Peer Support (KEDC)

Peer support arrangements and peer network programs are evidence-based practices which involve identifying and equipping a group of peers to provide ongoing support to individual students with significant disabilities in or outside of the classroom. Peer support arrangements are set up by training students (usually a student with a significant disability along with one to three peers) to provide academic and social support to each other during ongoing learning activities. Beyond the classroom, a group of peers will network together with a student with a significant disability to help foster social connections and friendships between classes, at lunch, in extracurricular activities, or beyond the school day. This program provides multiple peers to support students and, most importantly, this program facilitates learning and friendship outside the special education classroom. Peer support arrangements and peer networks can help students become more efficient communicators and increase participation in the classroom. The Kentucky Special Education Cooperatives will train school teams to expand their learning and participation in inclusive activities, both in academics and extracurricular. The Kentucky Special Education Cooperatives will support this initiative by providing training and coaching to school teams and to assist in developing an action plan for schools to implement the Peer Network Project. SOW: 1) Aiding Co-Ops in collecting implementation and impact data on peer support arrangements and peer networks in the schools in their respective regions. 2) Aiding Co-Ops in designing a fidelity implementation tool for measuring the extent to which pilot sites were implementing the components of each of these practices, and as a tool for providing TA to pilot sites. 3) Providing telephone and/or ZOOM consultation, on as needed basis, to each Co-Op in terms of insuring that students with the most significant disabilities, including students with complex communication challenges, have the opportunity to participate in peer support arrangements and peer networks. 4) Meeting regularly with all of the LICs, as a part of their own meetings, to brainstorm strategies for disseminating these practices to schools.