to Caucasian students
(M=6.0, SD=2.1). Teachers with low ratings of personal teaching efﬁcacy were equally
likely to refer Aﬁican American students (M=7.1, SD=1.9) and Caucasian students
(M=7.1, SD=1.6).

Slight differences in means were noted when analyzing the impact of student
gender and teacher efﬁcacy ratings on decisions to refer students for special education
services. Teachers with low ratings of personal teacher efﬁcacy were slightly less likely

to refer male students (M=6, SD=1.9) compared to female students (M=6.3, SD=1.7).

49

Teachers with high ratings of personal teacher efﬁcacy referred boys (M=7, SD=1.6) and
girls (M=7.1, SD=1.9) at similar rates. Teachers’ with high ratings of general teacher
efficacy were less likely to refer male students (M=6. 1, SD=1.7) than female students
(M=6.5, SD=1.6). Teachers with low ratings of general teacher efﬁcacy were more likely

to refer female students (M=7.0, SD=2.1) than male students (M=6.8, SD=1.9).

50

Chapter Five: Discussion

This study is an important addition to the current literature on teacher efﬁcacy and
special education referral practices. This study is unique for two reasons. First, this
study compares two different groups of teachers, those with experience and those without
experience. The students without teaching experience were labeled preservice teachers.
The majority of the literature in this area has been conducted with preservice teachers
who have never taught in their own classrooms (Shavelson & Borki, 1979; Soodak &
Podell, 1993; 1997). Second, this study investigates the impact of a student’s race and
gender on teacher referral decisions through case study methodology. Case study
methodology has been utilized previously (Gregory, 1977; Soodak & Podell, 1993) but
no studies were identiﬁed that have manipulated race and gender variables to understand
special education referral decisions.

Teacher Efﬁcacy a__s_a Predictor of SpeLial Education Referral

The results support previous studies suggesting that teacher efﬁcacy is a
signiﬁcant predictor of referral (Gibson & Dembo, 1984; Woolfolk et al, 1990; Soodak &
Podell, 1993; Soodak & Podell, 1997). Interestingly, when utilizing the two dimensions
of teacher efﬁcacy as suggested by Tschannen-Moran, Woolfolk Hoy & Hoy (1998), the

present study provides results that are startling at ﬁrst glance.

As noted, there are two dimensions of teacher efﬁcacy, general teacher efﬁcacy
and personal teacher efﬁcacy (Ashton & Webb, 1986; Gibson & Dembo, 1984). General
teacher efﬁcacy refers to the teachers’ beliefs about the power of external factors

compared to the inﬂuence of teachers and schools (Tschannen-Moran, Woolfolk-Hoy &

51

Hoy, 1998). External factors are those that the teacher has no control over. External
factors noted in the case studies used include student race, gender and socio economic

status.

It was expected that teachers with high ratings of general teacher efﬁcacy would
refer students to special education at higher rates than teachers with high ratings of
personal teacher efﬁcacy. In other words it was hypothesized that teachers attributing
student struggles to external factors would be less willing to work with the student in the
case study in the general education classroom (Tschannen-Moran, 1998). These [high
general teacher efficacy] teachers were expected to refer the student in the case study for
special education services. Similarly, teachers with high ratings of personal teacher
efﬁcacy were expected to continue working with the student in the case study. It was
expected that teachers with high ratings of personal teacher efﬁcacy would assume
personal responsibility for the students and retain students with problems in their
classrooms. Interestingly, the opposite result was found. For the present sample,
teachers with high ratings of general teacher efﬁcacy were less likely to refer students for
special education services. Initially, this result appears strange. However when noting
the differences between the present sample and the existing literature, the result gains

clarity.

The present sample contains both teachers with experience and teachers without
experience. An analysis of the data revealed that the teacher’s level of experience had an
impact on their decision making. The participants with high ratings of general teacher

efﬁcacy in the present sample are different from the participants with high ratings of

52

general teacher efficacy in the previous literature based on demographics alone. Most of
the teachers with high general teaching efﬁcacy ratings were experienced teachers. The
experienced teachers may have felt that external factors were more powerful than the
school overall, but their education and level of experience suggest that they also know
that these factors do not necessarily make a student a good candidate for special
education referral. This may be why experienced teachers in the present sample were
less likely to refer students for special education services. As the general education
teacher they may have known that it was still their responsibility to work with the student
in the general education setting causing them to retain the student and work with them

personally.

Similarly, teachers reporting high ratings of personal teacher efﬁcacy behaved
differently than hypothesized. Personal teacher efﬁcacy refers to the teacher’s beliefs
about their own abilities to affect student outcomes. Teachers in the sample who reported
high ratings of personal teacher efﬁcacy referred students for special education at higher
rates when compared to those with high ratings of general teacher efﬁcacy. Again, this
may be a function of the sample. The majority of teachers in the sample were preservice
teachers. When analyzed separately, the preservice teachers provided higher ratings of
personal teacher efﬁcacy. This was expected. Preservice teachers have fewer mastery
experiences to draw from when working with students. As a result, they are more likely

to take personal responsibility for their students.

