Introduction: Quality Programs For Students With Visual Impairments Special Schools (QPVI SS) - The Self-Study

I am a teacher. That fact and the resulting point of view informs and affects all aspects of the QPVI process. The training I was fortunate to receive and the thirty plus years of experience working with and for students with visual and multiple impairments are all wrapped up in this process. As a twenty-something year old teacher, I took my first job at the Texas School for the Blind in Austin. My second grade classroom, including 4 students with low vision and 4 Braille reading students, seemed like heaven to me. Fortified by the wealth of knowledgeable people around me, I felt that I was learning my craft and experiencing success with my students.

Life and what I thought was love took me away from that special school and deposited me back home in Corpus Christi, Texas as a secondary level itinerant teacher with a full caseload of students in middle and high school. Alone, but for the elementary level teacher of the visually impaired, a proficient and very busy Frances Stetson, I soon learned the benefits of working in a special school setting. As an itinerant teacher in the public school, I trudged along, trying to cobble together the many resources and services that had been at my fingertips at TSB. It was tough going, though, so, naturally, I thought further schooling might be the answer.

As a project to fulfill my master?s degree in Curriculum and Instruction, the notion of QPVI was born in its earliest form. Surely, I thought, there must be a way to think about and organize all this information. I was a little discouraged, but it never occurred to me to find a ?regular? teaching job, though, with dual certification, I was qualified to teach any elementary grade in general education. Some of my fellow UT graduates recall that our professor, Dr. Natalie Barraga, made us take an oath of lifelong service, and I do recollect that as an ever present subtext in her classes. If I was in it for the long haul, I decided I?d better know just what ?it? was or should be.

An itinerant teacher for several years, I studied the art and science of teaching, from both the student and teacher?s perspectives. I learned to respect the job done by public schools as they worked to incorporate students with special needs into the general school population and include them in their home communities. Still, serving students with visual impairments, and later, multiple impairments, was a very complicated and involved undertaking. That was especially true if school administrators had no knowledge or understanding of the needs of visually impaired students and their teachers.

Just then I was beginning to understand that administrative support was the key to successful programming. I happened to be in the right place at the right time to accept a position, in the late 1970?s, as the first consultant for students with visual impairments at a regional education service center in San Antonio, Texas. This job put me in the position of working with teachers and administrators, frequently to address problems with VI students and their educational programs. Thus ensued a year or so of ?band-aiding? VI program related problems in a 14 county area of south central Texas. What I found out soon enough was that ?band-aiding? didn?t work very well as a holistic strategy. As soon as one problem was plastered, up popped another and another.

In the early 80?s, with multiple crises arising in a district that had lost two master teachers, an opportunity arose for me to work with district administrators and VI staff to take a systematic view of the district?s program of services for students with visual and multiple impairments. We went through their entire program a bit at a time, during monthly meetings, resulting in considerable change and improvement. Word of the process and its benefits spread to other teachers of students with visual impairments, who requested it for their programs.

Over time, QPVI for public schools in Texas was born. These efforts were supported by the Texas Education Agency, Education Service Center, Region 20 in San Antonio, and the Texas School for the Blind and Visually Impaired, Outreach. QPVI evolved into a group process that included a programmatic self-study, a mechanism for preserving the good, and for implementing action oriented improvements. Having been involved in more than a few frustrating program reviews and strategic planning processes, I wanted more in the way of actual change and improvement than I had experienced by these typical methods. Recognition and preservation of promising and innovative practices currently employed was a high priority. I also wanted to bring administration and staff together in a staff driven process that would build lasting relationships between all participants. QP was piloted in five regions in Texas in the mid-1980?s, then spread to other regions and out-of-state. As a result, QPVI has been used extensively and successfully in Texas and in several states around the country. It has been called a long and involved process and that is, I admit, an apt description. My response, though, is that there is no quick and easy way to look at a complex and involved systems AND effect improvement specifically targeted by staff and administration working together. There is nothing else like the QPVI process in existence today in the field of education for students with visual and multiple impairments

QPVI for Special Schools was born in Iowa. Having implemented QPVI in the Iowa public schools, the Iowa State Vision Consultant, Dr. Karen Blankenship, was determined to implement the process wherever blind and visually impaired students are served in Iowa, including the Iowa Braille and Sight Saving School (IBSSS). After a great deal of mulling over the ?classroom versus residential services? question, in 2001 I wrote a QPVI guide for special schools with the view of piloting the process at IBSSS. And so, with the backing of Superintendent Dennis Thurman, the staff and administration of the Iowa Braille School acted as the pilot site for QPVI Special Schools. Looking back on that project I realize what a leap of faith it was for the school to be the first to try such an involved approach. I owe a debt of gratitude to classroom, residential, and administrative staff, as well as the students, all of whom contributed to the success of the pilot process. Their suggestions for improvements and ideas they originated have been woven into the fabric of the newly revised QPVI SS. This revision reflects the IBSSS experience.

