High school special education teacher Wayne Grytting, writing in the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, says state bureaucracy is needlessly denying students with disabilities the chance to graduate with a diploma. It’s not fair to withhold diplomas because teachers can’t figure out the rules for submitting portfolios for student work, he says.

Last year, half of all disabled students failed the portfolio, many because of unseen errors by their teachers. You would be hard pressed to find a special-ed teacher who is not aghast at what we are being mandated to do. State education “experts” act like astrologers pretending to do science.

At our high school, disabled students are learning to cook, swim, use PowerPoint, garden, bag groceries, climb rock walls, use Metro, paddle canoes, manage recycling, surf the Internet, do pottery and woodcrafts. We’d love to produce meaningful portfolios that respect the richness of what our students accomplish.

Anonymous comments on Grytting’s op-ed question whether students in special education should be receiving diplomas at all, and whether parents should be responsible for all life-long costs of their children. Many of the posts are hostile.

See related post here.

From the Washington Post:

A new report from the Montgomery County [Maryland] school system says the county’s special-education teachers are having so much trouble administering an alternative version of the Maryland School Assessment to severely disabled students that nearly one-fifth of students tested last year failed solely because of errors committed by the teachers.

The finding is significant because of the difficulty Montgomery and other counties have had in meeting annual targets under the No Child Left Behind Act for special-education students.

Special education was a factor for 15 of the 21 Montgomery schools that missed annual targets last year under the education law. Four elementary and four middle schools missed adequate progress goals solely because of special-education scores.

Among the report’s recommendations: mandatory training for teachers who give the test.

From the San Francisco Chronicle, [Riverside] Press-Enterprise, AP in San Jose Mercury-News:

High school seniors in special-education classes will have to pass California’s exit exam to get a regular diploma this June under a legal settlement filed Friday.

One advocate for disabled students estimates that at least 20,000 members of the class of 2008 who are in special education still have not passed the exam.

An exemption for disabled students expired after last year’s senior class graduated.

… The settlement requires the state to hire a consultant to study students who have failed the exam, and determine whether there are students who have mastered the material but still cannot pass the exam, even with accommodations.

From the [UK] Times:

British exam regulators report a 43 percent increase in the number of students who were given extra time or extra help to complete standardized tests, sparking allegations of affluent parents exploiting the system to benefit their children.

A number of experts agreed yesterday that the rules were open to abuse. Tom Burkard, a research fellow at the Centre for Policy Studies and director of the Promethean Trust, a charity for dyslexic children, said that many middle-class parents were exploiting the system to gain an unfair advantage for their children.

“Schools are under great pressure not to give students extra time in exams. When they do, it’s usually the result of pressure from middle-class parents,” he said.

Seattle Times editorial columnist Kate Riley reverses her earlier opinion, and assails her state’s testing standards after her son passes with flying colors.

Here’s the punchline to my son’s letter. He is autistic in a self-contained special-education classroom with limited mainstreaming, can read some words, can add a little and can barely draw a straight line.

She says her son’s portfolio showed progress, but in no way demonstrated mastery of the fourth grade curriculum. The state assessments are designed to implement the No Child Left Behind law.

OK. Let’s get this straight. This stupid assessment doesn’t change the worth of my kid, or any kid. He’s still the nicest, most fun member of the family to be around and he’s got great taste in music.

But what these tests should tell us honestly is whether a student meets one reasonable minimum standard of academic achievement – for all kids. (more…)

From the Baltimore Sun, an editorial favoring a proposal by Maryland schools superintendent Nancy Grasmick that would allow students who have repeatedly failed exit exams to graduate if they complete a senior project instead.

While testing students to determine how much they have mastered important subjects is worthwhile, all students must be given adequate preparation to pass the tests and — particularly for special-education students — sufficient options to meet graduation requirements.

… More flexibility is rightly at the heart of Ms. Grasmick’s proposal … All students should be given every chance to show that they have mastered their subjects and that they deserve a diploma.

Parents, advocates split over requiring students to pass tests to graduate

From the Baltimore Sun:

With thousands of special-education students in Maryland high schools failing the state’s graduation exams, parents and advocates are deeply divided about whether these students should have to pass the tests … While about two-thirds or more of students are passing the tests, only about one-third of those in special education are doing so.

… On one side of the discussion are parents and advocates who believe the tests are not fair and place too little emphasis on how a student does in classes … but others see the tests as forcing school systems to push special-education students to higher levels.

… In March, state Superintendent Nancy S. Grasmick announced that she would propose delaying the tests for students for whom English is a second language, special-education students and those with mild learning disabilities who are classified as having “504 plans.”

But she changed her mind and proposed in August that any student who fails the tests several times be allowed to submit a senior project instead.