The sample was not only unique in their level of experience but it is also

important to note that ﬁve percent of the participants were students majoring in special

53

education. These students have specialized knowledge regarding the referral process and
when it is and is not appropriate to refer students for special education services. Most
notably, the present study provided a description of the referral process prior to asking
the participants to make a decision. This was not done in previous studies. The
description explained the special education referral process as a continuum of help
available for students with problems. It goes on to state that teachers can do everything
from working with the student themselves to referring them to specialists including
special education. It is possible that some teachers read the description and understood
that referring a student for special education referral does not necessarily mean that they
will not work with the student personally. The inclusion of this description was vital and
provided a guarantee that teachers were answering referral questions based on the same
deﬁnition of referral. However the description also makes it difﬁcult to speculate on the
teachers true beliefs about special education.

A ﬁnal explanation for the differences in the present results and the previous
literature may be attributed to Tschannen-Moran et al’s (1998) model suggesting that
teacher efﬁcacy is cyclical in nature. To review, this model of teacher efﬁcacy suggests
that higher levels of efﬁcacy lead to higher levels of effort and persistence, which lead to
better performance [which in turn lead to higher levels of efﬁcacy] (Brouwers & Tomic,
2000). Perhaps the experienced participants encountered similar situations with students
in the past. If so, they may have had negative experiences after referring the students for
special education services. An experienced teacher or a special education major would
have experience with the referral process and understand that a special education referral

did not necessarily mean that a student would receive an evaluation. There is an

54

intermediate step required by law called “prereferral intervention”. This step subsurnes a
variety of modiﬁcations designed to keep the children in general education (MacMillan et
al, 1996). A child moves on to the next step — special education — only when they fail to
respond to the interventions provided during the pre-referral stage. The child is then
formally evaluated for special education services. It is plausible that the participants did
not want to engage in the time consuming process.

Perhaps this is an area that preservice teacher education programs have improved
upon in recent years. One explanation for the results may be that the university used for
data collection is among the top in the United States for teacher education programs.

The rigorous program may focus on encouraging preservice teachers to take personal
responsibilities for their students. A second explanation may be that teachers with
experience have encountered a larger number of unsuccessful results with students,
lowering their feelings of efﬁcacy, speciﬁcally personal teaching efﬁcacy. This
explanation supports the cyclical nature of teacher efﬁcacy as described previously by
Tschannen-Moran et a1 (1998). This explanation is also supported by a new study
conducted by Tschannen-Moran and Hoy (2007) suggesting that preservice teachers
report different feelings of efﬁcacy because they have fewer mastery experiences to draw
from.

The Impagt of Student Characteristics on Teacher Referral for Special Education

The second major outcome of this research is the strong support that it provides to
previous research showing that student characteristics inﬂuence teacher referral
decisions. The two student characteristics studied were student race and gender.

Although the race and the gender of the students did not signiﬁcantly impact teacher

55

referral decisions, they did have a slight impact. Most notably, the socio economic status
and the race of the student together have a signiﬁcant inﬂuence on referral decisions.
Socio economic status is addressed in the ﬁnal section of this dissertation.

The direction of the ﬁndings seemed to support my hypothesis indicating that
Aﬁican American students were referred at a slightly higher rate compared to Caucasian
students. This result is in line with previous studies (Artiles et al, 1998; Coutinho &
Oswald, 2000). In considering the two hypothesis presented by Coutinho and Oswald
(2000), it is plausible that the Aﬁican American students were referred at higher rates due
to cultural biases. This explanation is plausible because the results are also in the same
direction suggesting that Caucasian teachers refer Aﬁican American students for special
education at higher rates than Aﬁican American teachers (Coutinho & Oswald, 2000;
OSEP, 2001; Artiles et al., 1998; Robertson et al., 1994). They propose that referral for
special education is a biased process, working differently across different ethnic groups.
Their conclusion suggests that our public education system has a cultural bias that
incorrectly and disproportionately targets Aﬁican American students during referral
(Artiles & Trent, 1995). It is difﬁcult to conﬁrm the exact reason for the ﬁndings of the
present study. Although there may appear to be a lack of racial diversity in the sample,
this sample is representative of our public education system (Elhoweris, Motus, Alsheiky,
& Holloway, 2005). The majority of US. teachers are European American. Indeed 80%
to 90% of the teachers are European American and middle class (Elhoweris et al., 2005).
However the population of students is quite diverse. In fact, by the year 2040, children
from different cultural backgrounds are expected to be the majority of classrooms

(Cushner, McClelland & Safford, 2003). Perhaps schools of education and our public

56

education system in the US. will begin to focus on the considerable discrepancy between
the makeup of the student population and that of the teaching force. The results of the
present study appear to provide a positive light to this picture.

The gender of the student did not have a signiﬁcant impact on teacher referral
decisions. However differences in means were noted. Boys were referred at higher rates
than girls. This result is in the same direction as ﬁndings in previous studies (Prieto &
Zucker, 1981; Oswald et al, 2003; Delgado & Scott, 2006).