Word of the outcomes of QPVI for Special Schools has spread. There are currently five or six additional schools interested in implementing QPVI SS. Since I have not yet developed a trainer of trainers model for this process, I will be facilitating all sites until that is accomplished.

I?d like to include a few words about my future plans for QP, in response to two difficult issues historically and currently facing teachers of students with visual impairments. The first is the daunting task of comprehensive personnel preparation required to equip teachers of students with visual and multiple impairments. The second is the frustration with high staff turnover and variable staff skill levels encountered serving students in classes for students with moderate to severe multiple impairments. In addressing the first issue, personnel preparation, I am writing a course based on the QPVI Key Components that will be appropriate for use by university personnel preparation staff in providing a structure for meaningful practical application of the student?s TVI content knowledge. The second issue reflects the large numbers of students with visual impairments who have one or more additional disability and the difficulty of providing service to classroom staff members who lack a foundation of skills appropriate to the needs of this population of students. Quality Programs for Students with Multiple Impairments (QPMI) is intended to provide those foundation skills to teachers of students with multiple impairments to benefit all their students, in addition to those with visual impairments. Both materials are in process and will be field tested in the next year or two. 

What is QPVI:SS?

Quality Programs for Students with Visual Impairments: Special Schools is a model process for systematic program improvement for schools and centers for the blind in the development, improvement, and documentation of their programs serving students with visual and multiple impairments (VI and MI). Documenting and preserving effective practices already in place is an important outcome. At it?s heart it is a process for purposeful, reasoned change that is staff-driven. It?s goal is program improvement measured, in the final analysis, by student progress.

A trained QPVI SS Facilitator frequently pairs with a Co-facilitator designated by school administration and together they act as co-leaders of the process. Upon securing administrative and staff support, a Work Group forms, consisting of the co-leaders and a variety of individuals involved in student programming, including residential staff. This group begins Phase One of QPVI Special Schools by conducting a Self-Study of Key Components of the school program. Time needed to complete the Self-Study varies according to the size of the school and the number of issues chosen by participants for immediate action.

At the end of the Self-Study, the Work Group develops a report of their findings, including program strengths and needs, and presents it to the school superintendent or board for approval. During Phase Two (Priorities for Improvement), the Work Group selects priorities from the Work Group Final Report and begins addressing priorities. Some sites, particularly those that have experienced less than optimal results from efforts such as strategic planning, have opted to combine Phases One and Two, addressing some priorities as the arise during the process. If that is preferred, Action Teams volunteer to participate in proposing actions for the Work Group to consider. Combining the first two phases results in a longer time frame for the Self-Study. During Phase Three, the Work Group focuses their efforts on maintaining quality services to students and program growth and development into the future.

The Key Components (KC) of QPVI:SS

Key Component #1: Master List of Students

We create a Master List of students for all participating staff members. Basic information such as the following will be included: name, date, grade, disabilities, eye-medical information, dates of assessments available. A profile of the students attending the special school is developed if it is not already available. A sample of representative students is selected to follow through the Self-Study.

Key Component #2: Eligibility/Enrollment Guidelines

We read and discuss state and federal laws and rules regarding student eligibility for special education for students with visual and other disabilities to come to a common understanding of how to apply them. We review the data used to determine eligibility on sample students in detail (eye medical information, reports of Functional Vision Evaluations and Learning Media Assessments). Assessments used to collect eligibility data may be conducted to allow all staff to participate. The QP Work Group may decide to draw up an eligibility statement for the purpose of promoting a clear understanding by all. They also may choose to review or suggest revisions to enrollment guidelines.

Key Component #3: Roles And Responsibilities

We review standards in the field and build a set of applicable roles and responsibilities for participating staff, if these are not already in place. The issues of teaming and collaboration are topics for discussion.

Key Component #4: Unique Needs Of Students

In this key component, we look at the Full Individual Evaluation (comprehensive assessment) of our sample students, including assessment in the areas of the Expanded Core Curriculum, to determine if an appropriate assessment is in place. If so, we use those assessment results as we consider options for developing individual educational programs for students, planning for instruction, and measuring student progress. If an appropriate assessment is not in place, we plan for and complete assessments on students, then proceed with those results. Needs and opportunities for information sharing and new learning on these topics are identified. Needs beyond the graduation are considered as well.

