Educational Technology, Media and Materials for Individuals with Disabilities - National Center to Improve Faculty Capacity to Use Educational Technology in Special Education, Early Intervention, and Related Services Personnel Preparation and Leadership P

Overview

<p><strong>Purpose of Program</strong>: The purposes of the Educational Technology, Media, and Materials for Individuals with Disabilities Program are to (1) improve results for children with disabilities by promoting the development, demonstration, and use of technology; (2) support educational activities designed to be of educational value in the classroom for children with disabilities; (3) provide support for captioning and video description that is appropriate for use in the classroom; and (4) provide accessible educational materials (AEM) to children with disabilities in a timely manner.</p> <p><strong>Priority</strong>: This competition includes one absolute priority. This priority is: National Center to Improve Faculty Capacity to Use Educational Technology in Special Education, Early Intervention, and Related Services Personnel Preparation and Leadership Personnel Preparation Programs. The purpose of this priority is to fund a cooperative agreement to establish and operate a national center to improve faculty capacity to use educational technology in special education, early intervention, and related services personnel preparation and leadership personnel preparation programs.</p> <p><strong>Background</strong>: Educational technology (e.g., adaptive courseware, digital learning environments, learning analytics, virtual learning tools, accessibility technology, communication technologies) in IHEs can potentially be transformative in how it engages, supports, and enables learning and increases opportunities and options for diverse learners (U.S. Department of Education, 2017). Faculty at IHEs play a critical role in promoting knowledge and shaping the teaching methods of future special education, early intervention, and related services personnel (referred to as ‘‘educators’’ hereafter) and leaders (e.g., IHE faculty; school, program, district, and State administrators). The competencies needed by IHE faculty to prepare future educators and leaders have only recently been proposed and approaches to the acquisition of these competencies need to be explored (Foulger et al., 2017).</p> <p><strong>Programmatic requirements to be considered for funding under this priority</strong>: applicants, at a minimum, must—(a) Increase knowledge of faculty at IHEs about the range of educational technologies that can be used for educator or leadership preparation programs; (b) Increase capacity of faculty at IHEs to use a range of educational technologies in educator or leadership preparation programs; and (c) Increase capacity of faculty within and across IHEs to sustain professional learning networks related to the use of educational technologies in educator and leadership preparation programs.</p>