The impact of Reading First on students with disabilities and special education teachers in Utah

The Reading First (RF) program provides federal funding for the improvement of reading instruction in grades K-3 in low-achieving schools. The intent of this program is to include all students, yet little is know about the impact of RF on students with disabilities or special education teachers. The purpose of this study was to determine the effects RF has had on these students and teachers in Utah.;Student progress was measured using the state criterion referenced test (CRT). A set of criteria was used to select a group of 78 students with disabilities and 78 students without disabilities from Utah's RF schools, as well as 61 students with disabilities and 61 students without disabilities from a set of comparison schools. The performance of these groups was analyzed using two Analysis of Variance tests (ANOVAs). The first test found that students with disabilities (from both RF and comparison schools) performed significantly lower than their peers across grades 1-3. Although post hoc analyses showed that students with disabilities were making progress, this was not enough to significantly narrow the gap. The second ANOVA found that while both groups of students with disabilities made significant progress, students with disabilities from RF schools consistently performed below students with disabilities from comparison schools.;Data were also collected from 20 special education teachers in RF schools. These data included descriptive data (i.e., number of trainings attended, materials received through RF funding, etc.) from a teacher questionnaire and interviews with the special education teachers. These data found mixed results. In particular, while almost all special education teachers attended reading endorsement classes, fewer than half of the teachers attended school study groups and only 2 teachers reported interacting with their school reading coach on a regular basis. The greatest changes to special education programs mentioned by these teachers were the adoption of a push-in model and a change in their school's referral process. Overall, although it was found that these teachers were being included to some extent, greater efforts need to be made by RF schools to fully include special education teachers in their school reform activities.