Key Component #5: Type And Amount Of Staff

Using the information from KC#4 for each sample student, we determine what type and amount of service is appropriate to meet the needs identified. We then discuss the type and amount of staff needed to serve students. This information can be used to apply to the entire student population.

Key Component #6: Work Group Self-Study Report

This report reflects the results of the QPVI SS Self-Study. It includes work completed, documents developed, strengths and needs identified during the Self-Study, as well as priorities for continuous improvement activities. 

How does QPVI:SS work?

The features of the QP process design are an important contributing factor to its success. It has undergone continuous revision to allow incorporation of features that increase opportunities for participant engagement and outcomes identified by participants as desirable.

Administrative Support

Before beginning QPVI SS, the QP Facilitator frequently meets with school administration, including staff leadership teams, if applicable, to discuss the need for full administrative support for the efforts of the QP Work Group. One of the most commonly expressed reservations regarding embracing the QP process is that other improvement processes have resulted in increased work and little gain for school staff and students. If assurances can be made that the recommendations of the QP Work Group will be acted upon by staff and administration, unless contrary to law or rules, then participants are willing to invest their energy.

Staff Driven

The success and effectiveness of QPVI SS is dependent, in large part, on the engagement and involvement of the special school staff. A wide variety of staff members are given the rare opportunity to collaborate on behalf of students. If a majority of staff realizes the purpose and worth of the process, and engages fully in their leadership role, the process will succeed. The power of the group and the use of techniques to encourage full participation in the shared decision making process contribute to QP?s efficacy. A consensus model is used for decision making.

Key Components

In my role as regional consultant, I worked in one school district after another, with the QPVI process slowly evolving. Working on my Apple 2e, saving forms and documents to floppy disks, I kept track of questions and issues from each site. It became obvious early on that they all were dealing with essentially the same issues. When I began revising QPVI for special schools, I realized that the education piece was very similar to what applied in public schools. Examples of questions that emerged repeatedly were: ?Who was qualified to receive VI services??, ?What data was being used to qualify students??, ?Was the data reliable, did school staff know how to assess VI students across the range of visual and intellectual abilities??, ?What was the TVI?s role related to students??, etc. I grouped related topics into what became the Key Components of QPVI. Those have gone through some revision as well, including this version of QPVI SS, to make the process more manageable and applicable to actual practice. A description of the Key Components follows this section.

Look for Strengths, Then Needs

What?s working for you and the students? What?s exciting and rewarding? We want to recognize whatever that is and make sure it gets documented and preserved. You would think good ideas would last, but the field of education is so highly personnel driven and busy that they frequently aren?t. A creative individual may develop a marvelous idea, implement it and have it recognized as wonderful, but not be given the time to impart it?s magic to others. When that staff member moves on or retires, not only is a good person lost, but the idea or program is lost, too. In QP we seek to find, recognize, and document those ideas, so they can be passed on to the benefit of the school and students.

Along the way, staff members always seem ready to point out what?s not working and what needs fixing. There is a sense of eagerness when the opportunity is provided to spend time improving procedures or practices that do not serve as they should.

Conversation Questions

I've added this feature to the QP process as a technique to invite participants to engage in conversations with one another on topics of importance to the work they do. Conversation questions are intended to foster improved understanding of diverse views and values. We participate in these conversations following the Guiding Principles of Implementing QPVI SS.

Standards Based

Before we begin addressing the Key Components during QP Work Group meetings, we decide, as a group, which print resources to adopt and use as standards during the process. The references are used for decisions regarding practice, resolutions to differences of opinion, and searches for new information. In addition to resources in print, the Work Group will be encouraged to seek information from a wide variety of sources on the internet.

Action Orientation

The number one reservation of special school staff in engaging in yet another improvement process, is the lack of tangible results or beneficial action seen at the staff or student level. QP?s action orientation, experienced early and often during the process, convinces staff that their ideas are valued.

Focus

Keeping the school train on track is a ponderous task. Is it surprising that a car occasionally is disabled or even derailed? By employing a systematic approach and avoiding the quick fix we can maintain our focus and see results. We focus on what?s working to make sure of continued support to perpetuate those practices. When staff members identify less than ideal situations or practices, they can be improved upon as part of an overall plan. A long, involved plan is frequently not needed. It?s surprising how often the removal of barriers proves to be the simplest and most effective approach and how productive we can become when we maintain a focus.

