An Approach to Assessing the Features of a Tutor's Professional Competence in an Inclusive Education: A Pilot Study

The work solved the problems of substantiating the approach to the study of the features of the professional competence of a tutor (teaching assistant) in the conditions of inclusive education and conducting a pilot study of the basic components of competence: motivational-attitude, cognitive, behavioral, and reflective-evaluative ones. The methods used in international studies for studying subjective predictors of the implementation of inclusive practices by teachers served as a prototype for using a number of self-assessment tools in studying the basic components of tutor competence, including four questionnaires: ‘Attitude towards inclusion’, ‘Intention to implement inclusive practices’, ‘Efficiency of a tutor accompanying students with health deficiencies and disabilities in an inclusive education’, ‘Difficulties of the tutor in the implementation of tutor support in the conditions of inclusion’. The sample of this study is represented by 313 respondents (mean age 33.6±13.9; men — 9.6%, women — 90.4%), including 41 students of secondary vocational education organizations, and 272 students of higher education, among them there were 67 working tutors. All respondents answered the same questionnaires remotely using the ‘Anketolog’ system. Data analysis included an exploratory factorial analysis of each questionnaire, a check of their internal consistency, and a correlation analysis of relationships between all questionnaires. Cronbach's alpha ranged from 0.76 to 0.94, which indicates sufficient internal consistency of the questionnaires. Correlation analysis confirms the nature of the relationships of the original questionnaires previously obtained in international studies. Factor analysis made it possible to identify both the ‘Intention to implement inclusive practices’ questionnaire and the ‘Efficiency of a tutor accompanying students with health deficiencies and disabilities in an inclusive education’ questionnaire, two factors each, reflecting the specifics of the work of tutors, which, apparently, can be associated with their support for the agency of students with disabilities. This possible sensitivity to this aspect of tutoring allows us to expect that these questionnaires can become a useful tool for studying subjective readiness and ability as components of tutoring professional competence of future and working professionals in an inclusive education environment.

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