MacMillen et al (1996) suggest that the higher identiﬁcation rates for males than
females arises from differences in the deportrnent of males and females. Suggesting
differences in the deportment of the two genders implies that males and females display
differences in behavior and mannerisms that cause teachers to take note more than female
students. Males display more externalizing behaviors. This may have been a plausible
explanation for the present study if the students were viewed on video or through an
actual classroom observation. However, the students in the case studies were identical.
Race, gender and socio economic status were the only variables that were manipulated.
The sample may have expected that the male students were more disruptive but again,
this is difficult to say based on the information obtained. The students exhibited the same
behaviors and the results suggest that males and females were not equally at risk for
referral by their teacher. The male students were more at risk for referral.

Wehmeyer and Schwartz (2001) proposed a three part theory mentioned
previously. The ﬁrst two parts of the theory do not ﬁt the present study because case
study methodology was chosen. The third part proposes that the disproportionate number

of males in special education is due to inﬂuences of gender bias on the referral process.

57

The biases are based in stereotypes about gender and gender roles in our society.
Teachers appear to hold the same gender biases (and racial biases) and expectations that
are held by society as a whole. Compounding this problem is again the fact that most
teachers are women especially at the elementary level which was the focus of the case
studies (Cook & Boe, 1995). Qualitative data from the teachers after completing the
study may have shed light on this phenomenon.

ModerJators of Teacher Efﬁcaﬂgnd Teacher Referrai Decisions

Signiﬁcant results were found between teachers with high ratings of general
teacher efﬁcacy and Aﬁican American students. Teachers’ who felt that external factors
had a larger impact then their own teacher were more likely to refer African American
students for special education services. The most intriguing ﬁnding is that the socio
economic status and the race of the student together have a signiﬁcant inﬂuence on
teacher decisions to refer students. The Aﬁican American students with low socio
economic status were referred at higher rates when compared to the other students
according to the present sample.

The results somewhat support the idea that teachers with high ratings of general
teacher efﬁcacy are more likely to refer students to special education for external reasons.
Although I did not ﬁnd signiﬁcant differences in referral ratings based on gender,
signiﬁcant results were noted between general teacher efficacy and race and the students
socio economic status and the likelihood of teacher referral. The purpose of investigating
race and gender as a moderating factors of teacher efﬁcacy and teacher referral decisions
was to add to the gap in the literature examining the overrepresentation of African

American students in special education. As noted, there is a wealth of literature

58

conﬁrming this phenomenon. Again, the result of the previous investigations reveal a
number of reasons for the overrepresentation of Aﬁican Americans in special education
including a low tolerance for misbehavior (Hetzner, 2007; Skiba, Simmons, Ritter,
Kohler, Henderson & Wu, 2006), a lack of preparation for teachers and schools or
cultural gaps (Skiba et al, 2006), a racial bias, and a discrepancy between teacher and
student demographic characteristics (Elhoweris et al, 2005). All of the studies noted
focus on the problem of overrepresentation aﬂer students are already placed in special
education classes. However very few studies address the impact of teacher perceptions on
the problem of overrepresentation of African Americans on teacher referral decisions.
We now understand that teacher beliefs have a larger inﬂuence on referral decisions than
individual student characteristics.

Previous studies have shown that teachers and the general public have negative
stereotypes and inaccurate perceptions of the abilities of children ﬁom different cultural
backgrounds (Delpit, 1995; Grossman, 1995; Jensen & Rosenfeld, 1974; Ogbu, 1992).
Various studies have attempted to explain factors associated with teachers’ negative
attitudes toward children ﬁ'om culturally diverse backgrounds. They demonstrated that
educators hold different attitudes toward children as a function of their ethnicity (Ford &
Webb, 1994; Prieto & Zucker, 1981; Zucker & Prieto, 1977), gender (Gangne, 1993) and
socio economic status (Frey, 2002; Guskin, Peng, & Simon, 1992; Mutua, 2001).
Additionally, a number of researchers have investigated the role of teachers in the referral
process in an attempt to explain the effect of children’s characteristics on teachers’
decision making in special education programs. The results of these studies have

indicated that teachers tend to evaluate African American and poor students’ academic

59

performance and behavior in a biased manner (Frey, 2002; Prieto & Zucker, 1981;
Zucker & Prieto, 1977). Similarly, in studies where teachers were watching, hearing or
watching and hearing videotapes of middle and lower class Caucasian and Aﬁican
American students, teachers rated the middle class Caucasian students more favorably
than the lower class Caucasian children or Aﬁican American children regardless of social
class (Jensen & Rosenfeld, 1974).

Limitations

The ﬁrst limitation pertains to the sample. All of the participants were students
attending a large University in the Midwest. This particular university is known for the
College of Education and emphasis on internship experience. Most of the experienced
teachers completed at least one full year of internship and an additional year of teaching.
This is not the normal course of scholarship for teachers. Most colleges and universities
require a semester (half year) of internship for preservice teachers. As such, this sample
was more experienced than the samples presented in the literature.

