Some disabled students to be held to different standards

Thursday, Dec. 4, 2003 | 11:20 a.m.

SUN STAFF AND WIRE REPORTS

WASHINGTON -- Education Department officials have decided children with the most severe learning problems can be held to a different academic standard than their peers -- a move that will ease pressure on schools struggling to make yearly progress.

The new department rule to be announced within days would affect a limited number of students deemed to have "significant cognitive disabilities" by their states. It would allow those students to be tested against standards appropriate for their intellectual development. More significantly, those scores would be counted as part of their school's performance.

Currently, students who take tests based on different standards can't be considered "proficient." This penalizes schools as they add up yearly achievement, which is critical because schools that receive federal aid for the poor, but fail to make adequate yearly progress, face increasing sanctions from the government.

Many schools have failed to make annual progress because disabled students didn't score high enough on tests or because too few of those students participated.

In the Clark County School District, where more than half of the 277 schools tested last year failed to show the "adequate yearly progress" demanded by the federal No Child Left Behind Act, the new special education standards were hailed.

"Maybe somebody woke up," said Assemblywoman Chris Giunchigliani, D-Las Vegas, a special education teacher in Clark County for 23 years who has been critical of the standards. "It sounds like this is an acknowledgement from the federal government that students with disabilities may learn in a different way, and at a different pace, than their mainstream peers."

Bob Miller Middle School in Henderson, which has typically posted some of the highest overall test scores in the county, wound up on the state's "watch list" this fall because of low test scores by a single student subgroup -- special education.

Miller offers an intensive program for children with severe learning disabilities to provide them with the least-restrictive environment in a neighborhood school setting, Principal Tam Larnerd said.

"I have no problem holding general education students to the same line, and making that line as high as possible," Larnerd said this morning. "However, not all kids are the same and there are some with special needs that should be considered when assessing their progress."

Some school associates went on the defensive when told Miller had been put on the watch list, Larnerd said. But in the long run it will probably have the intended effect, Larnerd said.

"There are no more invisible students," Larnerd said. "Bob Miller has great test scores, but when you break down that data, not every individual part is stellar. If we need to look at every special education student's (learning plan) and figure out what's lacking to get them to where they need to be, that's exactly what we'll do."

Gloria Dopf, director of special education and school improvement for the Nevada Education Department, said the revision is good news.

"It's more fair, and it keeps within the spirit of the law," Dopf said. "You want to have progress and expectations of growth for all youngsters, but some of our students are in special education because of deficits in the very skills proficiency tests are measuring."

There are a handful of schools in the state -- such as Miller -- that are on the watch list solely because of low scores by special education students. Dozens of campuses failed to show proficiency in several areas, including special education.

"We were hearing fears about there being a stigma of special education students as the ones who were responsible for a school not making (adequate yearly progress)," Dopf said. "That can't help the perception of special education or those students' relationships with the overall school population."

How soon the revision will have an effect in Nevada isn't known. It may be too late to change the next round of statewide testing in the spring, Dopf said.

Ross Wiener, policy director for the advocacy group, The Education Trust, said the rule will offer clarity and put more focus on raising achievement.

"That's important, because then you get into the hard work of, how do we do it?" he said. "That's the real challenge."

Education Department officials said they tried to find balance, recognizing the call for different standards in limited cases without eroding school accountability for all students.

The rule does not spell out which children meet the definition of having a significant cognitive disability, leaving that to the states with some narrow limits. The plan also requires that any alternative standards for students must be tied to state academic content.

State leaders and education groups negotiated with department officials for months on the language, part of a long-standing, complex debate over how to fairly test disabled children.

"Schools around the country will not be identified by their states as 'needing improvement' if their students with the most significant disabilities are unable to take the same tests as their peers," Education Secretary Rod Paige said. He said the rule also "protects children with disabilities from being wrongly excluded from accountability systems that provide valuable information to parents and educators."

The rule targets kids with the most severe learning problems who are required to take tests in their grades. It would affect only 1 percent of students at the state and school district levels. That's about 10 percent of all special education students.

States could appeal for a higher amount. Other children could take alternative tests, as they can now, but they would still be held to the same grade-level standards as other students.

James Wendorf, executive director of the National Center for Learning Disabilities, generally embraced the rules. He said concerns raised about children's performance in special education should put additional focus on basic quality of education.

By 2005-06, all states must test students in grades three though eight in math and reading annually and at least once during high school. The law also requires a science test at least once in elementary, middle and high school by 2007-08. The goal is to ensure all children are proficient in reading and math by 2014.

Sun reporter

Emily Richmond and the Associated Press contributed to this story.