The current sociopolitical context of special education is one of dangerous currents. I will give a brief overview of three of these currents and then discuss how we might proceed to avoid their taking us where we don’t want to go.

New Zealand has much of real quality to be proud of in special education. On numerous international surveys of education, New Zealand schools continue to rank highly - especially with respect to reading and written language, and were such surveys to focus on special educational matters, my guess is that the picture would be equally positive. There are very real difficulties in developing special educational provisions for a country with New Zealand’s geographical characteristics. New Zealand has a relatively small total population, which is scattered widely across a rather large and geographically well separated area, and these factors make for real problems in providing for children with difficulties which occur infrequently - as do most conditions associated with exceptionality and special education.

Clinic procedures are frequently justified on the basis of research studies, yet clients and procedures may be sufficiently different to make generalisation of findings a dubious proposition. For this reason the staff of a major children’s clinic chose to review both process and outcome in the diagnosis and treatment of children referred with suspected attention deficit disorder. Children were diagnosed as having attention deficit disorder with or without hyperactivity. However, the diagnostic groups could be differentiated on too few pre-treatment variables to be considered different populations. In addition, the treatment offered did not differentiate between children with different diagnoses. Evaluation of treatment at 4 mths showed limited improvement in children who were treated with methylphenidate (Ritalin). At 12 mths no improvements were evident that could be directly attributed to treatment. The study points out the importance of individual clinics monitoring the processes of diagnosis and treatment of children referred with suspected attention deficit disorder and emphasises the need for referring agents and clinic personnel to maintain effective communication.

Since the early 1970s special education courses at graduate and post-graduate levels have become standard offerings at many Australian universities. As these courses continue to be the main avenue of professional development for special educators in this country, it is pertinent to wonder how often the objectives and content of the courses are examined and revised to ensure contemporary relevance. It must be recognized that the field of special education appears to be in what Tomlinson (1982, p.24) has described as a ‘permanently dynamic state’, with frequent changes in policy, service delivery, roles and responsibilities. The roles and responsibilities of special educators have certainly changed significantly during the past decade (Watts, 1990; Dyson, 1991), and the earlier studies of essential competencies required by special education teachers (e.g. Whitmore,1982; Scott, 1983; Davis, 1983) may not provide reliable data on which to design current courses. There has been renewed interest overseas in the issue of what constitutes essential knowledge and skills for teachers working in special education (Best, 1988; Ramsey & Algozzine, 1991; Ramsey, Algozzine & Smith, 1990; Glomb & Morgan, 1991; Folio, 1990; Cannon, Idol & West, 1992; Reynolds, Wang & Walberg, 1992; Swan & Sirvis, 1992), and it is worth analysing some of this material to determine its relevance for the Australian context. The information could well prove useful as a basis for evaluating special education courses here.

The recent development of special education courses within teacher education degrees has focussed attention on the content of these courses. Although several policy documents recommending content for these courses have been published in recent years, very little empirical work has been conducted to determine the relevance of such proposals. This study examined the misconceptions of teacher trainees about intellectual disability as a means of identifying particular aspects of special education content that may need to be addressed in special education courses. The sample held several misconceptions which suggest that many teacher trainees may have a poor understanding of intellectual disability.

This paper examines choice-making in work and community access programs by people perceived to have a severe intellectual disability. The results indicate that the quality and quantity of choice-making are restricted in these settings. The impact of factors such as type of work setting, gender, perceived attractiveness and level of ability are investigated. The implications of this study for research, personnel preparation and workplace interactions are explored.