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Abstract
The IEP is considered the hallmark of special education, but it is not designed to be an accountability tool. Standards-based accountability calls for the entire educational system to be accountable for the learning of all students. Researchers from the National Center on Educational Outcomes and others, question if the IEP can be used as an accountability tool. These researchers, as well as the California Department of Education, call for local investigations of districts' practices in relation to IEPs and standards.
This qualitative research study was designed to compare the IEP goals to the proposed "Reading and Writing Content Standards" established by the Commission for the Establishment of Content and Performance Standards in California. The IEP goals studied were from IEPs of 184 students receiving Resource Specialist Program (RSP) services and Speech/Language services in the 3rd, 4th, 6th, 7th, 9th and 10th grades in a medium sized school district in Southern California. A total of 437 goals were analyzed by a team of analysts and compared across parameters taken from the "Reading and Writing Content Standards." These parameters represented different levels and complexity of skills for the areas of reading, writing, listening and speaking. Analysts coded each goal according to how it matched the parameters of skills and answered related queries regarding each goal.
Findings in the study showed that the IEP goals studied did match parameters of strand, overarching skills and discrete skills. The grade level skills that are being identified on the IEPs as goals for students were limited in two ways. First, results showed that although goals did match parameters, the skills addressed in the IEP goals were consistently lower level skills in terms of grade level. Second, goals were not written for a greater complexity of skills. Grade level competencies being addressed were predominantly at the first grade level for all students, regardless of the age of the student. Of all of the goals analyzed (N = 437), no goal in the study was coded as being higher than a fourth grade level skill. Implications are discussed and recommendations are presented.
