Illinois ASPIRE Centers
To implement Illinois ASPIRE, ISBE has established four regional
ASPIRE Centers—one in the city of Chicago, and one each
in the northern, central, and southern parts of the state.
All ASPIRE Centers will provide standardized professional
development and technical assistance to educators and parents
in their geographic regions, focused on the following topics:
- Designing and providing early intervening services, with
an emphasis on reading instruction that is scientifically
research-based;
- Student progress monitoring;
- Response to intervention; and
- Standards-aligned instruction and assessment.
The professional development will include elements of Flexible
Service Delivery, the Standards
Aligned Classroom curriculum and Reading
First.
All school districts and special education joint agreements
located within the counties served by each regional center
will be eligible to participate in training offered within
the region (click
here for a regional map  ).
In addition, school demonstration/data
collection sites will be identified within each region
to facilitate school and student level data collection and
evaluation, and these sites will receive training and technical
assistance services from the regional centers.
The four Illinois ASPIRE Centers are administered by:
- Illinois ASPIRE – North: Northern
Suburban Special Education District
Contact: Mark Shinn at markshinn@mac.com
or (847) 275-7200
OR
Peggy Miller at pmiller@nssed.org
or 847-831-5100
- Illinois ASPIRE – South: Southern
Illinois University
Contact: Melissa Bergstrom at mbergst@siue.edu or 618-650-3182
OR
Michael McCollum at mmccollum@siue.edu
or (618) 650-5182
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