The study, involving 15 Indiana high school resource room teachers, focused on three aspects of resource room programming: (1) teachers' perceptions of their roles as resource room teachers and perceived concerns regarding the provision of services to mildly handicapped adolescents; (2) role-related activities of secondary resource room teachers; and (3) the amount of academic learning time (ALT) provided within secondary resource room programs. Interviews with the resource teachers and resource room observations yielded data that indicated that, despite some common features, programs varied widely in characteristics and operation. Data are summarized for salient characteristics (such as number of students served, program components, and resource room scheduling). Among findings were that two-thirds of the programs were multicategorical; the numbers of students served ranged from 7 to 70; resource rooms could be classified into six types based on the nature of teacher activities (tutorial, prevocational, content-area, basic skills, coping skills, and consultation); tutorial services existed in 73% of the programs, but only two programs had provisions for systematic consultation with regular class teachers; and ALT data showed that target students worked independently, without any direct teacher involvement for 22% of the time. Among the 10 recommendations made were: that teacher education programs should more adequately prepare secondary school special educators; that certification should be distinct for secondary special educators; and that secondary school resource room teachers should be given more control over their schedules, caseloads, and grouping practices. Six pages of references are provided, and appendices consist of interview topics, interview documents, and sample teacher observations and category descriptions. (CL)