Prepared by

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Reflections on the State of Alternate
Assessments for STUDENTS WITH SIGNIFICANT
COGNITIVE DISABILITIES When and How will we meet
the Requirements under NCLB

• Prepared by
• Jan Sheinker, Ed.D

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Defining Achievement

• How do we describe it?
• What does it look like?
• What evidence will we accept?

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Defining Achievement

• How do we describe it?
• What does it look like?
• What evidence will we accept?

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Achievement Standards and Assessments for
STUDENTS WITH MOST SIGNIFICANT COGNITIVE
DISABILITIES

• Alternate achievement standards
• relationship to grade level may be ambiguous
• may not be clearly different from grade to grade.
  
• BUT support individual growth because of their
  linkage to different content across grades.
• Not likely to show the same clearly defined
  advances in cognitive complexity as on
  grade-level standards.
• BUT provide an appropriate challenge for students
  with the most significant cognitive disabilities
  as they move through their schooling.

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Alternate Achievement Standards

• clear link to the content standards for the grade
  in which the student is enrolled
• grade-level content may be reduced in complexity
  or modified to reflect pre-requisite skills.
• for each grade, define one or more alternate
  achievement standards for proficiency.

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Section 2 Academic Achievement Standards

• 2.1 Define Alternate Achievement Standards
• Developed through a documented and validated
  standards-setting process, define alternate
  academic achievement standards that
• (1) are aligned with the States academic content
  standards
• (2) promote access to the general curriculum and
  
• (3) reflect professional judgment of the highest
  achievement standards possible.
• States must show
• Written documentation of the formal approval that
  
• illustrates how alternate achievement standards
  were defined and
• explains how they are linked to grade-level
  content.

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NOT ACCEPTABLE

• Alternate achievement standards are restricted
  to functional life skills and are not linked in a
  meaningful way to academic knowledge/skills
  specified in State standards.

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Defining Achievement

• How do we describe it?
• What does it look like?
• What evidence will we accept?

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Alternate assessments for students with
significant cognitive disabilities

• Extended from state academic content standards
  for NCLB at least reading/language arts and
  mathematics and in 2007 science
• Substantially different BUT not wholly
  independent of the State academic content
  standards
• Clearly related to grade-level content BUT
• Reduced in scope or complexity OR modified to
  reflect pre-requisite skills

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Defining Achievement

• How do we describe it?
• What does it look like?
• What evidence will we accept?

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current alternate assessment must

• Yields results separately in reading and math
• Clear guidelines for student participation
  provided to all LEAs
• Designed and implemented in a manner that
  supports use of results for AYP
• Aligned with/Linked to state content standards
• Assessment design is appropriate for school
  accountability measure (e.g., results comparable
  across schools and districts Evidence includes
  test blueprint, test administration manual or
  administrator training materials, scoring rubric
  and scoring procedures)
• State provides evidence of technical quality,
• Includes evidence of validity, reliability
  accessibility, objectivity, and consistency with
  nationally recognized professional and technical
  standards
• Description of the standard-setting process
  employed the judges that participated in
  standard setting and their qualifications and
  state adoption of the resulting alternate
  achievement standards
• Reports results to teachers and parents in a
  manner consistent with the alternate achievement
  standards

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current alternate assessment must

• Yields results separately in reading and math
• Clear guidelines for student participation
  provided to all LEAs
• Designed and implemented in a manner that
  supports use of results for AYP
• Aligned with/Linked to state content standards
• Assessment design is appropriate for school
  accountability measure (e.g., results comparable
  across schools and districts Evidence includes
  test blueprint, test administration manual or
  administrator training materials, scoring rubric
  and scoring procedures)
• State provides evidence of technical quality,
• Includes evidence of validity, reliability
  accessibility, objectivity, and consistency with
  nationally recognized professional and technical
  standards
• Description of the standard-setting process
  employed the judges that participated in
  standard setting and their qualifications and
  state adoption of the resulting alternate
  achievement standards
• Reports results to teachers and parents in a
  manner consistent with the alternate achievement
  standards

Assessment design is appropriate for school
accountability measure (e.g., results comparable
across schools and districts Evidence includes
test blueprint, test administration manual or
administrator training materials, scoring rubric
and scoring procedures)
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current alternate assessment must

• Yields results separately in reading and math
• Clear guidelines for student participation
  provided to all LEAs
• Designed and implemented in a manner that
  supports use of results for AYP
• Aligned with/Linked to state content standards
• Assessment design is appropriate for school
  accountability measure (e.g., results comparable
  across schools and districts Evidence includes
  test blueprint, test administration manual or
  administrator training materials, scoring rubric
  and scoring procedures)
• State provides evidence of technical quality,
• Includes evidence of validity, reliability
  accessibility, objectivity, and consistency with
  nationally recognized professional and technical
  standards
• Description of the standard-setting process
  employed the judges that participated in
  standard setting and their qualifications and
  state adoption of the resulting alternate
  achievement standards
• Reports results to teachers and parents in a
  manner consistent with the alternate achievement
  standards

Includes evidence of validity, reliability
accessibility, objectivity, and consistency with
nationally recognized professional and technical
standards Description of the standard-setting
process employed the judges that participated in
standard setting and their qualifications and
state adoption of the resulting alternate
achievement standards
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Reports results to teachers and parents

• In a manner consistent with the alternate
  achievement standards
• Interpretation of the scores
• Clarity for Teachers and Parents about
• What students can and cannot do
• Based on the STRUCTURE OF THE CONTENT

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THE GOAL
Clarity, Consistency and Transparency In Communica
ting About Student Performance
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Where do we go from here?The Challenges

• Recognize the iterative process of SYSTEMS
  building
• Pursue greater clarity in defining and describing
  our expectations
• Demand increasing technical quality as we learn
  more about how to do that for alternate
  assessments
• Audit our processes and systems as a basis for
  improvement
• Abandon low expectations for our students and
  ourselves

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Where do we go from here?The Challenges
Recognize the iterative process of SYSTEMS
building

• We learn something new about our definitions and
  descriptions when we try to apply them to REAL
  KIDS
• We learn something new about our assessments when
  we see them performed by REAL KIDS
• We learn something new about technical quality
  when we try to justify our results for REAL KIDS

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Where do we go from here?The Challenges Pursue
greater clarity in defining and describing our
expectation

• If our definitions (extended standards) and
  descriptions (achievement descriptors) do not
  differentiate one skill from another, one grade
  or grade cluster (with caution) from another, one
  performance level from another
• GREATER CLARITY
• IS REQUIRED
• Simultaneous development of extended standards
  and draft achievement descriptors may help

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Where do we go from here?The Challenges Demand
increasing technical quality

• We need to seek state of the art solutions as
  we learn more about how to determine technical
  quality for alternate assessments, remembering
  that
• WE ARE BREAKING
• NEW GROUND

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Where do we go from here?The Challenges Audit
our processes and systems

• Audits provide a basis for improvement if we
  continuously examine what worked and what didnt
  to
• FIND BETTER
• SOLUTIONS
• Detailed, high quality technical reports are
  one tool to help us examine what we have done

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Where do we go from here?The Challenges
Abandon low expectations

• We know so little about the mind that it would
  be arrogant to say we know what these students
  are capable of achieving
• IF THIS IS WORTH DOING
• IT IS WORTH DOING WELL
• FOR OURSELVES AND OUR STUDENTS

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CAN OUR EFFORTS TO CREATE TECHNICALLY SOUND
ASSESSMENTS FOR THE MOST CHALLENGING STUDENTS
RENEW OUR PURSUIT OF
INNOVATION IN ASSESSMENT?