The second limitation pertains to the case study methodology. To start, some
teachers may have had difﬁculty identifying with the students in the case studies because
of the method of presentation. One previous study used videos to gather data which
resulted in rich information provided by the teachers. Secondly, the case studies
provided a detailed description of the referral process. There are beneﬁts and drawbacks
to this inclusion. The beneﬁt is that each teacher has a similar frame of references on
which to draw conclusions. The drawback is that we do not know how the additional
information impacted teacher perceptions of the referral process. It is possible that

teacher decisions would have been different without the inclusion of the description.

60

An additional limitation relates to the statistical procedures utilized in the fourth
research question. A t-test between groups was utilized for analyzing the hypothesis. In
an attempt to determine the relationship between general and personal teaching efﬁcacy
and the teachers’ decisions to refer students of different genders and races, multiple
independent t tests were conducted. The limitation to this method of analysis is as the
number of independent tests increases, the probability of at least one wrong test result or
false positive result also increases and becomes much larger that .05. In statistics, this is
known as a Type 1 error.

A ﬁnal limitation may have been the sample. The sample was both a stratiﬁed
sample and a volunteer sample. A stratiﬁed sample implies that each group represents a
subgroup of interest. The present sample was selected from the College of Education.
All of the students were enrolled in Teacher Education courses. In addition, all of the
participants were given a choice regarding participation in the study. Most students in
each class chose to participate. However there is a possibility that the other students hold
different beliefs and would have made different decisions. The likelihood of the results
changing is slim. There were approximately four students total who chose not to

participate in the study.

Future Directiong
Initial referral is often considered the most important step in the special education
eligibility process because it (1) identiﬁes which children will be considered for services
and (2) is an important predictor of future eligibility for special education (Artiles &
Trent, 1994; Ysseldyke & Algozzine, 1983). My goal is to complete this dissertation and

bring light to the sheer complexity of the process and perceptions that contribute to the

61

overrepresentation of certain students in special education classrooms. Reducing
inappropriate special education referrals requires a focus on teachers, teacher education
programs, and updating the process of referral with research based alternatives.

Given the evident deleterious effect of low teacher efﬁcacy, and the demonstrated
pattern of the decline of personal teacher efﬁcacy in the initial years of teaching, teacher
education programs should provide students with the experience and support that they
need to prepare them to work successfully with racially and academically diverse groups
of students. Research has demonstrated that, once teacher education students become
teachers themselves, there is a sharp decline in their belief in their own effectiveness
(Soodak & Podell, 1997). Therefore, new teachers should have ample opportunity to
engage in self-study and to beneﬁt ﬁ'om the wisdom of more experienced colleagues in
both general and special education through mentoring, consultation and co-teaching
(Toumaki & Podell, 2005). Preservice teachers should also be provided with experiences
to work in a diverse array of school settings including urban, rural and suburban school
districts prior to their ﬁnal internship experience (Knoblauch & Hoy, 2008). In fact,
there has been an almost universal call for more ﬁeld experiences in diverse settings
(Ladson-Billings, 2000; Zeichner & Hoeft, 1996). Haberrnan (1995) has advocated
training teachers in the most challenging environments so that they will be better
prepared to teach in all settings. It is also important that student teachers are provided
with opportunities to work with a variety of supervisors. Knoblaugh and Hoy (2008)
found that the c00perating teacher’s efﬁcacy beliefs had a direct impact on the efﬁcacy

beliefs reported by the preservice teacher.

62

A ﬁrst major theme in the literature addressing disproportionality is the impact of
cultural differences on teacher perceptions and practices related to minority students
(Gravois & Rosenﬁeld, 2006). In an effort to address the disproportionate placement of
minority students in special education, many policymakers have looked to preservice and
in-service professional development of teachers and alternative identiﬁcation process
including an alternative identiﬁcation process for special education referral.

The methodology utilized in schools is known by many school psychologists as
the traditional model of service delivery (Merrell, 2006; Reschly & Ysseldyke, 2002).
This model requires students to take standardized intelligence and achievement tests. If
the psychologist notes a large discrepancy between the two measures, the student is
typically found eligible for special education services. This model of practice lacks
treatment validity because there is little to no assessment to treatment link. It also lacks
treatment validity because it does not distinguish between “slow learners and LD
discrepant students. The outcomes for these two groups is the same. The traditional
model also lacks reliability because students may be eligible in one district and not
another (Merrell, 2006; Reschly & Ysseldyke, 2002). One of the ﬁnal criticisms of the
traditional model is that standardized tests are culturally biased and harmful (Merrell,
2000). Standardized tests require knowledge that is at times culturally speciﬁc. If
students are not from the mainstream culture, they may not be able to showcase their true
abilities with these measures.

In an attempt to move toward a more scientiﬁc model or a problem solving
model, recent federal regulations for the identiﬁcation of children with special needs

include procedures that may be used by education agencies to identify students with

63

learning and behavioral difﬁculties. The new model is Response to Intervention. This
model is especially relevant to the present dissertation because the beneﬁt of this model is
the method of identifying children. Although the model can be implemented in various
ways (Fuchs, Mock, Morgan, & Young, 2003; Klinger & Edwards, 2006)

Response to Intervention is a preventative approach that includes the use of
students’ learning rate and level of performance to make instructional decisions. We
know that teacher identiﬁcation is not always accurate and appropriate (Beatiie, 1985;
Nanquin, 1999; Campbell, 2003). With the new Response to Intervention Model,
students are identiﬁed through universal screening procedures. Response to Intervention
offers a promising alternative for reducing disproportionate representation of culturally
diverse students in special education (Linan-Thompson & Vaughn, 2007) and for
reducing teacher variables in the decision making process by identifying students at risk
early and providing preventative instruction to accelerate progress.