Student Centered

A critical feature of QPVI is that we place most of our attention on actual students. By selecting a sample of students to represent the wide variety attending the school, our work has immediate impact on students and staff. As teams review and analyze these students? records, conduct assessments, and work together on programming for them, we model procedures and practices that apply to every other student in the school. Throughout the process, we look for student outcomes related to our work. A profile of the student population flows from that and is a useful tool in analyzing the current and future allocation of resources.

Observation Visits

Observation visits will be made by staff members and the facilitator to become familiar with sample students as they function in classrooms, in the residential facility, in the cafeteria, during P.E., on-the-job, or at play. This effort includes both the QP Facilitator and any administrators involved.

Site Based

The QP Facilitator is responsible for working with school staff to make sure the process is applicable to each individual state and school. What may be a troublesome issue in one state may be a non-issue in another. If there is an initiative underway at a school, addressing the major points of one of the QP Key Components, then that initiative may either continue as before or be subsumed into the QP process.

Outside Facilitators

Maintaining an atmosphere of objectivity is an essential tenet of the QP process. Special schools typically benefit from the long-term retention of staff. However, long term relationships can work against the objectivity needed to defuse issues that have accumulated emotional baggage over the years. That is one reason for employing facilitators from outside the special school community. Another reason is to bring in a person with specialized training and experience in the QPVI process.

Inside Ownership

Although the process is led by outside facilitators, activities are designed to promote ?inside ownership? on the part of the special school staff. Staff and administrative engagement are essential to the success of QPVI. Over the course of the Self-Study, the QP Facilitator encourages the transfer of guidance of the process to members of school staff. Generally speaking, the completion of the Self-Study signals the end of outside facilitation as the Work Group and Action Teams have become adept at working toward self-identified short and long term goals.

Data Collection

Whether we are looking at student progress, programmatic effect, or any other aspect of life at a special school, data collection gives us answers we cannot attain by other means. As we set up the QPVI process for a particular site, questions are asked and answered regarding the type and method of data to be collected in support of the school and its programming.

Regular Meetings

Momentum is a force of nature that works in favor of prolonged processes. In conducting regular, usually monthly meetings, a sense of forward movement and accomplishment is achieved. These meeting are at sufficient intervals to allow thought and action between them. They are also of sufficient length to accomplish the work set out in each agenda.

Guided Activities And Meeting Focus

QPVI agendas for each meeting are based on the years and years and years of experience accumulated by QP Facilitators past and present. It is my belief that successful facilitators are biologically suited to their roles and, as such, are driven to continuously improve this continuous improvement process. They have suggested readings, forms, activities, and explanatory materials for participants to make this complex process as user-friendly as possible. Meetings are focused and productive.

Communities of Practice

Referred to by different names, teams or learning communities, the emphasis here is one of individuals connecting with each other as learners. Many who have experienced yet another too basic, awareness-level training are ready to spend their precious time more productively. During the course of QP, individuals and teams are encouraged to self-identify needed skills and knowledge. Perhaps all that is needed is a resource, but if new information is needed, then we first seek out someone at the school who has the skill or knowledge and pair the two for a real-world learning experience. This has the added benefit of bringing people together in new ways and in new roles to deepen their connections to each other. A frequent outcome is of each person learning something new from the other that can be immediately applied to their students.

Outcomes

With the Work Group engaged in productive activities and interchanges, numerous positive outcomes result. One feature of the QPVI process is to list desired outcomes for each Key Component before work begins and to monitor progress toward those outcomes. For example, an outcome for Key Component #2: Eligibility and Enrollment Guidelines might be for a specific percentage of staff to be involved in at least one student?s Functional Vision Evaluation or Learning Media Assessment. Outcomes measurement helps us stay focused and chart our own progress.

Why QPVI:SS?

QPVI SS is a unique process. It stands in stark contrast to practices such as strategic planning, the engagement of an outside evaluator, or internal problem-centered efforts. QPVI?s process design features are illustrated in the following point-by-point comparison.

Systematic versus Problem Centered

By looking systematically at the school's educational program, we are able to see how each part relates to another and how effectively the current program accomplishes intended outcomes. With a problem-centered approach, it is tempting to keep a narrow focus on the problem and perhaps miss outside contributing factors. The structure provided for the systematic review is unique to QPVI.

Global versus Piecemeal

Once again the global view gives the Work Group a programmatic perspective that is not easily attained within a school community. The time and effort needed to bring varied staff together is significant. This is a factor contributing to small initiatives within schools. Though these certainly can be effective, a global approach brings more resources to bear on any problem and affords a broader response. Administration and staff support for the QP meetings allows this global approach.

