Qualitative Study: The Associations of Culturally Competent ‘Highly Qualified’ Teachers Towards their Hispanic Students’ IEP Fulfillment within a Culturally Relevant Pedagogy Framework

This is a qualitative study exploring the relationship between the cultural competency of highly qualified (HQ) teachers and the progression of Individualized Education Programs (IEPs) for Hispanic students, employing a generic qualitative design (Merriam, 1998). The study employed semi-structured interviews with open-ended questions, exploring the teacher’s documented cultural competency focusing on their intercultural knowledge, skills, and attitudes based on the student’s IEP progress report. The 7 HQ Texas teachers completed two scalable surveys: 1) The Culturally Responsive Teacher Preparedness Scale (CRTPS) 6-point Likert scale (Hsiao, 2015), 2) The Teacher Multicultural Attitude Survey (TMAS) 5-point Likert scale (Tomalin & Stempleski, 2013). The IEP progress report obtained for this study is a chart of IEP progress codes for 2 mathematic IEP goals, 2 reading IEP goals, and 2 science IEP goals. The IEP progress report was completed by the teacher through Qualtrics, where the teacher labeled the chart with “Student 1, and Student 2” to maintain anonymity. The survey results and IEP progress report will validate if higher survey scores and IEP progress reflect higher levels of culturally relevant teaching (CRT) practices for Hispanic students with exceptionalities. This study used three data sources; surveys, IEP progress reports, and interviews to triangulate data and provide an understanding of teachers’ culturally responsive preparedness and multicultural awareness regarding the IEP progress of Hispanic students. This study addressed concerns regarding the fulfillment of IEPs, cultural competency, and implications for culturally responsive teaching related to Hispanic students with exceptionalities and a recommendation for creating culturally responsive educational ecosystems.