Students with disabilities face a vast array of physical, cognitive, social, and external barriers. The combination of barriers and negative attitudes faced by students with disabilities makes it difficult to develop skills to be more independent in future academic and career-related settings. This article examines the importance of faculty…

Despite a pending policy change aimed at including more students with disabilities and English-language learners (ELLs) in the "nation's report card," the federal agency that administers the national testing program appears to be softening the penalty for states that fail to improve inclusion rates. The disagreement underscores the…

The No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) holds public schools accountable for the academic achievement of student subgroups that are larger than the state minimum-subgroup-size threshold. In 2004, California added students with disabilities to the NCLB subgroup categories. Using a regression discontinuity design, this study compared the academic…

This paper summarizes an action research project to develop a math screening instrument that would be effective (valid and reliable) and efficient (time for administration). An instrument was developed after review of the mathematics assessment and mathematics disabilities literature. The instrument was administered to kindergarten, first, and…

No Child Left Behind (NCLB) legislation focuses attention on high expectations for all students in learning grade level academic content, and requires that disaggregated participation and performance data be reported for students with disabilities and English language learners (ELLs). Although not required by law, some states have reported data…

In most developed countries, research studies that investigate the effects of special education on student outcomes have become conventional practice. However, in developing countries such as the twin-island Republic of Trinidad and Tobago, there are no studies about the progress and outcomes of students and youths with disabilities. This…

Comparing a small, rural school with sometimes less than 100 students to a massive inner-city school with greater than 2,500 students is crude and untenable. There are simply too many variables. Nonetheless, the No Child Left Behind Act treats these two very different schools the same. When urban and rural schools cannot meet AYP or highly…

The purpose of this report is to provide an update on the state of the research on testing accommodations, as well as to identify promising areas of research to further clarify and enhance understanding of current and emerging issues. The research described encompasses empirical studies of score comparability and validity studies, as well as…