This newsletter feature issue focuses on quality assurance and innovative efforts to enhance service quality for persons with developmental disabilities. Individual articles include: "Redesigning Quality Assurance" (Clarence J. Sundram); "Quality Assurance, Quality Enhancement" (Charlie Lakin et al.); "Challenging…

This monograph describes projects of the Minnesota Governor's Planning Council on Developmental Disabilities which focus on empowerment and self-advocacy for individuals with disabilities and their family members. Individual sections address: (1) Partners in Policymaking (an intensive course to train individuals with disabilities and family…

This directory provides a selection of resources in the major areas of interest in the field of postsecondary education for individuals with disabilities. Most resources listed are organizations, information centers, agencies, foundations, or advocacy organizations related to a specific disability. The first section groups advocacy, access, and…

This document presents summaries of a variety of resources concerned with the inclusion of people with developmental disabilities in faith communities. Each listing usually provides bibliographic information, source and price information, and a summary or description. Following an introductory essay, the first section provides summaries of 43…

This paper provides an overview of the course taken by the United States to improve its public education system in response to the issue of global competitiveness. The nation's attempts at reform of public schooling since 1983 are described, recommendations from the report "A Nation at Risk" are summarized, and teacher education reform…

Through technology, students with disabilities are identifying new options for participation, exerting more control, making more choices, and interacting more effectively. Inclusion, as a policy and as a practice, is reducing the physical and social isolation encountered by individuals and families, broadening expectations, reducing limits, and…

This paper describes the development and establishment of an inclusive education program on a junior high school campus. Although this is the documentation of secondary programming, with an emphasis on severe disabilities, these "phases" can be generalized to other program areas and levels of education. During phase I, a functional,…

This paper reviews the concept of integration, identifies present practices in Alberta (Canada), and describes related issues and trends. Terms are clarified, current initiatives are outlined, the effectiveness of integration is discussed, and the legal and judicial context is examined. The North American experience with integration is briefly…

This literature review on young adults with mental retardation brings together two previously disparate areas of research, community integration and young adult development. After a discussion of various theories addressing the young adulthood stage of development, the paper summarizes research on young adults with mental retardation in the…

This paper addresses the issue of measuring the integration of various ethnocultural communities into Canadian society by means of statistical or social indicators. The overall philosophy of the study is based on the following principles: (1) indicators should have a clear meaning with respect to the underlying concept of integration; (2)…

This bibliography lists 804 journal articles, books, chapters in books, and reports dealing with ethnocultural communities in Canada and measures of their integration into Canadian society. The publication is divided into three major parts. Part 1, "Canadian Ethno-Cultural Communities in General," includes materials on issues concerning…

To be culturally valid, the characteristics identified by dialectologists as distinctive of black English must correspond to the terms members of the black community use to characterize their speech. Not all of the patterns that characterize black English within the dialectal framework are equal in their social or ethnic significance--the speech…

Notes that not all opposition to busing derives from socially, unhealthy, or immoral values and provides alternatives such as fear of sending children into high crime areas. Most Bostonians are said to hate forced busing because of the violence it is spawning. [Available from America, 106 West 56th Street, New York, New York 10019]. (Author/AM)

This booklet contains an outline of, and recommendations based on, a study of 128 New Zealand children in special groups mainstreamed into kindergartens and play groups. Research goals were to explore how mainstreaming had been implemented, whether special group children were profiting from the environment's educational opportunities, and whether…

A survey was conducted of 101 day training and habilitation services in Minnesota serving adults with developmental disabilities. The survey gathered information on age of clients, level of functioning, additional disabilities, place of residence, length of placement, vocational activities, integration, supervision, length of time at the same job…