
Director of Special Education and Related Services, New Hanover County Schools
Panelist
Allison R. Jones, Ph.D.
Allison R. Jones, Ph.D. is the Director of Special Education and Related Services for New Hanover County Schools (NHCS) in Wilmington, NC where she oversees the special education programming for approximately 3,300 students with disabilities. In this role, she ensures specially designed instruction and related services are provided appropriately and in compliance with federal regulations as well as allocates the resources needed to provide equitable learning environments for all learners.
Prior to her current position with NHCS, she was an associate professor and program coordinator for the special education undergraduate program in the Department of Early Childhood, Elementary, Middle, Literacy, and Special Education at the University of North Carolina Wilmington, Wilmington, NC. She taught a variety of courses related to special education, transition, and effective instructional practices and maintained a research agenda focused on the transition of students with high-incidence disabilities into employment, postsecondary education, and independent living with a concentration on diversity in transition, specifically the self-advocacy skills of students with disabilities from minority backgrounds.
Dr. Jones was also a transition support teacher for several years in Germantown, Maryland where she provided transition services to both the high and low-incidence population of students with disabilities. In addition, she worked as a transition specialist for George Mason T/TAC where she provided transition services for Region 4 in the state of Virginia. She has also worked with the National Technical Assistance Center on Transition (NTACT) (formally known as the National Secondary Transition Technical Assistance Center) where she helped to develop the Indicator 13 Checklist to ensure that transition plans for students with disabilities ages 16 and older are in compliance with federal guidelines.