About

Elizabeth Bettini is an associate professor in the Special Education program at BU Wheelock College of Education & Human Development. Her research examines factors shaping the special education teacher workforce, with a focus on how working conditions contribute to the shortage of special education teachers and to inequities in access to skilled, committed teachers based on students’ disability, race/ethnicity, or socioeconomic status. Her current work is centered on identifying potential interventions to improve working conditions and eliminate these inequities. Dr. Bettini previously taught students with emotional and behavioral disorders in self-contained and inclusive settings in Arizona and Connecticut, bringing practical teaching experience to her research and academic pursuits.

Research topics

• Psychology
• Political Science
• Medicine
• Clinical psychology
• Public relations
• Medical education
• Pedagogy
• Social psychology
• Mathematics education
• Developmental psychology

Selected publications

• Educators’ Perspectives of Working Conditions in Inclusive Elementary Schools

  Journal of Learning Disabilities · 2025-03-17 · 5 citations

  articleOpen access

  Educators need supportive working conditions to fulfill their responsibilities to students, families, and colleagues. Given the crucial role of working conditions in teacher effectiveness, we sought to understand educators' (including general educators, paraeducators, specaial educators, and principals) perspectives about their working conditions as they included students with disabilities. We analyzed 28 primarily qualitative studies, conducted between 1998 and 2023, using Conservation of Resources (COR) theory as a framework to study their working conditions. We analyzed their responsibilities in inclusive schools (e.g., instruction, collaboration), and the resources that were provided or needed to fulfill those responsibilities (e.g., time, professional development). We found inclusion often required substantial responsibilities for educators; however, they often lacked needed resources, leaving them feeling stretched thin as they tried to meet students' needs. These findings have implications for supporting educators in inclusive schools.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Whole Person Care Clinic for Youth with Sickle Cell Disease

  Journal of Pain · 2025-04-01

  article
  PublisherDOI

• Principals’ Conceptions of Their Roles Supporting Self-Contained Programs for Students With Emotional/Behavioral Disorders

  Remedial and Special Education · 2024-03-25 · 4 citations

  article1st authorCorresponding

  Special educators serving students with emotional/behavioral disorders (EBD) depend on their principals’ support, yet prior research has not explored principals’ roles in supporting these programs. Using constructivist grounded theory methods, we analyzed interviews with five U.S. elementary school principals about their roles in supporting self-contained programs for students with EBD. Principals held widely varying conceptions of students with EBD , visions for their program, and understandings of their own roles and responsibilities for their programs; collectively, interactions among these gave rise to principals’ senses of agency , both for the program’s capacity to be a causal agent in promoting student growth and their own capacity, as leaders, to improve the program. Our findings indicate the centrality of principals’ conceptions of EBD for how they support self-contained programs for students with EBD, which has important implications for future research and practice regarding principal leadership for special education.

  PublisherDOI

• Comparing Teacher Turnover Intentions to Actual Turnover: Cautions and Lessons for the Field

  Educational Evaluation and Policy Analysis · 2024-05-24 · 9 citations

  article

  Many studies rely on teachers’ reported career intentions instead of measuring actual turnover, but research does not clearly document how these variables relate to one another. We test how measures of teacher intentions relate to turnover. Using nationally representative data on 102,970 public school teachers, we conduct a descriptive and regression analysis to probe how teachers’ turnover intentions are and are not associated with moving schools and leaving teaching. While there is some variation across measures of intent, we find evidence that intention is distinct from, but strongly related to, turnover. We advise that surveys continue to capture intention as it provides meaningful information, but we recommend intention not be used as proxy for turnover.

  PublisherDOI

• Small fiber neuropathy in children, adolescents, and young adults with chronic orthostatic intolerance and postural orthostatic tachycardia syndrome: A retrospective study

  Autonomic Neuroscience · 2024-03-08 · 8 citations

  articleSenior author
  PublisherDOI

• Insights Into Child Abuse and Neglect in the Washington DC, Maryland, and Virginia (DMV) Area: Evidence and Opportunities

  Global Pediatric Health · 2024-01-01 · 1 citations

  reviewOpen access

  Child abuse and neglect (CAN) significantly impact health, the economy, and society. This narrative review examines CAN in the Washington DC, Maryland, and Virginia (DMV) region, comparing it with national and international levels. The review highlights high CAN rates in the DMV, driven by factors such as socioeconomic status, parental substance abuse, and child vulnerabilities. Screening and reporting challenges, exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic, impede accurate data collection. This review emphasizes the need for standardized reporting mechanisms, economic investment in public health, and intersectoral collaboration. It recommends targeted support for at-risk families, specialized care for vulnerable children, and the development of predictive screening tools. Continuous research on regional and cultural factors and the pandemic's impact is crucial for future resilience. Addressing CAN requires a comprehensive approach involving prevention, early detection, intervention, and policy reform to safeguard the well-being of children.

