“Idea Spotlight” highlights successful TBI systems improvement strategies.
While the strategy may not work exactly as described within your State, consider how you can modify and adapt the strategy for your State’s benefit.
PUBLIC EDUCATION AND TRAINING: Educating School Personnel
To correctly identify and appropriately serve students with traumatic brain injury, it is essential that school personnel receive training about traumatic brain injury and its effect on children and youth. In order to reach this broad audience located across the State, States should make use of a variety of avenues for information dissemination.
Missouri relies on technology to maximize educational opportunities and reach a broad audience. The Internet allows Missouri to bridge the distance to school personnel located throughout the State and provide them with practical, “hands-on” training available at all times.
Attending the Children and Youth Plenary session at the March 2007 TBI Grantee Meeting sparked Missouri’s curiosity about what was going on in their State’s school systems related to children and youth with TBI. With the assistance of the Department of Education representative on the TBI statewide advisory council, Missouri’s lead agency, the Department of Health and Senior Services (DHSS), was able to locate the appropriate contact person within the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education (DESE). As luck would have it, DHSS learned that DESE had been considering revamping their existing TBI training modules. The three-day training modules were highly medical; DESE was interested in developing a less time intensive and more teacher-friendly training.
DESE and DHSS decided to work together to revise the modules. Each agreed that they wanted to have the revised training available on-line to allow school personnel to access the information as needed. Upon reviewing the modules, DHSS reported that the current training materials would require extensive revisions in order to make it a Web-based interactive training.
Knowing that there was no need to “reinvent the wheel” and that many trainings specific to school personnel had been developed, DHSS searched the Federal TBI Program’s Collaboration Space (TBICS) <http://www.tbitac.nashia.org/tbics/>. DHSS then chose and evaluated several of the trainings to determine which would best meet their needs.
The training that Missouri liked best was an on-line training developed by Tennessee’s Project BRAIN under their Federal TBI Program grant. The training is set up as a “Virtual School” for information on the subject of traumatic brain injury. The school consists of several “classrooms” containing information that is pertinent to school personnel working with students with traumatic brain injury. Participants enter the school and access different sections of the school for information. The sections include:
Nurse’s Office - This room contains general information about the brain, the causes and effects of TBI, medical issues related to brain injury, and information about concussion or mild TBI.
Family Resource Center - Information geared towards professionals and families is located in this room. There are video interviews in which individuals with TBI, family members, and professionals share relevant information and personal insights about the effects of TBI. The Family Resource Center also includes links to family/caregiver specific Web sites, recommended readings, and printable information for use by school professionals and families/caregivers.
Classroom - The classroom has information on how the effects of brain injury might manifest within the educational environment, how skills may be impaired, general interventions for the classroom, and how to use the method of “Contextualized Hypothesis Testing” to determine what, how, when, and where interventions should be tested and implemented. Several printable case studies are included for a review of the concepts presented.
Library - This virtual resource center contains Web links, printable information, recommended readings, and statistics about the incidence of TBI. Learn about terms commonly used in reference to TBI by taking advantage of the “TBI Dictionary.”
Upon DHSS’s recommendation, DESE reviewed Project BRAIN’s Web site and Virtual School. DESE agreed that the Virtual School was exactly what they had in mind because it presented the material very comprehensively and creatively and the Web-based format would allow educators to access the information quickly and when needed. Also, the training was created using a teacher-oriented model and not a medical oriented model.
Missouri then approached Project BRAIN to obtain permission for DESE to include a link to the Virtual School on their Web site. Once the permission was secured (Project BRAIN had to verify that the site could handle the additional traffic), a link was added. In addition to the training resources available through the link, DHSS developed a list of TBI resources specific to Missouri that is accessed prior to entering the school. Resources include: family support, educational information, State agencies, and rehabilitation hospitals. Visit Missouri’s resource page, which includes a link to the Virtual School, at <http://www.dese.mo.gov/divspeced/EffectivePractices/tbiresource.pdf>.
DESE then sent a notice to all special education directors, principals, general and special education teachers announcing the availability of the training resource.
Congratulations to Missouri for linking with your State Department of Education and for using an existing resource! Feel free to contact Heather Crown (mailto:hacrown@tbitac.nashia.org or 301-656-3150) at the TBI Technical Assistance Center at NASHIA with questions or to discuss this and other strategies for training school personnel and linking with your State’s Department of Education.
Rate this idea! To rate this idea, go to TBICS at <http://www.tbitac.nashia.org/tbics>. Once logged in to TBICS, click “Ideas” on the red horizontal bar, then click the “Idea Look Up” link. In the keyword field enter “school personnel.” In the next window, click on the idea “Educating your State’s School Personnel.” You will then be able to rate this idea - from “not effective” to “very effective.” We would love to hear your feedback!