Overall, this study suggests that special education referral decisions are often
based on a combination of variables including student characteristics and teacher beliefs.
Thus, school districts should make every effort to provide supportive environments for
teachers to collaborate with each other and engage in professional development for
continued growth. Further, schools should be cognizant of the characteristics of referred

students as well as the characteristics of teachers requesting the referrals.

64

Appendix One: Consent Form for Participation in the Study

Name
Envelope #

 

 

TEACHER CONSENT FORM

You are invited to participate in this study, “Teacher as Expert”. This is a research study
focused on understanding teacher perceptions.

1) The reason for this research is to help understand some of the ways faith-based
community organizations support the educational missions of schools. It is hoped that
this information will help community-based organizations be more effective in
supporting schools.

2) If you choose to participate in this study, you will be asked to complete two short
questionnaires and to read a case study. Your participation may take 15 minutes at the
most.

3) Your participation is completely voluntary. You may choose not to participate at all,
or you may refuse to answer certain questions, or you may discontinue your participation
at any time without penalty. No discomforts or stresses are foreseen.

5) The results of this participation will be conﬁdential, and will not be released in any
individually identiﬁable form without your prior consent, unless otherwise required by
law. No one will be able to identify your results from this study. Refusal to participate
or withdrawal from participation will not in any way penalize you. You may have the
results of the participation, to the extent that they can be identiﬁed as yours, returned to
you, removed from the research records, or destroyed at any time prior to the end of the
study.

The investigator will answer any further questions about the research, new or
during the course of the project. You are encouraged to ask questions. You may
talk with anyone on the research team during the study, or you may contact the
researcher: Daniele Eiland, phone: 517-394-5457, email: eilandd@msu.edu.

Research at Michigan State University which involves human participants is overseen by the
University Committee on Research Involving Human Subjects (U CRIHS). If you have
questions or concerns regarding your rights as a study participant, or are dissatisﬁed at any
time with any aspect of this study, you may contact — anonymously, if you wish —Peter
Vasilenko, Ph.D., Chair of the University Committee on Research Involving Human Subjects
(UCRIHS) by phone: (517) 355-2180, fax: (517)432-4503, e-mail: ucrihs@msu.edu, or
regular mail: 202 Olds Hall, East Lansing, MI 48824.

65

Appendix One Continued: Consent Form for Participation in the Study

If you agree to participate in the research, please sign below and return this form, with
your questionnaire, in the attached envelope to the box in the ofﬁce

 

 

Signature of Participating Teacher Date Signatures of Investigator Date

 

I Please sign the consent form and the investigator will collect it from you

66

Appendix Two: Teacher Letter
Dear Teachers,

You are invited to participate in a research study with the School Psychology Pro gram at
MSU.

What is the purpose of the research?

This research is designed to help us understand teacher perspectives about students.

Thank you so much for your participation! Please email or call Daniele Eiland
(ﬁndd@msu.edu or 394-5457) or Jean Baker (jbaker@msu.edu or 432-0843) if you
have any questions about your participation or the study.

Sincerely,
Daniele Eiland

67

Appendix Three: Teacher Information Questionnaire

 

TEACHER INFORMATION QUESTIONNAIRE

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Date: Age: Race:
Circle your gender: Male Female
1. Year in graduate school
2. What college are you in?
3. What is your major and minor?
major minor
4. Circle your highest education level?

High School BA BS MA PhD JD Other

 

 

5. Are you currently teaching?
a. Grade level taught?
SES of district low middle high
6. Years of teaching experience (not including internship)

 

(a) What did you teach?

 

7. Years of internship
(a) SES of district low middle high
(b) What subject did you teach?

 

 

(c) What grade level did you teach?

8. Cities, States that you have worked in

 

 

 

 

 

I Please make sure that you have answered all parts to each question.

Thank you for your participation! .' ! !

68

Appendix Four: Teacher Efﬁcacy Questionnaire

Teacher Efﬁcacy
A number of statements about organizations, people, and teaching are presented below.
The purpose is to gather information regarding the actual attitudes of educators
concerning these statements. There are no correct or incorrect answers. We are interested
only in your frank opinions. Your responses will remain conﬁdential.

INSTRUCTIONS: Please indicate your personal opinion about each statement by circling
the appropriate response at the right of each statement.

