Recent surveys of teachers found that students with disabilities like many of the features of the new college- and career- ready (CCR) assessments that were recently rolled out by states and consortia, but that there are challenges related to instructional issues that need to be addressed to improve student outcomes.

Four challenges identified by teachers were:

Reading: students struggled to read extended passages of text in the time available; they had difficulty understanding the assessment questions; they had difficulty extracting supporting evidence from text and video; they were not familiar with “authentic” texts.

Writing: students were not used to writing extended responses to assessment questions; they were not used to composing online responses, and lacked keyboarding and scrolling skills.

Justification of answers: students had difficulty using evidence to justify answers, and were not used to providing written justification for math responses.

Getting the research and essay done in one day: students did not have basic research skills; they were not able to complete research and write about it in a timely way.

To address this issue NCEO and the National Center on Systemic Improvement recently co-published a Brief on Lessons Learned About Instruction from Inclusion of Students with Disabilities in College and Career Ready Assessments. The Brief was prepared to provide information and suggestions for state education agencies (SEAs) and other technical assistance (TA) providers. Easy-to-use tables identify the challenges, implications for instruction, the relationship to CCR standards, and the implications for TA providers. It also includes an extensive list of suggested resources.

The members of NCEO’s Inclusive Assessment Community of Practice (CoP) made important contributions to this Brief. They provided information about the issues and implications. The CoP members also reviewed drafts of this Brief.

A companion brief on lessons learned about the implications for assessment from the inclusion of students with disabilities in CCR assessments will be available soon.