Striking a Balance in School Psychology Training: a Comparison of Blended Delivery Formats and Student Outcomes
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Striking a Balance in School Psychology Training: a Comparison of Blended Delivery Formats and Student Outcomes Carrie Ball 1
&
Jennifer McNeany 1,2 & Alyce Hopple 1
Accepted: 21 October 2020 # California Association of School Psychologists 2020
Abstract As higher education faces declines in federal funding and enrollment, academic programs are increasingly tasked with examining their recruitment and admissions practices, mode and flexibility of delivery, and student retention. In particular, some programs may encounter pressure to introduce part-time or distance learning options into traditionally full-time, on-campus programs. Concurrently, the field of school psychology suffers from a critical nationwide shortage, which further strengthens the impetus for programs to attract and successfully prepare graduate students in greater numbers. In this article, we examine various metrics of student success from one graduate program that concurrently offered program curriculum in two blended delivery formats. In particular, we examine (a) enrollments; (b) timely remediation; (c) retention and degree completion; and (d) intern performance and post-graduation employment across the two delivery formats. We discuss potential benefits and challenges of distance education in school psychology training and offer recommendations for balancing quality and accessibility in curriculum delivery. Keywords Distance education . Blended instruction . School psychology training
The field of school psychology suffers from a critical nationwide shortage. In an effort to address this shortage, some programs may feel pressured to consider alternative learning options for graduate students, such as part-time, hybrid, or distance education programs. Though public institutions have seen a 20% increase in distance enrollments in recent years (Montelongo 2019; Seaman et al. 2018), utilization of distance learning in school psychology programs remains low in comparison to other clinical disciplines (e.g., counseling, nursing, social work), with only about 30% of programs employing some aspect of distance education (Hendricker et al. 2017). Low implementation may be a result of a dearth of empirical knowledge surrounding the topic. The present study aims to contribute to existing knowledge by comparing the effectiveness of two simultaneously delivered delivery formats on four important types of student outcomes.
* Carrie Ball [email protected] 1
Department of Applied Clinical and Educational Sciences, Indiana State University, Terre Haute, IN 47809, USA
2
Department of Educational Leadership , Indiana State University , IN 47809 Terre Haute, USA
Distance education may be broadly defined as instruction that employs a range of instructional technologies and methods “to deliver instruction to students who are separated from the instructor and to support regular and substantive interaction between the students and the instructor” (Seaman et al. 2018, p. 5). Online education refers to the subset of distance education that is delivered u
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