KEY: l=Strongly Agree 2=Moderately Agree 3=Agree slightly more than disagree
4=Disagree slightly more than agree 5=Moderately Disagree 6=Strongly Disagree

1. The amount a student can learn is primarily related to family background.
1 2 3 4 5 6 (circle one)

2. If students aren't disciplined at home, they aren’t likely to accept any discipline.
1 2 3 4 5 6 (circle one)

3. When I really try, I can get through to most difﬁcult students.
1 2 3 4 5 6 (circle one)

4. A teacher is very limited in what he/she can achieve because a student's home environment is
a large inﬂuence on his/her achievement.
1 2 3 4 5 6 (circle one)

5. If parents would do more for their children, I could do more.
1 2 3 4 5 6 (circle one)

6. If a student did not remember information I gave in a previous lesson, I would know how to
increase his/her retention in the next lesson.
1 2 3 4 5 6 (circle one)

7. If a student in my class becomes disruptive and noisy, I feel assured that I know some
techniques to redirect him/her quickly.
1 2 3 4 5 6 (circle one)

8. If one of my students couldn't do a class assignment, I would be able to accurately assess
whether the assignment was at the correct level of difﬁculty.
1 2 3 4 5 6 (circle one)

9. If I really try hard, I can get through to even the most difﬁcult or unmotivated students.
1 2 3 4 5 6 (circle one)

10. When it comes right down to it, a teacher really can’t do much because most Of a student’s
motivation and performance depends on his or her home environment.

1 2 3 4 5 6 (circle one)
*In Hoy, W.K & Woolfolk, A.E. (1993). Teachers' sense of efﬁcacy and the organizational health of schools. The Elementary School
Journal 93, 356-372.

69

Appendix Five: Case Study #1 — Caucasian male, low SES

 

 

CASE STUDY

 

Brad is a Caucasian male who is in third grade student at Pineview Elementary School. Pineview
is located in a suburban town in the Midwest. Brad lives in the Pineview housing development
across from the school. Brad’s mother and father are both unemployed. His teacher expresses
academic and behavioral concerns. She states “I enjoy having Brad in my class. Lately he has
not been keeping up in reading and has failed the last 3 assignments”. She goes on to state that
Brad has been fooling around in class throwing paper airplanes across the room. He also talks
constantly especially during instruction. When she calls on Brad in class, he rarely answers the
question correctly. He usually asks her to repeat the question and the other children laugh at him.
The teacher says that she needs to refer him because she does not know what to do with him and
he is ruining her ability to control the rest of her students.

Brief Description of Special Education Referral Process
There is a continuum of help available for students with problems. Teachers can do everything
from working with the student themselves to referring them to specialists including special
education.
Question for teachers: - circle one
(a) How likely would you be to continue to work with this student in the regular
education classroom?
1 2 3 4
(definitely not) ( definitely would)
(b) How likely would you be to refer this student for assistance outside of the classroom
for special education services?
1 2 3 4
(definitely not) ( definitely would)
(c) In your opinion (as the regular classroom teacher), is this student a candidate for
special education?
1 2 3 4
(deﬁnitely not a candidate) ( deﬁnitely a candidate)
((1) Would this student receive a better education in a special education classroom with
a special education teacher?
1 2 3 4
(definitely not) ( deﬁnitely would)

70

 

Appendix Six: Case Study #2 — Caucasian male, high SES

 

 

CASE STUDY

 

Brad is a Caucasian male who is in the third grade at Pineview Elementary School. Pineview is
located in a suburban town in the Midwest. Brad lives in the neighborhood across the street from
the school. Brad’s mother is a doctor and her father is an executive at a local ﬁrm. His teacher
expresses academic and behavioral concerns. She states “I enjoy having Brad in my class. Lately
he has not been keeping up in reading and has failed the last 3 assignments”. She goes on to state
that Brad has been fooling around in class throwing paper airplanes across the room. He also
talks constantly especially during instruction. When she calls on Brad in class, he rarely answers
the question correctly. He usually asks her to repeat the question and the other children laugh at
him. The teacher says that she needs to refer him because she does not know what to do with him
and he is ruining her ability to control the rest of her students.

Brief Description of Special Education Referral Process
There is a continuum of help available for students with problems. Teachers can do everything
from working with the student themselves to referring them to specialists including special
education.
Question for teachers: - circle one
(a) How likely would you be to continue to work with this student in the regular
education classroom?
1 2 3 4
(deﬁnitely not) ( deﬁnitely would)
(b) How likely would you be to refer this student for assistance outside of the classroom
for special education services?
1 2 3 4
(deﬁnitely not) ( deﬁnitely would)
(c) In your opinion (as the regular classroom teacher), is this student a candidate for
special education?
1 2 3 4
(deﬁnitely not a candidate) ( deﬁnitely a candidate)
((1) Would this student receive a better education in a special education classroom with
a special education teacher?
1 2 3 4
(deﬁnitely not) ( deﬁnitely would)

71

 

Appendix Seven: Case Study #3 - Caucasian female, low SES

 

 

CASE STUDY

 

Julie is a Caucasian female who is in the third grade at Pineview Elementary School. Pineview is
located in a suburban town in the Midwest. Julie lives in the Pineview housing development
across from the school. Julie’s mother and father are unemployed. Her teacher expresses
academic and behavioral concerns. She states “I enjoy having Julie in my class. Lately he has
not been keeping up in reading and has failed the last 3 assignments”. She goes on to state that
Julie has been fooling around in class throwing paper airplanes across the room. She also talks
constantly especially during instruction. When she calls on Julie in class, she rarely answers the
question correctly. She usually asks her to repeat the question and the other children laugh at her.
The teacher says that she needs to refer her because she does not know what to do with her and
she is ruining her ability to control the rest of her students.