  PublisherDOI

• Examining the Supply of New Special Educators: Variations by Institutional Characteristics and For-Profit Status

  Remedial and Special Education · 2024-08-27 · 4 citations

  article

  U.S. schools have long experienced shortages of special education teachers (SETs), challenging the nation’s capacity to ensure qualified SETs for students eligible for special education services. Addressing SET shortages requires preparation programs to supply sufficient numbers of new SETs to meet demand, yet prior research provides few insights into trends in the supply of new SETs. Thus, we examined how the supply of new SETs changed over time in relation to the characteristics of teacher preparation programs. We find a decreasing supply of new SETs nationally, primarily driven by a reduced supply of new SETs from small colleges. Results suggest the current SET shortage may be connected, in previously undocumented ways, to the broader decline of small- and mid-sized colleges. Finally, findings indicate the nation may be far more dependent on for-profit institutions for supplying new SETs, which has implications for the production of SETs by alternative certification and traditional teacher preparation programs.

  PublisherDOI

• Special Education Teachers of Color Burnout, Working Conditions, and Recommendations for EBD Research

  Journal of Emotional and Behavioral Disorders · 2023-01-12 · 17 citations

  article

  This article is in direct response to Garwood’s call to action about burnout and the special education teacher workforce. While Garwood’s call to action is critically needed, we contend that the call is incomplete as it lacks emphasis on factors linking sociocultural identity and burnout. Therefore, in this article, we discuss the significance of elevating sociocultural identity, specifically race and ethnicity, into research about special education teacher burnout. We argue that any research on special education teacher burnout that does not include race and ethnicity is overlooking the racialization of special education teachers’ working conditions, and ultimately is incapable of addressing one of the most pressing issues in the special education field—retaining teachers of color. Recommendations for researchers to address sociocultural identities (i.e., race and ethnicity) in their research, specifically about special education teachers of color teaching students with emotional and behavioral disorders, are addressed.

  PublisherDOI

• Conceptual Frameworks for Understanding Special Educators' Decisions to Stay or Leave

  2023-12-07 · 2 citations

  book-chapter1st authorCorresponding

  US schools have never had enough special education teachers (SETs) to serve all students with disabilities, in part due to high SET attrition rates. As such, researchers have long sought to understand why SETs leave, but they have often done so without grounding their analyses in clear conceptual frameworks. Conceptual frameworks help scholars build schemas for understanding a problem; in doing so, they point out potential directions for future inquiry, directing scholars' attention toward new ways of conceptualizing a problem. Efforts to research and improve SET retention thus require strong conceptual foundations, supported by robust research, to understand why SETs leave and stay. Therefore, in this chapter, we describe conceptual frameworks that researchers have used to study SET attrition and retention. We first present an overview of the frameworks used in prior research, and second, consider some of the possibilities presented by these frameworks, and gaps for which the field needs stronger frameworks.

  PublisherDOI

• Handbook of Research on Special Education Teacher Preparation

  2023-12-07 · 24 citations

  book
  PublisherDOI

Frequent coauthors

• Nelson C. Brunsting

  University of Florida

  15 shared

• Michelle M. Cumming

  13 shared

• Hannah Morris Mathews

  University of Florida

  12 shared

• Yujeong Park

  University of Tennessee at Knoxville

  11 shared

• Mary T. Brownell

  University of Florida

  10 shared

• Bonnie S. Billingsley

  Virginia Tech

  10 shared

• Laila A. Mahmood

  Children's National

  9 shared

• Allison F. Gilmour

  American Institutes for Research

  9 shared

Labs

• Special Education Research LabPI

Awards & honors

• Three BU Researchers Win National Honor for Early-Career Sci…