Fostering Collaboration in Greek Secondary Schools for Inclusive Education: Exploring Attitudes and Overcoming Obstacles between Special Education and Mainstream Teachers.

379 p.
Attitudes of both general education and special education teachers play a critical role in the successful implementation of inclusive education. When these two groups of educators collaborate, they can pool their resources, knowledge, and skills to create a supportive and inclusive learning environment that benefits all students. By working together, they can identify students who may need extra support, develop appropriate accommodations and modifications, and create an individualized educational plan that meets each student's unique needs. Inclusive education requires a collective effort, and when general and special education teachers collaborate, they can ensure that all students receive the education they deserve.The main objective of this study is to analyze the perceptions of Greek secondary school teachers on the parallel support model for inclusive education. The specific objectives of the study include investigating the teachers' perspectives on collaborative efforts, identifying the necessary changes and potentialobstacles for achieving successful collaboration, and examining the role of the teacher in the process. The study also aims to assess the attitudes of Greek secondary school teachers towards inclusive education, evaluate the impact of training on these attitudes, explore differences between special educators and mainstream teachers, as well as differences based on demographic characteristics. Finally, the study aims to investigate the effects of attitudes towards collaboration on the overall success of inclusive education initiatives.Current research is mixed qualitative with semi-instructional interviews and quantitative, synchronous, primary, correlational between and within groups in a non-experimental design, using reliable (a>0.66) and valid Likert type questionnaires. A sample of quantitative research was conducted by 307 teachers of secondary Greek schools, almost equally distributed among permanent (N = 159), deputies (N = 146), general (