Teach Effectively!

The US Education Department (ED) announced in April that it would allow states to exempt an additional 2% of students from the standards associated with high-stakes testing and the law referred to as No Child Left Behind. On 10 May, ED described the guidelines by which states will be able to alter their goals for annual yearly progress (AYP) so that students who have substantial difficulties with mastering academic material may be assessed in alternative ways. The 2% of students affected by this policy is in addition to the 1% already eligible for alternative assessment because of significant cognitive deficits.

ED described the policy in a press release. The topic has also been the subject of reports by multiple news organizations, including:

• The NY Times (U.S. Provides Rules to States for Testing Special Pupils)
• New London (CT, US) Day (Schools Get New Options For NCLB Testing)
• Thompson Publishing (Spellings Offers ‘New Path’ for NCLB, But Devil Is in the Details, Critics Say)

Others are sure to report on this story soon. The Division for Learning Disabilities will post a statement on TeachingLD.org in the next few days. The Council for Exceptional Children will surely have something, too.

The original announcement in April was a welcome development in the education of students with disabilities. ED appears to be hoping to implement the change in a way that will not permit states to use it to shirk the instructional obligation for those who will be covered by the 2% rule. Even when we use the most effective teaching procedures, some students will still not achieve as well as we hope (see our note about failure rates in Follow Through), as Secretary M. Spellings acknowledged in her remarks at the press conference. We just can’t allow schools to revert to discredited practices because of this rule. For those students who will be covered by the new rule, we are still obliged to teach as effectively as possible. Otherwise, we’re mis-serving them, not giving them the best chance we can.