Urban Special Education Course Analysis

If standardized testing is going to change, then now is the time. The Every Student Succeeds Act [ESSA] has recently been enacted, and states are feeling the pressure to integrate a balanced assessment system as mandated. As this essay has presented, the current system and models of standardized testing are rife with problems. This proposed solution addresses the core elements of this problem with education in the United States today.

A standardized test refers to any examination that is administered and scored in a predetermined, standard manner. There are two major types of standardized test: aptitude test and achievement test (Popham 1999). The test that is most familiar to parents, educators and students is the standardized achievement test. Every year schools administer achievement test to students, the scores of these test are then used by the public and school board members to evaluate a schools effectiveness. Although previous generations of American student have had to sit through test, never have test been given so frequently or played such a prominent role in schooling as they do today (Kohn 2000). The large role standardized testing has taken in todays schooling has lead many to question whether or not it is effective in measuring educational quality. In fact many researcher have reason to believe it is in face ineffective due to a bias against minority students. In order to understand how a bias in standardized testing would impact minority students, we must educate ourselves on the amount of preparation the test requires, as well as how it is created. The issue of standardized testing being biased should matter to all people, not just those who are directly effected by it, because as a society it is our job to ensure that each child is given equal opportunity to succeed.

For centuries the debate have been about the overrepresentation of minorities inside of special education. Analyst have called on the recount of misrepresentation of displaced students in special education labeling .An equivalent factor of minority is due to poverty, test bias and education process leading to achievement gap. Economic impoverishment and lack of exposure to general education curriculum contributes to life experience to take standardize testing. Poverty is the sole or even the crucial driver of racial ethnicity in a specific educational program. Ethnic students are subject to be isolated in educational settings and not exposing the student to the proper test material leading to test bias.

Welner (2014) states that “standardized assessments are linked to curriculum standards and performance standards and tied to specified consequences” (p. 39). Welner discuses that the standard-based testing in American schools are a mess and need to be untangled because of the consequences of underperformance. Schools are defunded, teachers and principals are laid off, and schools are marked as ‘failing’. There needs to be a reform in schools that need academic improvement and the way to figure out which schools need development is by testing the students. Jones & King and McLaughlin & Overturf provide different feedback on standard-based testing. According to McLaughlin & Overturf (2012), “Using formative assessments is not only an effective way to monitor student progress, but also a viable way to glean information for planning future instructions” (p.157). In order for teachers to know if their lessons are effective or not, teachers give standard-based tests and assessments to their students. Without tests, student progress cannot be tracked in a concise manner. Jones & King (2012) agree that by building new assessments and curricula, American schools are redefining success (p.37). That success can also come at a price when dealing with more rigorous standards that are new to the

Personally, I see two major tripping blocks in Special Education in this article. First, why should a standardized test determine a student’s success in high school – especially a student with

The primary reason the researcher has proposed investigating this topic is to test the notion that NCLB unfairly impacts sub-groups including special education. This despite the fact that the act was originally developed to help sub groups and special education students achieve the same or similar proficiency as their peers. During the researchers discourse and meetings with educational administrators, information revealed that the general education staff at many facilities seems to believe the job of fixing the NCLB deficiencies provided there are any rests on the hands of special Education departments and teachers. This idea need be explored, thus this research paper is being proposed. In addition, there is a great deal of debate that currently exists regarding standardized testing and the fairness of such testing relative to special Ed students. Again a gap currently exists in the literature regarding this aspect of NCLB, thus further exploration is required.

Disproportionate identification of minority students in special education is a major concern in schools today. This paper describes the issues in the assessment process with minority students and how we have arrived at a situation where minorities are being misdiagnosed into special education programs. Additionally, several legal cases are mentioned which show numerous actions and rulings that have tried to correct the disproportionate identification in special education. Some of the legal cases discussed include Larry P. v Riles, Diana v. State Board of Education, and Guadalupe v. Tempe Elementary School, which all significantly impacted special education today. Additionally, the Individual with Disabilities Education Act has enforced

“Pushing Back Against High Stakes for Students with Disabilities” is an article that focuses on the shortcomings of certain assessments such as the testing required by the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) that is unfair for children with learning disabilities. The author brings to bear that unfair testing is frustrating for the children and has no value-add for their education. She continues by touting the fact that teachers cannot slow down and give extra time for topics that are difficult for the students but must move on due to the time constraints of the school year and policies of the school systems. The author calls for resistance to the mandated testing and demand a change to the system that is frustrating the education of children with learning disabilities but does not provide viable alternatives or methods to achieve them.

