Federal Policy

1
Federal Policy Statewide Assessments for
Students with Disabilities

• Sue Rigney
• U.S. Department of Education
• OSEP Project Directors Meeting
• August 2008

2
Federal Policy

• State assessments
• Alternate modified achievement standards
• NAEP
• Participation
• Requires alternate for State- and district-wide
  assessments
• Accommodations guidelines

NCLB
IDEA
3
Federal Policy Implementation

• Statute, regulations guidance drafted and
  disseminated
• Compliance monitoring carried out by multiple
  offices e.g.,OSEP, OESE, SASA
• Peer review of Title I State Plan required
• Technical assistance

4
State Policy Implementation

• Inclusion policies and procedures
• Optional development implementation of AA-AAS
  or AA-MAS consistent with statute
• Support for test administration and use
• Infrastructure for local implementation
• Assessment training
• Professional development to support effective
  instruction

5
Intent - NCLB

• To ensure that all children have a fair, equal,
  and significant opportunity to obtain a high
  quality education
• All schools publicly accountable for performance
  of SWD

6
NCLB Requires

• Challenging State content standards
• Academic achievement standards
• Statewide accountability system that includes all
  schools
• Annual reporting of assessment results and AYP

7
NCLB Regulations

• AA-AAS (1) December 2003
• Permits alternate achievement standard for
  students with most significant cognitive
  disability
• AA-MAS (2) April 2007
• Permits modified academic achievement standard
  for students whose disability prevents them from
  meeting grade level standard in period covered by
  current IEP
• 1-2 caps as safeguard for students

8
Testing Students with Disabilities

• State Testing Options
• Grade level test
• Grade level test with accommodations
• Grade level test alternate format, same
  academic achievement standards
• Test based on modified achievement standards (2
  cap)
• Test based on alternate achievement standards (1
  cap)

9
Reporting

• State must report to the Secretary the number
  and percent of SWD taking
• General assessments
• General assessments w/ accommodations
• AA-Grade Level Achievement Standards
• AA-Modified Achievement Standards
• AA-Alternate Achievement Standards

10
Modified Alternate Achievement Standards

• Are permitted, not required
• Use limited to eligible students based on State
  guidelines
• State must provide evidence of technical quality

Sue Rigney, USED
11
AA-AAS

• Alternate achievement standards permitted only
  for students with most significant cognitive
  disability

12
AA-AAS

• Required since July 2000
• Operational in all states
• Regulation requires alignment with grade-level
  content standards
• Most states needed to revise the AA-AAS to meet
  requirement for academic content
• A few states still working on it

13
Impact on Assessment Practice

• Virtually all State assessment participation
  policies changed since IASA
• Participation of SWD in State assessments is
  substantially increased
• 22/50 states have changed participation
  policies/guidelines for AA-AAS since the Dec
  9, 2003 regulation
• Peer Review has prompted linkage to academic
  content for all states

14
Impact on Instruction

• Anecdotal and case studies
• Most pre-date requirement for academic content
• Inclusion in accountability makes a difference
• I think our expectations are higher.

15
Impact on Student Outcomes

• Evidence of student outcomes limited
• Reports do not separate general test results and
  alternate results
• OSEP collects detailed data in biennial report
  but its hard to find

16
Modified Achievement Standards

• Are aligned with States academic content
  standards for the grade in which student is
  enrolled
• Challenging for eligible students but less
  difficult than grade-level achievement standards
• Include 3 achievement levels

17
Student Eligibility

• Disability precludes achievement of grade-level
  proficiency as demonstrated by
• States Grade-level assessments or
• Other measures such as
• Response to appropriate instruction
• Multiple measurements over time

18
AA-MAS Is Not

• A modified assessment
• Accommodations that would invalidate the general
  test are not permitted for the AA-MAS because the
  construct should be the same
• Modified content standards
• No change to the grade-level content standards
  permitted
• AA-MAS test blueprint should be comparable to the
  general test blueprint
• A lower cut point on the general test

19
State Guidelines (1)

• Establish and monitor guidelines for IEP teams to
  determine which students eligible
• Provide IEP teams a clear explanation of
  differences between AA-GLAS, AA-MAS, AA-AAS
• Ensure that parents are informed

20
State Guidelines (2)

• Establish and monitor implementation of
  guidelines for developing IEPs
• IEP goals based on grade-level content
  standards
• IEP designed to monitor student progress

21
Other state responsibilities

• Inform IEP teams that student may be assessed on
  MAS in one or more subjects
• Ensure student has access to grade-level
  curriculum
• Ensure students not precluded from attempting to
  complete diploma requirements
• Ensure annual IEP team review of assessment
  decisions
• Disseminate guidelines for appropriate use of
  accommodations

22
State Support for IEP Teams

• Which office(s) will
• develop participation guidelines for AA-MAS?
• develop guidelines for writing standards-based
  IEPs?
• disseminate materials and provide professional
  development to IEP teams?
• monitor the implementation of IEP teams
  appropriate use of participation guidelines and
  development of standards-based IEPs?

23
Debunking the Myths

• Its unfair to require students with disabilities
  to take those tests
• Its unfair to expect children with different
  types of disabilities to achieve on a one size
  fits all test
• Its unfair to find districts in need of
  improvement when its only the scores of
  students with disabilities holding them back

www.napas.org
24
AYP Targets Missed by Schools ThatDid Not Make
Adequate Yearly Progress, 2004-05
Source Study of State Implementation of
Accountability and Teacher Quality Under NCLB
(based on data reported by 39 states for 19,471
schools that missed AYP.
25
Lessons Learned

• Collaboration needed to develop alternate
  assessments assessment, special ed, content
  experts
• Resources needed to build local support systems
• Consequences must be documented

26
More Lessons Learned

• Assessment gap vs instruction gap
• Simpler test items may not be the answer
• A test alone does not change practice
• Interpretation of outcomes difficult because
  student results confounded with opportunity to
  learn

27
Implications for Higher Ed

• All new teachers need to know the state content
  standards
• Content
• Pedogogy
• Teachers Administrators need to know how to
  work with special pops
• Research
• Resources

28
Implications for Higher Ed

• Collaboration is essential for
• Curriculum alignment
• Instruction
• Test development
• Who needs to be included?
• Special education
• Curriculum specialists
• Assessment experts