PROJECT OVERVIEW

    Nearly a decade has passed since a team of special education university faculty, researchers, policy analysts, and other stakeholders conducted a large-scale study of faculty supply and demand issues. Findings from that comprehensive effort indicated that: special education doctoral production had decreased by 30% over the previous two decades; nearly half of all doctoral graduates chose careers outside of academe; and nearly a third of all faculty vacancies remained unfilled. One result of the study is that relationships among the number of college and university faculty, the production of special education teachers, and services delivered to children and youth with disabilities became acknowledged.  Given the shortages of faculty, questions were subsequently raised about higher education’s capacity to produce a sufficient supply of highly qualified special education teachers.  

The Office of Special Education Programs (OSEP) is supporting an evaluation effort to provide information about the nation’s capacity to produce a sufficient supply of qualified special education teachers.  The primary focus of the evaluation is on the production of new special education doctoral graduates who assume faculty positions.  This evaluation effort will comprise four major tasks:

Task 1:  Assess the status and capacity of special education doctoral programs  

Task 2:  Assess the demographics, career goals, and characteristics of current special education doctoral students who are “in the pipeline”

Task 3:  Determine career paths, demographics, and other characteristics of two cohorts of special education doctoral graduates: five years of graduates who participated in The Faculty Shortage Study and five years of recent graduates (i.e., June of 2001 through June of 2006)

Task 4:  Determine basic characteristics of university-based special education teacher education programs (e.g., staffing patterns, projected retirements).