THE EARLY CHILDHOOD INCLUSION NETWORK

THE EARLY CHILDHOOD INCLUSION NETWORK:
ONE COMMUNITY'S EFFORTS
TO PROMOTE CHILD CARE INCLUSION

Dianne Apter and Pam Walker

How The Inclusion Network Got Started

It became apparent to some service providers in Onondaga County, New York, in the late 1980s, that few children with special needs were in child care centers in the community. There were some examples of inclusion, but, at that time, many children with disabilities were in separate programs. The Early Childhood Inclusion Network of Onondaga County came together in 1991 through the initiation of a few special education program directors who also happened to be on the board of the county Child Care Council, which provides technical assistance to the child care community. From the beginning, participants included representatives from special education and from child care, a representative from the university-based Early Childhood Direction Center, a representative from the Health Department, and a few others.

Members of this task force shared a strong commitment to inclusion. They felt that the effort to expand inclusion in child care settings needed to be a team effort; for example, it couldn't be just "dumping" kids into child care. They felt at that time that they really needed to communicate with each other. Thus, they began what ultimately became the Early Childhood Inclusion Network.

Parallel to this, there was a statewide task force that met in Albany, the state capitol. This group consisted of similar players, but also included the appropriate people from state divisions (Department of Education, Department of Health, Department of Social Services, Council on Children and Families). A representative from the Early Childhood Inclusion Network who was also part of the state coalition served as a liaison between the two groups.

Getting to Know Each Other

The Early Childhood Inclusion Network began by spending a lot of time getting to know each other and sharing viewpoints on various issues. Child care people talked about at times feeling devalued by special educators, who might come into their child care center, assist a child, and then walk out without acknowledging the child care staff at all. Special education representatives talked about how they would go into the child care center to work with the child or children, and how the child care teacher would say 'oh, good,' and think that that meant that relief had come and she could leave, and she'd walk out of the room. Network members were pretty honest with each other. In addition to the problems, however, people also talked about the positive things that were happening in the community, the good partnerships, what they were learning from each other. The "getting to know each other" phase went on for a couple of months, without a lot of focus. This phase in the development of the group was crucial to building trust and respect.

Identifying and Addressing Barriers to Inclusion

After the task force had been meeting for a while, a representative of the statewide coalition came to the county to do a focus group on barriers to inclusion. Members of the task force had already spent some time thinking about this; therefore, at the focus group, people were able to identify some key barriers to inclusion. Some of these were related to transportation. For example, child care runs all the time, but special education goes on school breaks, so the bus drivers for children with special needs have to be informed of these schedule differences. Or, at school, the bus drivers wait at the curb and special education assistants bring children out to the bus; but child care doesn't have relief staff to take somebody out to the bus. So, what seems, on one level, to be a small problem, can be a very large one. "This kid can't be here if we can't get her to the bus, the bus driver refuses to come in to the child care center because that's not his job, and the child care center can't leave the kids alone to go out to the curb." We're talking about 20 feet, and it presents this seemingly insurmountable barrier. Things like this came out that were important to talk about.

At that point, members of the task force decided that they wanted to develop a couple of foci. The state education department had come out with "innovation waivers." These waivers allowed communities to apply to do something differently, to waive a regulation, as long as what you were proposing got their approval, and as long as it didn't cost any more money. Basically, the waivers were intended to address state regulations that got in the way of inclusion. The task force received approval for three different waivers.

The first waiver addressed an issue related to itinerant special education teachers. A state law specified that approved special education programs were the only programs that could employ itinerant special education teachers. While the county was allowed to hire PTs, OTs, and speech therapist for "on the road" teams, they couldn't hire teachers. A waiver allowed the county to hire a teacher as part of an itinerant team.

The second waiver applied only to special education preschool programs based in public schools. It allowed them to hire pre-K teachers at a salary commensurate with that of child care teachers and waive the requirement that they hire certified teachers. A certified special education teacher would still be the lead teacher in the room.

The third waiver dealt with the teacher/child ratios. It allowed a slightly higher ratio of students to teacher/paraprofessional (15:1:1, versus 12:1:1). At the same time, it proposed a limit on the ratio of special needs/non-special needs children, in order to protect against creation of classrooms of only children with special needs.