Brief Description of Special Education Referral Process
There is a continuum of help available for students with problems. Teachers can do everything
from working with the student themselves to referring them to specialists including special
education.
Question for teachers: - circle one
(a) How likely would you be to continue to work with this student in the regular
education classroom?
1 2 3 4
(deﬁnitely not) ( deﬁnitely would)
(b) How likely would you be to refer this student for assistance outside of the classroom
for special education services?
1 2 3 4
(deﬁnitely not) ( deﬁnitely would)
(c) In your opinion (as the regular classroom teacher), is this student a candidate for
special education?
1 2 3 4
(deﬁnitely not a candidate) (deﬁnitely a candidate)
(d) Would this student receive a better education in a special education classroom with
a special education teacher?
1 2 3 . 4
(deﬁnitely not) ( deﬁnitely would)

72

 

Appendix Eight: Case Study #4 — Caucasian female, high SES

 

 

CASE STUDY

 

Julie is a Caucasian girl who is in the third grade at Pineview Elementary School. Pineview is
located in a suburban town in the Midwest. Julie lives in the neighborhood across the street.
Julie’s mother is a doctor and her father is an executive at a local ﬁrm. Her teacher expresses
academic and behavioral concerns. She states “I enjoy having Julie in my class. Lately he has
not been keeping up in reading and has failed the last 3 assignments”. She goes on to state that
Julie has been fooling around in class throwing paper airplanes across the room. She also talks
constantly especially during instruction. When she calls on Julie in class, she rarely answers the
question correctly. She usually asks her to repeat the question and the other children laugh at her.
The teacher says that she needs to refer her because she does not know what to do with her and
she is ruining her ability to control the rest of her students.

Brief Description of Special Education Referral Process
There is a continuum of help available for students with problems. Teachers can do everything
from working with the student themselves to referring them to specialists including special
education.
Question for teachers: - circle one

(a) How likely would you be to continue to work with this student in the regular

education classroom?
1 2 3 4
(deﬁnitely not) ( deﬁnitely would)
(b) How likely would you be to refer this student for assistance outside of the classroom

for special education services?

1 2 3 4
(deﬁnitely not) ( deﬁnitely would)
(c) In your opinion (as the regular classroom teacher), is this student a candidate for
special education?
1 2 3 4
(deﬁnitely not a candidate) ( deﬁnitely a candidate)

(d) Would this student receive a better education in a special education classroom with
a special education teacher?
1 2 3 4
(deﬁnitely not) ( deﬁnitely would)

73

 

Appendix Nine: Case Study #5 — African American male, low SES

 

 

CASE STUDY

 

 

Jermaine is an African American male who is in the third grade at Pineview Elementary School.
Pineview is located in a suburban town in the Midwest. Jermaine lives in the Pineview housing
development across ﬁom the school. Jerome’s mother and father are unemployed. His teacher
expresses academic and behavioral concerns. She states “I enjoy having Jermaine in my class.
Lately he has not been keeping up in reading and has failed the last 3 assignments”. She goes on
to state that Brad has been fooling around in class throwing paper airplanes across the room. He
also talks constantly especially during instruction. When she calls on Brad in class, he rarely
answers the question correctly. He usually asks her to repeat the question and the other children
laugh at him. The teacher says that she needs to refer him because she does not lcnow what to do
with him and he is ruining her ability to control the rest of her students.

Brief Description of Special Education Referral Process
There is a continuum of help available for students with problems. Teachers can do everything
from working with the student themselves to referring them to specialists including special
education.
Question for teachers: - circle one
(a) How likely would you be to continue to work with this student in the regular
education classroom?
1 2 3 4
(deﬁnitely not) ( deﬁnitely would)
(b) How likely would you be to refer this student for assistance outside of the classroom
for special education services?
1 2 3 4
(deﬁnitely not) ( deﬁnitely would)
(c) In your opinion (as the regular classroom teacher), is this student a candidate for
special education?
1 2 3 4
(deﬁnitely not a candidate) (deﬁnitely a candidate)
(d) Would this student receive a better education in a special education classroom with
a special education teacher?
1 2 3 4
(deﬁnitely not) ( deﬁnitely would)

74

Appendix Ten: Case Study #6 — African American male, high SES

 

 

CASE STUDY

 

Jermaine is an African American male who is in the third grade at Pineview Elementary School.
Pineview is located in a suburban town in the Midwest. Jermaine lives in the neighborhood across
from the school. Jermaine’s mother is a doctor and his father is an executive at a local ﬁrm. His
teacher expresses academic and behavioral concerns. She states “I enjoy having Jermaine in my
class. Lately he has not been keeping up in reading and has failed the last 3 assignments”. She
goes on to state that Brad has been fooling around in class throwmg paper airplanes across the
room. He also talks constantly especially during instruction. When she calls on Brad in class, he
rarely answers the question correctly. He usually asks her to repeat the question and the other
children laugh at him. The teacher says that she needs to refer him because she does not know
what to do with him and he is ruining her ability to control the rest of her students.

