Interprofessional development in inclusive schools

Recent political reforms in the Danish school system have lengthened the school day and integrated child and youth educators into aspects of the teaching programme as part of a common European strategy of inclusion. The school day now contains homework cafes and lessons with child and youth educators, both initiatives of which support the subject-oriented education at school. These changes have challenged the way [education/school] professionals work and how they see their own and each other's roles in the school system (EVA 2013). The changes have also increased the need for collaborative practices/the need to establish collaborative practices between the different groups of professionals working at a school (Downes 2011, Anderson-Butcher 2004). To ensure all students succeed at school, teachers and child and youth educators need to collaborate more effectively, particularly when it comes to students with weak school affiliation or special needs. In this connection researchers (Friend 2002; Luetke-Stahlman 1999) have pointed to the need to integrate knowledge about students with special needs into school practice so that teachers and other education/school professionals have the qualifications required to work with these students. This paper describes the challenges [education/school] professionals (teachers and child and youth educators) face in striving to develop inclusive school practice, and how these challenges relate to differences in skills and competencies between the professions. The knowledge for the paper was generated in a research project entitled “Interprofessional development in inclusive schools”. The project worked from a basic understanding that we need to develop preventive educational strategies for children and young people with learning difficulties and in social risk positions, and that these strategies must involve not only teachers but also other education/school professionals with specific knowledge about inclusion in schools, such as child and youth educators, special educators, social assistants, etc. The paper discusses the following questions: • What collaborative competencies are required in the development of new ways of working with inclusive strategies? • In what ways can the specific competencies and knowledge gained by specialized education/school professionals help diminish weak school affiliation and exclusion? • How can cooperation between [education/school] professionals best lead to new interventions that involve student perspectives and that students thus see as meaningful? Previous research in the field points to the fact that professional boundaries and rivalries impede collaboration and communication. Some of this research (Spratt et al 2006, Thornberg 2009) indicates, for example, that teachers lack confidence in intervention proposals made by professionals in groups other than their own, if these professionals have no knowledge of or experience in the given field. The research project examines how interprofessional collaboration transforms when professionals collectively engage in developing interventions. This gives them a common goal, but also emphasizes the importance of involving the students at whom the intervention is aimed. Methodology: To shed light on the research questions, the project has focused on how the collaboration between teachers and child and youth educators working at primary and lower secondary schools supports students’ education. Teachers and child and youth educators from four different types of schools in various parts of Denmark participated in the project – 16 teachers and 12 child and youth educators in all. From summer 2016 to spring 2017 these education/school professionals participated in three workshops and collaborated on developing new interventions aimed at increasing the inclusion of specific students with weak school affiliation or/and special needs. To support the aim of developing interventions that incorporate the perspective of students’ conceptions and experience of participation and inclusion, the professionals interviewed students with weak school affiliation or special needs in the beginning of the process. These interviews were transcribed and integrated in the workshop as a basis for developing inclusive interventions. The participants were asked to organize and categorize students’ statements by means of empathy maps (ref). As collaborative practices are the project focus, we used/operated with the ideas of design-based research (Barab, S. et. Al. 2004, Cobb 2003) and to some extent the concept of research circles (Persson, 2007). The design development was theory oriented, with our introducing theories about the different aspects of professional collaboration, co-creation and social innovation (Conger, S. 2002, Edwall et. al. 2008)). In accordance with the processes of design-based research (iteration), the professionals tried out the interventions between the workshops, and the designs were subsequently reconsidered and adjusted. All discussions between the professionals were documented through video and audio recording, and the various intervention designs developed by the participants were described. During the workshops the professionals were asked to try to specify in which ways their professional competencies were relevant to the proposed intervention. It became clear that the professionals found it hard to express their own knowledge of their competencies directly. Nevertheless, the recordings show that the various professional competencies are generally used in productive ways. They also make clear, however, that some rather static conceptions of one profession versus the others hinder the possibilities of developing new collaborative interventions. To clarify these conceptions of the collaboration process, we transcribed all the discussions conducted at the workshops, using categories from the theory of professional collaboration (Engeström, 1987 & Engeström 2001, Friend 2002, Thornberg 2009) for the thematic analysis (Ritchie et. al. 2013). Preliminary summary and results The analysis is still ongoing, but we can currently point towards some preliminary results. 1. As regards social dynamics and a comprehensive view of the child (student), the child and youth educators are in closer contact with the student. 2. Obstacles to the co-creation-process: The professionals found it difficult to integrate the new knowledge gained from working with other professionals, and they also identified/identify a series of institutional barriers. 3. Crossing spatial boundaries: Both the professionals and the students seem to think of the two physical spaces they work in and attend as two separate worlds with different rules and different possibilities. The interventions indicate that some students may benefit from the dissolution of these borders, i.e. letting some teaching take place in the school-based leisure club or using some of the more activity-based methods from the school-based leisure club in the classroom. 4. Changing teaching methods: Students with weak school affiliation or special needs would benefit from a change in teaching methods that takes some of the competencies possessed by child and youth educators and uses them in the classroom. As a further step, it is relevant to open up students’ educational perspectives in directions other than upper secondary school. Preliminary conclusion The collaboration and co-creation between teachers and child and youth educators holds potential for a successful inclusion agenda. However, some fields require further development: 1. Education/School professions need to be developed in the light of school reforms; the various professions need to be adjusted to meet the demands of/to fulfil new tasks. 2. Common awareness of the students and their needs and a stronger focus on the relationship between professionals and students/children 3. Institutional support and transformations, breaking barriers between the school and school-based leisure clubs