The development of the sentiments, attitudes, and concerns about inclusive education (SACIE) scale

Inclusion is an international trend, and means that all children learn together in the same classrooms, regardless of the presence of a disability. Attitudes, sentiments, and concerns are variables which have been found to influence the success of inclusion. There is a need, then, for the development of a concise tool for measuring these. This paper describes the development of an improved scale for measuring sentiments, attitudes and concerns about inclusive education in pre-service teachers, based on an examination of data gathered from 996 pre-service teachers from five tertiary institutions using a modified version of the Interactions with People with Disabilities scale (Forlin, Jobling & Carroll, 2001; Gething, 1991, 1994), the Concerns about Inclusive Education Scale (Sharma & Desai, 2002), and the Attitudes Toward Inclusive Education Scale (Wilczenski, 1992, 1995). The scale has been developed with international use in mind, and the sample includes pre-service teachers in Singapore, Hong Kong, Australia, and Canada. Based on the statistical results, conceptual judgments, and a critique of content and format from an "expert group", a new scale, the Sentiments, Attitudes and Concerns about Inclusive Education scale (SACIE), is developed. The rationale behind the development of the scale is discussed.