Fact Sheet: Testing Action Plan. Federal Information & News Dispatch. ProQuest Research Library, search.proquest.com/docview/1726842708?accountid=6222. Accessed 27 Oct. 2016. This article provides knowledge on how standardized tests are shaped and organized, and how they affect students, especially minorities. This article explains that standardized tests can have positive effects if they are organized the correct way and taught the information in class because “students do best on high-quality assessments that actually measure critical thinking and complex skills when they have been exposed to strong instruction”. This article also emphasizes the fact that standardized tests can be very time consuming, and that they are unfair

Students with impairments or special needs have to take the same SOL as the students who do not go to special need classes. This shows a fault in the system for students that have to take the standardized test that do not take in knowledge like other students do. Yes special education students should be held to high standards because once they are older they will have higher standards; however, they should not be set to the same high standards as general education kids. They are not being exposed to the kind of instruction that would allow them to do well on the test. It isn’t fair to have special needs students take a test designed for general education students, these students are scoring below average because of their disabilities.

Another issue arising for students developing educationally in a high-stakes testing environment is the overwhelming consensus of the failures associated with the testing in meeting the needs of the economically disadvantaged and the students with special needs. As high-stakes testing became the prevalent norm for Texas and the U.S, supporters were adamant that this testing provide new opportunities for those students in the highest risk of failure. This new level of accountability would reportedly help struggling schools better meet the needs of their students, however the results have not proven favorable (Tim Walker, 2014). Even before NCLB legislation nationally, as high school students were required to pass an exam for graduation, the retention rates for minority and economically disadvantaged students began to soar. In a 2003 article in the journal of the Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development, authors Amrein and Berliner report “Many teachers retain students if they doubt their potential to pass the TAAS the following year” (Amrein & Berliner, 2003). The fact that minority and economically disadvantaged students have been retained at alarming rates in the state of Texas has not gone unnoticed around the nation. Critics have used this to show the lack of effectiveness of testing on actually increasing students’ knowledge base (Amanda Walker, 2005). Often, economically students, with minimal opportunities for outside intellectual growth, have been

Diane Ravitch, former Assistant Secretary of Education, said “We must take care to make our public schools once again the pride of our nation” (Ravitch 260). At this point in time, the testing process that most, if not, all schools have adopted is proving to be an impediment to our education system that many are not proud of. Students today are more focused on getting the grade rather than the knowledge and experience that is needed for their future. Standardized testing, in a nutshell, could be a positive policy for today’s students. The execution of these baseline tests are not conducive to learning or measuring a student’s true ability or intelligence due to the emphasis on passing tests instead of actual learning and critical thinking skills, as well as having the same parameters for every student regardless of their situation. The current state of our standardized education system is leaving our students with a massive educational impairment.

My first piece of evidence is my Foundations of Teaching Final paper for the course TAL 806, Foundations of Teaching Urban Special Education: Adolescence. I chose this piece of evidence because this paper

Despite of the policymakers’ efforts to implement strategies in order to evaluate and enhance special education effectiveness, the high stakes testing system has several negative consequences to students, as shown at Pazey et. al. study “The More Things Change, the More They Stay the Same: Comparing Special Education Students’ Experiences of Accountability Reform Across Two Decades”. This qualitative case study interviewed 12 especial education students, half in 1995 and the other half 2012, after the introduction of the testing system and, later on, following two decades of implementation. According to this research, exceptional students felt marginalized when assigned to separated test preparation classes, when they failed the exams. In addition,

In society today, there is a lot of emphasis put on standardized testing. Colleges use it today in the form of SAT and ACT scores in determining if a student should be admitted or denied access to college. Considered in this is also the fact that socioeconomically disadvantages test takers, can’t afford the extra help SAT preparation classes cost. Even at the high school level, there are respondents that offer advice that students would learn more if they tried harder. Some argue that standardized testing is a way to make teachers be more creative in the way they teach. When adding both types of concepts together as to why standardized testing is a promising idea or not, there are so many other people that think standardized testing is a bad idea. This does not even take into consideration that each child learns separate ways. Nor does it take into consideration that many students have some type of learning disability. There again, reminding us that the socioeconomically disadvantaged students may not be able to afford the appropriate testing to find out if they do have a learning disability, preventing them from learning like their other counterparts. It appears; standardized testing is another way of saying that education is a one size fits all approach,