Dr. Carolyn Hughes Principal Investigator Department of Special Education P.O. Box 328 Peabody College Vanderbilt University Nashville, TN 37203

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The Peer Buddy Program

     The Metropolitan Nashville Peer Buddy Project is jointly funded by the Tennessee Developmental Disabilities Council and the U.S. Department of Education, Office of Special Education and Rehabilitative Services. The project provides technical assistance to high school teachers and students as they implement a Peer Buddy Model that promotes the inclusion of students with severe disabilities in regular education activities. The Peer Buddy Model was initially piloted for two years with 45 students with severe disabilities at McGavock High School, then the largest high school in Tennessee. In the 1998-1999 school year, the project was expanded to all eleven comprehensive high schools in Nashville which enroll approximately 300 students with severe disabilities.

     All three hundred project participants will have general education Peer Buddies who will support them in inclusion in everyday school life, providing them access to the resources and support available to all students. Fundamental to the Peer Buddy Model is a Peer Tutoring course, in which general education students earn high school credit by interacting with students with severe disabilities. As a result of the model, students with severe disabilities are attending vocational and regular education classes, participating in school clubs and sports events with their buddies, eating lunch with general education peers, and generally "hanging out" before and after school with general education students.

     Project impact includes:

•  Improving post-school outcomes of 300 youth with severe disabilities by allowing them to participate fully in the support, resources, and activities of high school life;

• Contributing to the knowledge base regarding best practices for including students with severe disabilities in daily high school life;

• Disseminating findings and products nationally to all parties interested in replicating the Peer Buddy Model.

Find out more about the Peer Buddy Model
clicking on the links to the left.

This project received support from the Tennessee Developmental Disabilities Council and the U. S. Department of Education
Grant #H158Q60004