Amanda Kloo

What, Where, and How? Special Education in the Climate of Full Inclusion

After the passage of PL 94-142 in 1975 guaranteeing a free, appropriate, public education to all students with disabilities, multiple reauthorizations of IDEA have refined, revised, and renewed the nations moral and pedagogical commitment to providing well-planned, public, inclusive, and appropriate education to all students with disabilities. But conflicting views of where that education should take place, what that education should consist of, and how that education should be delivered have continued to plague the field of special education. In this article, we provide an historical perspective on the arguments over where, what and how. We open four “windows” on special education service delivery in four different settings in Pennsylvania to illustrate contemporary interpretations and contemporary public policy related to where, what, and how. In the end, we raise questions about whether current, fully inclusive special education practices fulfill the promise of PL-94-142 to provide a special and appropriate education to students with disabilities.

Assessing Opportunity-to-Learn for Students With Disabilities in General and Special Education Classes

Current legislation encourages schools to educate students with disabilities (SWDs) in general education settings to the greatest extent appropriate. However, it is unclear whether inclusion in general education settings provides SWDs a sufficient opportunity to learn the academic content assessed by accountability measures. This initial study was designed to (a) describe the extent to which general and special educators provide their eighth-grade classes with an opportunity to learn the state-specific standards and to (b) examine the extent to which SWDs experience a differentiated opportunity to learn compared with their overall class. Across three states, we trained 38 general and special educators to use an online teacher log to report on various opportunity-to-learn (OTL) indices for 46 mathematics and reading classes and 89 nested SWDs. Based on an average logging period of 151 days, the results indicated that this sample’s SWDs included in general education classes experienced less time on standards, more non-instructional time, and less content coverage than their overall class. Limitations and implications for policy and future research are discussed.

The “Two Percent Students”: Considerations and Consequences of Eligibility Decisions

Since the 2001–02 school year, the accountability provisions of the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) have shaped much of the work of public school teachers and administrators in the United States. NCLB explicitly prohibits schools from excluding students with disabilities from the accountability system and requires not only participation of all students in statewide accountability assessments but also reporting of the results for students with disabilities along with other students and as a disaggregated group. From the beginning of these requirements, lawmakers recognized that there would be a small group of students with disabilities for whom the regular assessment, even with accommodations, would not be appropriate and they authorized states to develop an alternate assessment based on alternate achievement standards (AA-AAS) for this group of students. More recently, responding to pressures from the field, additional flexibility has been granted to develop an additional alternate assessment based on modified grade-level achievement standards (AA-MAS) for students with disabilities who present with persistent academic difficulties. It is expected that approximately 2% of the total student population might be included in this new alternate assessment. This article examines the decisions that need to be made by individual states to determine the target population for this new alternate assessment and the policy implications of these decisions.

Implementing an Alternate Assessment based on Modified Academic Achievement Standards: When policy meets practice

One of the primary challenges in developing effective accountability systems is determining how best to include students with disabilities. The purpose of this paper is to report on the initial implementation of one option for including students with disabilities into the accountability system in the United States. In 2007, federal guidance allowed states to develop an Alternate Assessment based on Modified Academic Achievement Standards (AA-MAS) for a small group of students with disabilities. An evaluation of the development and implementation of this assessment within one state, Pennsylvania, is presented. Lessons learned and recommendations are offered for educational leaders considering developing an alternate assessment as a method to include additional students with disabilities into accountability systems.

Implementing Modified Achievement Tests: Questions, Challenges, Pretending, and Potential Negative Consequences

This chapter discusses findings from the General Supervision Enhancement Grant awarded to the state of Pennsylvania by the US Department of Education’s Office of Special Education Programs for which the authors provide research support and consultation. The views and commentary expressed therein are solely those of the authors. No official support or endorsement by the US Department of Education or the Pennsylvania Department of Education is intended or to be inferred. We thank the editors, Deborah Fulmer, and Jane Partanen for comments on earlier drafts.

Response to Intervention: A reality check

In this chapter, we describe the policy and practical decisions one school district and school had to make to implement a progress monitoring and Response to Intervention (RtI) model in an historically low-achieving school with a substantial population of students at risk tfor academic failure – characteristics that are common to many public schools across the nation. We contrast the lofty goals and theoretical orientations of RtI described in a burgeoning literature in special and general education with the “real life” burdens of capacity, resources, time, and school culture in a struggling school.

Predicting End-of-Year Achievement Test Performance: A Comparison of Assessment Methods.

Motivated by the multiple-measures clause of recent federal policy regarding student eligibility for alternate assessments based on modified academic achievement standards (AA-MASs), this study examined how scores or combinations of scores from a diverse set of assessments predicted students’ end-of-year proficiency status on statewide achievement tests. Scores from 388 eighth-grade students, both with and without disabilities, from 3 states were compared for the predictive validity of test inferences from a set of brief online screening tests, teachers’ ratings of performance, and students’ previous year’s achievement tests. The research team developed screening tests in reading and mathematics that were found to be internally consistent and added predictive value to the identification of students who would perform at a level below proficient on state achievement tests of reading and mathematics. Although achievement results from the previous year were more predictive of future achievement results, scores from the online screening tests and from Performance Screening Guides could be used as supplements to typical achievement tests. Implications of these findings for educators in the 17 states currently using AA-MAS tests for students with disabilities are discussed, and needed future research is identified.

IEP Team Decision-Making for More Inclusive Assessments: Policies, Percentages, and Personal Decisions

Since the 2001–2002 school year, the accountability provisions of the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB, 2001) have shaped much of the work of public school teachers and administrators in the United States. NCLB required each state to develop content and achievement standards in several subjects, to administer tests to measure students’ attainment of those standards, to develop targets for student performance on those tests, and to impose a series of sanctions on schools and districts that did not meet the targets. Together, the standards, assessments, and consequences constitute a standards-based accountability system. State assessments are the mechanism for determining whether schools have been successful in teaching students the knowledge and skills defined by the content standards. The accountability provisions ensure that schools are held accountable for educational results. Many states had such a system in place before NCLB took effect, but since 2001–2002, every state in the United States has had to develop and implement a standards-based accountability system that meets the requirements of the law. This mandate has affected every public school student, every public school, and every district in the nation.