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For those who didn’t participate at all in testing, we believe there must
be an inquiry with regard to whether an alternate assessment was considered or
administered for these students in conformance with IDEA and State of California
mandates that all children participate in standardized assessments. For those
who did participate with accommodations, an inquiry should be made to determine
how many of these accommodations precluded standardization and a means of
determining progress or lack of same.
Interestingly enough, the results of our analysis (reflected in the table
below and in the attached appendices) indicate that many of those students whose
scores were not included in the API figures, may in fact be typical students who
do not receive any special education services. It is our concern that many of
these students may be struggling students, who for whatever reason do not
qualify for special education services, yet who are at-risk for failure, have
"fallen through the cracks" and would benefit from remedial programs.
We believe all these students are a manifestation of a trend seen across our
community and the state, as chronicled in a recent article in the January 28,
2001 issue of the Daily Breeze about LAUSD. [Appendix 3] Entitled "Reading
is ‘key’ for older students," the article quotes LAUSD Board Member
Mike Lansing, who stated "Middle and high school students have been left
behind in LAUSD’s push for improved literacy, which has focused almost
entirely on elementary schools." Mr. Lansing continued, "Just because
these students have missed the reading programs in elementary school does not
mean the district can turn its back on them."
We fear this is also the reality for these students in our own district and
that the Stanford 9 scores of our middle school and high school students are
proof of it. An indicator of where our middle and high school students stand in
this area is reflected in the Stanford 9 scores reported in the November 21,
2000 Stanford 9 Report in our students’ national percentile rankings for
reading. [See Item 2 below, Appendix 7] For example, many of Mira Costa’s 9th,
10th and 11th graders are scoring below the national average in reading. This is
also probably true for nearly all the children receiving special education
services at the high school and throughout the district. It is an acknowledged
fact that children who fail to learn to read feel the lasting impacts of this
failure throughout their lives. This situation not only impacts our children. It
ultimately impacts our community and cries out for our attention.
On November 29, 2000, the U.S. Department of Education issued a press release
in conjunction with its Twenty-Second Annual Report to Congress on Special
Education. [Appendix 4] The press release was entitled "Education
Department Celebrates IDEA 25th Anniversary; Progress Continues for Students
with Disabilities" and stated in the introductory paragraph that "a
record 55% of America’s students with disabilities are graduating from high
school at a time when dropout rates are falling and more disabled students
are attending regular classes alongside nondisabled students than ever
before."
Unfortunately, this "progress" is not presently evident for
students with disabilities in MBUSD. Despite the fact that the rate of students
with disabilities in MBUSD generally conforms to the national average, the CDE
draft report "Making Changes to Achieve Positive Results for California’s
Children" reports that only 20% of Manhattan Beach Unified School District’s special
education students
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