"Can We Talk?" Retreats

In addition to the waivers, the task force sponsored two retreats, 9 months apart, called: "Can We Talk?" and "Where Do We Go From Here?" "They were very successful; we used outside facilitators; lots of people came; and we really focused on issues related to building partnerships and teams, barriers to working in teams, and how to communicate." The first one was oriented more toward expressing feelings and perspectives; the second one was much more goal-focused.

Both retreats attracted a mix of special education and child care representatives. Among the child care representatives, there were a variety of people from both not-for-profit and for-profits settings, and from urban and suburban settings. "Some came because they were already doing inclusion, some because they were intrigued by the idea, and some because of concerns about being mandated to do so by the ADA."

The time together at the retreats was critical. Participants gained a much greater understanding of each other. For instance, they realized differences in the pace of their daily activities and involvements with children. While the child care center teacher is there all day long with the same children, the special education teacher comes in for only an hour or two of intensive work. At times, the special education teacher would react with, "Come on, you're not on top of this enough; you're not doing such-and-such a developmental activity." The child care teacher would respond with, "Calm down, yes, we do do that." Those involved in the retreats seemed to come away with a different way of looking at things, with greater appreciation for each other. Special educators increased their understanding of different styles related to support and learning which may be used by child care providers; and child care providers realized that they did have valuable knowledge and expertise which could be utilized in support of children both with and without disabilities.

Developing a How-To Manual for Child Care Providers

At the retreat, child care providers talked about not knowing how to start doing inclusion--who to talk to, what to do first. Thus, one of the outcomes of the retreat was a decision to compile a manual for child care providers related to inclusion strategies and issues. A subcommittee was formed to work on the manual, with representatives from child care, special education, and the Early Childhood Direction Center. They decided they wanted the content of the manual to come from the perspective of those who had been doing inclusion in the community, incorporating their suggestions for what works, what doesn't work, and so forth. Two student interns interviewed a wide range of people, including child care directors and staff, special education directors, teachers, and assistants. During the process of preparing the manual, child care people kept saying, "Keep it simple; keep it short." The committee compiled the data and developed an outline and rough draft; a graduate student pulled everything together and edited the final draft of the manual, "Serving Children with Special Needs in Your Child Care Facility." This manual discusses the benefits of inclusion; describes elements of successful collaboration; and provides detailed information about setting up collaborative, inclusive programs (e.g., philosophy, lines of authority, money and contracts, schedules, space and accessibility, meetings, staff development, family involvement).

Lessons and Future Directions of the Inclusion Network

There are a number of lessons that emerged from the efforts of the Early Childhood Inclusion Network. A few are outlined below.

It is critical that child care providers are empowered and supported to include children with disabilities. However, finding time to release child care staff to be part of interagency, community-wide discussion and planning is difficult. In addition, sending child care staff to a workshop to learn about children with special needs is not sufficient training, in itself; on-site technical assistance is also needed--and the availability and quality of this is variable.

It is critical that representatives from child care and special education come together to learn about each other's perspectives and formulate strategies for working together. Those involved in this project generally didn't have a lot of training or practice in such interdisciplinary collaboration and team work. It is important that teacher preparation programs increase their emphasis on training in these areas.

Within the region, there are now many more people doing inclusion than ever before. Many programs have increased their capacity to support children with more severe disabilities. To a much greater degree than previously, there is shared ownership for inclusion, where all children are seen as "ours," versus some as "yours" and some as "mine." Currently, there is a greater push from the state to move in the direction of inclusion and close segregated programs. Child care providers are concerned about possibly being overwhelmed by having too many children with too many needs and too little support; and fiscal support for child care centers is still lacking. Thus, the Early Childhood Inclusion Network will focus on issues related to planning and implementing increased inclusion in ways that maintain quality child care programs for all.

For further information about the Early Childhood Inclusion Network, contact Dianne Apter, Director, Early Childhood Direction Center, 805 S. Crouse Ave., Syracuse, NY 13244.

"Serving Children with Special Needs in Your Child Care Facility"

To order a copy by mail, write to:

Center on Human Policy

Syracuse University

805 South Crouse Avenue

Syracuse, NY 13244-2280

Preparation of this article was supported in part by the National Resource Center on Community Integration, Center on Human Policy, School of Education, Syracuse University, through the U.S. Department of Education, Office of Special Education and Rehabilitative Services, National Institute on Disability and Rehabilitation Research (NIDRR), through Contract No. H133D50037. No endorsement by the U.S. Department of Education should be inferred.