Effects of schools attuned on special education referrrals for African American boys

This study compared the number of special education referrals for African American boys before and after the implementation of the training program, Schools Attuned. The purpose of the research was to ascertain if the number of special education referrals for African American boys generated in schools with teachers trained in Schools Attuned were significantly lower than referrals for African American boys that were generated in schools without teachers trained in Schools Attuned.;Four consecutive years of archival special education referral data from 64 urban schools in a major metropolitan area comprised the research sample. The schools were divided into two groups. One group consisted of 32 schools with teachers who were trained in Schools Attuned. An additional group of 32 schools consisted of teachers who were not trained in Schools Attuned. The referral data from the group of schools with Schools Attuned trained teachers were compared to the data from the group of schools without Schools Attuned trained teachers. The first two years of referral data were designated base line data. The last two years of the data from sample were compared to the base line data to determine if there was a difference in referrals for African American boys in the Schools Attuned group when compared to the No Schools Attuned group.;The results of the repeated measures analysis of variance showed no significant difference in referrals for African American boys in schools with Schools Attuned trained teachers when compared to referrals in schools without Schools Attuned trained teachers. When the referrals for African American boys for each group of 32 schools were compared to their own time period baseline, a significant decrease in the number of referrals was shown.