Technical Assistance Categories

• General/Universal TA Category:  Passive technical assistance and information provided to independent users through their own initiative resulting in minimal interaction with TA Center staff.  This includes one-time invited or offered conference presentations by TA Center staff.  It also includes information or products, such as newsletters, guidebooks, or research syntheses, downloaded from the TA Center's website by independent users.  Brief communications by TA Center Staff with recipients, either by telephone or email are also considered General/Universal TA.  Evaluation and continuous feedback are a requisite of General/Universal TA.  

• Targeted/Specific TA Category:  Technical assistance service is developed based on needs common to multiple recipients and is not extensively individualized.  A relationship is established between the technical assistance recipient's and one or more TA Center staff.  This category of TA can be one-time, labor-intensive events, such as facilitating strategic planning or hosting regional or national conferences.  They can also be episodic, less labor-intensive events that extend over a period of time, such as facilitating a series of conference calls on single or multiple topics that are designed around the needs of the recipients. Facilitating a Communities of Practice (CoPs) can also be considered Targeted/Specific TA.  Evaluation and continuous feedback are a requisite of Targeted/Specific TA.

• Intensive/Sustained TA Category:  Technical assistance services that require a stable, on-going negotiated relationship between the TA Center staff and the TA recipient, and should include a purposeful, planned series of activities designed to reach an outcome that is valued by the individual recipient.  This category of TA should result in changes to policy, program, practice, or operations that support increased recipient capacity and/or improved outcomes at one or more systems levels.  Evaluation and continuous feedback are a requisite of Intensive/Sustained TA.

OSEP defines model as a set of evidence-based[1] practices within a defined implementation strategy that will improve child or system outcomes.   OSEP-funded technical assistance and dissemination projects designed to identify and demonstrate the effectiveness of models must 1) identify a model comprised of specific intervention practices and implementation strategies based on theory, research, or evaluation data documenting positive child or system outcomes; 2)  implement the model in multiple sites and evaluate implementation by, at minimum, measuring fidelity and social validity[2],  and identify core components of the model; 3) refine the model based on the results of the evaluations and then further evaluate the impact of the model on child or system outcomes; and 4) produce detailed procedures and materials to enable others to replicate the model.

[1] Evidence-based, as used here, refers to findings from research that indicate either “strong” or “possible” evidence of effectiveness of a practice.   Different research techniques are capable of yielding either “strong” (e.g., well-designed randomized control trials, comparison studies using well-matched groups) or “possible” evidence of effectiveness (e.g., pre-post studies, comparison-group studies in which the intervention and comparison groups are not well-matched; and “meta-analyses” that combine the results of individual studies which do not themselves meet the threshold for “possible” evidence). (Adapted from U.S. Department of Education, Institute of Education Sciences, 2003)

[2] Social validity, as used here, assesses whether the goals of the model, the practices that comprise the model, and the outcomes that are achieved through implementation of the model are acceptable, relevant, and useful to stakeholders (e.g., administrators, practitioners, families, and children with disabilities).  (Adapted from Kazdin, 2005)

> Click here to download the Conceptual Model (Updated 7.08)