Collaborative Networks of General and Special Education Teachers at an Inclusive School Site

Inclusive education is when all students, regardless of any challenge or neurological differences, are in the general education classroom and receive high-quality instruction, interventions, and support to succeed in the core curriculum. With 62.5% of students receiving most, if not all, special education services in the general education classroom (Snyder et al., 2019), general and special education teachers must work together to meet their students' needs. The case study investigated the collaborative networks of eight general and special education teachers and learned how general and special education teachers collaborate to support inclusion at a public middle school. Through interviews, teachers mapped and described their ego-networks and discussed how they collaborate to support students with special needs in their classrooms. The study identified a network dense with special educators which provided multiple sources of accessible education experience and expertise. Proximity and structured partnerships were found to be the main drivers for network development. Working together, teachers differentiated and scaffolded the curriculum and provided an individualized education. The study provides further understanding of collaborative networks within a school site and situates this knowledge within the lens of educational leadership through distributed leadership practices and supports equitable educational practices that celebrate and honor neurodiversity within classrooms