This report contains the proceedings of a forum held on June 28, 2023 in New Orleans, Louisiana, to discuss issues surrounding meaningful accessibility of assessments. The forum was a post-session to the Council of Chief State School Officers (CCSSO) National Conference on Student Assessment (NCSA) and was a collaboration of the "Assessment,…

Drawing upon the growing datafication of contemporary schooling, our purpose in this article is to use topological thinking as an analytical device to better understand the professionals and practices within emergent data infrastructures. We address this by attending to an influential national (and subnational) data infrastructure of school…

Policy generally refers to outlined ways of doing things, which are usually linked to laws. Educational reforms are changes in educational policies, expectations, and implementations. Policy and educational reform includes reforms at the federal, state, and local levels. Examples of federal reform include the passing of the Americans with…

The purpose of this paper is to trace the historical trajectory of special education and how societal perspectives influenced the special education movement. It aims to answer if special education and inclusion have achieved their goals for all individuals, especially those with disabilities. A review of historical trends, special education laws,…

This issue of "Equity Dispatch" examines national education policy as it moves from development to implementation, the impact local actors can have on upholding the original intent of policy, and the ways administrators and educators can critically examine policy implementation in order to ensure equitable opportunities for students.

The goal of Special Education is to help individuals with disabilities transition to meaningful adult roles. When students with disabilities pursue education majors, Special Education Faculty must balance their desire to support college students with disabilities, while maintaining the rigor of their academic programs. To gain a better…

Research suggests that educators' use of resources influence the ground-level effects of policy. However, we know very little about educators' utilization of policy resources. This study employs a mixed-methods research design to provide empirical evidence of the policy resources available to education policy implementers and the ways in which…

The aim of this essay is to advance understandings of current efforts to democratize disciplined approaches to educational innovation and improvement in the US and other countries, with a specific focus on the macro-level policy contexts of improvement research in education. In the US, earlier analyses examined these policy contexts from a…

Although education is in many ways a responsibility of states and localities, the U.S. federal government also has an important role to play. National laws, court rulings, and policy guidance help ensure that English Learner (EL) and immigrant-background students have equitable access to a meaningful education. It is then up to states and school…

Special education, a discipline that aims to provide specialized instruction to meet the unique needs of each child with a disability, has turned 40 years old in the United States. Ever since the passage of the Education for All Handicapped Children Act (P.L. 94-142) in 1975, every state has been directed to provide a free and appropriate…

Each edition of the IDRA Newsletter strives to provide many different perspectives on the issues in education topics discussed and to define its significance in the state and national dialogue. This issue focuses on Accountability and Civic Engagement and includes: (1) Will States Use ESSA [Elementary and Secondary Education Act] to Undermine…

Educational professionals have the challenging responsibility of serving a highly diverse population of students. Laws such as the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA), also known as the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB, 2001), the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA, 2004), the Vocational Rehabilitation Act of 1973, and the…

An examination of past research, policies, and reforms in mathematics education suggests that there have always been, and remain, tensions in conceptualizing the aims and goals of mathematics teaching and learning. While the disproportionality and conditions of marginalized learners is a cause for concern, it is important to understand that…

The coupling of literacy and race emphasizes their historic and contemporaneous intersection in literacy research. In this article, I draw on my scholarship and use three counternarratives to articulate how literacy and race significantly influence access, equity, and freedom. First, I examine access within the sociohistoric context of African…

Despite the large increase of students with learning disabilities entering postsecondary institutions and the legislative emphasis on providing students with disabilities equal access to education, we have yet to develop a more cohesive and comprehensive planning of accommodations for postsecondary students with learning disabilities. The purpose…