Staff Issues versus Prescribed Issues

A staff-driven process allows the issues of those closest to the students and student outcomes to be identified and addressed. The result has greater meaning and effect than when their efforts are prescribed for them by various state or school initiatives and worked on in isolation.

Interconnecting Web versus Organizational Model

The QP process fosters people working with one another in new and unique ways to promote cross training and teaming. In the organizational model one might look to a particular person in a specified job to perform an action. As we work together in teams, we will encourage an ?outside of the box? mentality to who does what. This approach encourages staff members to use all the skills they have and acquire new skills from team members.

Outside versus Inside

The involvement of an outside entity is helpful in maintaining a sense of objectivity. Staff directing initiatives from within the school can sometimes have their own agenda to forward or have difficulty maintaining objectivity. Whether or not that is true, the perception can effect the desired result.

Current Standards Based versus Personal Choice

It?s beneficial to any school program to measure its practice against current standards. During QP, accepted standards in the field of education are read and consulted as we move through the Key Components. This approach allows staff members to form the same base of information as the make decisions and choices about programming.

What can QPVI:SS do for you?

One of the reasons that QP continues in use and popularity after two decades, is that, despite its complexity and drawbacks, it generally succeeds in accomplishing numerous significant outcomes for participants, their schools, and students. Based on years of collecting participant data, I can say that, if the process is implemented correctly and with the majority of participants fully engaged, you almost certainly will experience the following benefits.

A clear sense of purpose of service to students with visual and multiple impairments ? In accommodating the regulations of state and federal law, administrative requirements, and established school protocol and practice, it can be difficult for any one to develop and maintain a focus on the essentials of their job. For the purposes of this discussion, I will assume that our mutual goal is successful student outcomes. The guided group process, as cumbersome as it is, succeeds beautifully in the grass roots effort of the group to define their common purpose. They will also establish a common understanding of critical issues and set common standards.

A wealth of varied staff work together to adopt program standards - We are fortunate, as a field, to have developed and recorded many standards over the last thirty years and more. Unfortunately, our jobs keep us so busy, that the voluntary reading of a new text is far down the list of pressing needs. The extended QP schedule with strategic readings and discussions afford participants the rare opportunity to incorporate the latest research and thinking into their practice in a manageable way. If current standards exist, they are reviewed and can be revised to reflect needed improvements and the incorporation of ?promising practices? approaches.

Improved communication and collaboration between staff members, parents, and administration - The field of education, where staff time is heavily weighted toward work with students, frequently fosters feelings of isolation on the part of individual workers. Time for staff to communicate and collaborate may not be valued as critical to successful outcomes for students. It may be viewed as important, but logistically difficult and limited, considering conflicting busy schedules and a lack of time. Regularly scheduled QP meetings provide a unique opportunity for staff to communicate and collaborate. During the course of QP, specific attention will paid to the needs expressed by staff for further opportunities.

Increased staff effectiveness and satisfaction - An almost universal byproduct of the reading, discussion and action promulgated by the QP process is an increase in both staff effectiveness and satisfaction with their jobs. This is not to promote an expectation of a special school Shangri-La and it does not promise perfection, as that is not our goal. It does promise that, for those who engage in the dialogue and put new ideas into action, their practice will be more effective and personally rewarding. Though not every idea will thrill every individual, many will make sense and result in positive changes of one kind or another. The more you can assure yourself that you are following a reasoned and researched plan, the surer you can be of having the desired effect.

Improved service to students and improved student outcomes ? Whether this refers simply to greater knowledge of the student, increased content knowledge by staff, greater collaboration among staff members and parents, or any of a multitude of improvements that can result from QP, benefit to the student is achieved as well as the goal of improved student progress.

Guiding Principles for implementing QPVI:SS

• We all have to decide where and how to engage our life and work energy. Wherever that engagement occurs, there is the greatest likelihood of beneficial results.
• The accomplishments reflected in productive group work frequently exceed, by far, the work of the individual.
• New learning stems, in part, from an individual?s endeavor to maintain an open mind, to understand and respect the ideas and viewpoints of others.
• Listening to learn challenges the listener to understand the speaker rather than formulating a rebuttal.
• Innovative thinking questions old assumptions and looks for new insights.
• Each person brings their own authentic meaning and life experience to the group, which must be encouraged and respected.
• Every voice is valued in the group process. The practice of succinct expression allows wider participation by all.

After the Self-Study

Once the Self-Study is completed, the documents, practices, or procedures, are kept in a handbook and used by staff. A QPVI SS final report is written that indicates the strengths and needs found and states priorities for further action. A process is put in place for addressing the priorities selected by staff members. Group facilitation is generally taken over by a member of school staff or administration.