The report presents recommendations of a commission for improving special education in New York City. The commission conducted interviews with over 300 persons, held 2 days of public hearings, and reviewed documents, publications, and laws and documents in New York and eight other states. Recommendations are offered for four major topic areas: (1)…

Increasing public understanding of school testing programs is seen as the joint responsibility of test publishers and schools, and also as a primary responsibility on the part of test publishers to increase the schools' understanding of tests. The most common areas of misunderstanding about tests are addressed: purpose of the testing program; the…

Established in 1966, in an era of educational creativity, Santa Fe Community College (SFCC) has consistently fostered innovation in instruction and programming and a student-centered approach to education. In 1976, in recognition of a need for change fostered by a switch in academic calendars, loss of vetarans enrollment, reduced state funding,…

To investigate the influence of student sex, ethnicity and teacher sex, ethnicity, and teaching level on referrals to special education, 320 teachers responded to a case history by completing 11 Likert-type questions. Results showed that recommendations were influenced by teacher ethnicity and teaching level, but not by student sex or race. Also,…

The narration for a slide tape presentation describes vocational, technical, and adult education services offered by Broward County (Florida) for handicapped youth and adults. Program requirements are briefly described, as are exploratory prevocational services offered to middle school students, vocational work evaluation performed in grade 9, and…

Data from administration of the Bruininks-Oseretsky Test of Motor Proficiency and the Cornish Test of Motor Planning were taken on 120 children (5-13 years old), 60 of whom had been classified learning disabled (LD). Thirty of the LD Ss had been assigned to adapted physical education. The study sought to do two things: (1) determine whether the…

Described are the procedures for a referral-to-placement process which places each handicapped child in the least restrictive, most appropriate, educational program. The process stresses the role of the regular education teacher in determining the special education program options appropriate for the student. A sample report prepared by a regular…

Article based on a presentation given at a special commemorative session at the 1964 annual meeting of the American Psychological Association, Los Angeles

The purpose of this study was to investigate the relative validities of four essay scoring systems, reflecting alternative conceptualizations of the writing process, for identifying "competent" writers. Each rater was trained in two of the four scoring systems: General Impression Scoring (GI), Diederich Expository Scale (DES), CSE…

The paper reports a pilot study of 280 entering first grade students to try to identify potential handicaps, giftedness, or other special needs. During the preregistration program Ss were given measures of visual acuity, auditory acuity, and language functioning. Language test data allowed the identification of six profile types for further…

The paper traces the apparently conflicting trends toward elimination of special classes for handicapped students (mainstreaming) and the movement toward special programs for gifted and talented students. Issues related to identification and labeling are examined, and the importance of flexible definitions for both retardation and giftedness is…

Findings of 43 studies examining the effects of class placement on social adjustment of mentally retarded students were reviewed. Studies met the following criteria: (1) they investigated the class placement of mentally retarded students; (2) they included a dependent measure of social adjustment; and (3) they reported quantitative tests of…

According to a report from the University of New Mexico (UNM) 52 percent of Del Norte High School's (Albuquerque) graduates who entered UNM in the fall of 1979 were placed in at least one Basic Skills class, designed to assist beginning students whose American College Test (ACT) scores showed deficient college preparation in raising their academic…