Program Philosophy

The PSU Graduate School of Education has 8 guiding principles. Three of them are particularly relevant to the Inclusive Educators Program:

1) To create and sustain educational environments that serve all students and address diverse needs,

2) To encourage and model exemplary programs, and

3) To develop programs to promote social justice, especially for groups that have been historically disenfranchised.

These three principles are the foundation upon which the Inclusive Educators Program rests.

The Inclusive Educators Program has as its core mission the development of exemplary educators. Exemplary teachers are teachers who are effective with all students. The central beliefs of the Inclusive Educators Program are that: students with disabilities should be educated alongside their nondisabled peers, classroom teachers bear central responsibility for the education of all students in their classrooms, the role of special educators is to provide resources and support for classroom teachers and their students in the classroom as much as possible, general and special educators serve students best when teaming and collaborating, and that inclusive education when properly practiced leads to the development of exemplary educators as well as the effective education of all students.

These beliefs rest on a foundation of research-based best practices.