Brief Description of Special Education Referral Process

There is a continuum of help available for students with problems. Teachers can do everything
from working with the student themselves to referring them to specialists including special
education.

Question for teachers: - circle one
(a) How likely would you be to continue to work with this student in the regular
education classroom?
1 2 3 4
(deﬁnitely not) ( deﬁnitely would)
(b) How likely would you be to refer this student for assistance outside of the classroom
for special education services?
1 2 3 4
(deﬁnitely not) ( deﬁnitely would)
(c) In your opinion (as the regular classroom teacher), is this student a candidate for
special education?
1 2 3 4
(deﬁnitely not a candidate) ( deﬁnitely a candidate)
(d) Would this student receive a better education in a special education classroom with
a special education teacher?
1 2 3 4
(deﬁnitely not) ( deﬁnitely would)

75

 

Appendix Eleven: Case Study #7 — African American female, low SES

 

 

CASE STUDY

 

Ebony is an African American female who is in the third grade at Pineview Elementary School.
Pineview is located in a suburban town in the Midwest. Ebony lives in the Pineview housing
development across from the school. Ebony’s mother and father are unemployed. Her teacher
expresses academic and behavioral concerns. She states “I enjoy having Ebony in my class.
Lately he has not been keeping up in reading and has failed the last 3 assignments”. She goes on
to state that Ebony has been fooling around in class throwing paper airplanes across the room.
She also talks constantly especially during instruction. When she calls on Ebony in class, she
rarely answers the question correctly. She usually asks her to repeat the question and the other
children laugh at her. The teacher says that she needs to refer her because she does not know
what to do with her and she is ruining her ability to control the rest of her students.

Brief Description of Special Education Referral Process
There is a continuum of help available for students with problems. Teachers can do everything
from working with the student themselves to referring them to specialists including special
education
Question for teachers: - circle one
(a) How likely would you be to continue to work with this student in the regular
education classroom?
1 2 3 4
(deﬁnitely not) ( deﬁnitely would)
(b) How likely would you be to refer this student for assistance outside of the classroom
for special education services?
1 2 3 4
(deﬁnitely not) ( deﬁnitely would)
(c) In your opinion (as the regular classroom teacher), is this student a candidate for
special education?
1 2 3 4
(deﬁnitely not a candidate) ( deﬁnitely a candidate)
(d) Would this student receive a better education in a special education classroom with
a special education teacher?
1 2 3 4
(deﬁnitely not) ( deﬁnitely would)

76

 

Appendix Twelve: Case Study #8 — African American female, high SES

 

 

CASE STUDY

 

Ebony is an African American female who is in the third grade at Pineview Elementary School.
Pineview is located in a suburban town in the Midwest. Ebony lives in the neighborhood across
the street. Ebony’s mother is a doctor and her father is an executive at a local ﬁrm. Her teacher
expresses academic and behavioral concerns. She states “I enjoy having Ebony in my class.
Lately he has not been keeping up in reading and has failed the last 3 assignments”. She goes on
to state that Ebony has been fooling around in class throwing paper airplanes across the room.
She also talks constantly especially during instruction. When she calls on Ebony in class, she
rarely answers the question correctly. She usually asks her to repeat the question and the other
children laugh at her. The teacher says that she needs to refer her because she does not know
what to do with her and she is ruining her ability to control the rest of her students.

Brief Description of Special Education Referral Process

There is a continuum of help available for students with problems. Teachers can do everything
from working with the student themselves to referring them to specialists including special
education.

Question for teachers: - circle one
(a) How likely would you be to continue to work with this student in the regular
education classroom?
1 2 3 4
(deﬁnitely not) ( deﬁnitely would)
(b) How likely would you be to refer this student for assistance outside of the classroom
for special education services?
1 2 3 4
(deﬁnitely not) ( deﬁnitely would)
(c) In your opinion (as the regular classroom teacher), is this student a candidate for
special education?
1 2 3 4
(deﬁnitely not a candidate) ( deﬁnitely a candidate)
((1) Would this student receive a better education in a special education classroom with
a special education teacher?
1 2 3 4
(deﬁnitely not) ( deﬁnitely would)

77

 

Appendix Thirteen: Welcome Letter
Dear Teachers,

You are invited to participate in a research study with the School Psychology Program at
MSU.

What is the purpose of the research?
This research is designed to help us understand teacher perspectives about students.

Directions:
Please reaQnd/or complete the followmg;

1, Teacher Consent Letter (Page 2)
i. Read and sign your name

; Teacher Information Questionnaire (Page 3)
i. Read and answer each question thoroughly

_3_. Teacher Efﬁcacy Questionnaire (Page 4)
i. Read and answer each question

_‘L Case Study (Page 5)
i. Read and answer I question at the end

Thank you so much for your participation! Please email or call Daniele Eiland
(eilandd@msu.edu or 394-5457) or Jean Baker (jbaker@msu.edu or 432-0843) if you
have any questions about your participation or the study.

Sincerely,
Daniele Eiland

78

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