The Regional Directorate for Education (DRE) promotes a series of training courses for teachers, psychologists and other technicians working in the area of Special Education at all school establishments of the Regional Education System. These initiatives are organised under the Integrated Plan for the Promotion of School Success.

The first course will take place in Angra do Heroísmo. It starts next Monday, July 6, and will run until July 9, covering a total of 280 trainees.

Under the guidance of psychologist Sandra Martins, this training course aims to promote more effective conditions for the inclusion of children and youngsters with special educational needs in our schools, providing the appropriate educational responses as well as dynamic, interactive and multidimensional assessment. The course will be followed by others to take place throughout the school year 2015/2016.
 
With this initiative, participants will acquire a more sustained and critical knowledge on the model concerning the international classification of functioning, disability and health - version for children and youth (ICF - CY).

The need to organise this training course arises from the difficulties felt by technicians and special education teachers in the process regarding the assessment, eligibility and intervention in students with special educational needs, more specifically in the assessment of the functioning and disability of students eligible for special education programmes.

Therefore, the Regional Directorate for Education will "provide moments when participants will be have the opportunity to use the CIF-CJ application, based on a problem-solving methodology."

Sandra Martins is a full member of the Portuguese Association of Psychologists. She holds a postgraduate degree in Psychopathology and Psychotherapy of Children and Adolescents. She has worked at Francisco Ferreira Drummond Basic Education School since 2012 and at "Casa do Povo" of Porto Judeu since 2011. Sandra Martins was responsible for the promotion of the Parental Education Programme "Fantastic Families with Children," an initiative targeted at families with children with disabilities that was developed in partnership with the Regional Directorate for Social Security .