Accessibility for Students with Disabilities

We believe all students can learn and all students should have the opportunity to be fairly assessed to measure their learning and progress.  The School District of Clayton is accountable for the assessment of all students enrolled in the District, including those with disabilities. It is the District’s intent to provide students and their families with the most accurate data possible while also considering the child’s needs when making assessment decisions. It is the role of the Individualized Education Program (IEP) or Section 504 Plan team (including the parents) to make the best decisions for assessment.  All testing accommodations must be specified in a student’s IEP or 504 Plan and provided to the teaching team to follow.  For state assessments, all students will participate in either the Missouri Assessment Program (MAP) assessments designed for specific content areas or the MAP-Alternative (MAP-A) assessment.  

Assessments are selected and administered to ensure that if an assessment is administered to a child with a disability, the assessment results accurately reflect the child’s aptitude or achievement level or whatever other factors the test purports to measure, rather than reflecting the child’s impaired sensory, manual, or speaking skills (unless those skills are the factors that the test purports to measure).

Legal Information

The Clayton assessment program is designed to assess and report progress of all students and to be in compliance with all state and federal requirements including (but not limited to):

Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 prohibits exclusion of and discrimination toward persons with disabilities in federally assisted programs and activities. Students with disabilities under Section 504 are entitled to a free appropriate public education (FAPE) and accommodations in and through the general education program.

Individuals with Disabilities Education Improvement Act (IDEA - 2004) (Public Law 108-446) provides federal assistance to states and mandates a free appropriate public education (FAPE) for all students identified with educational disabilities who require special education and related services. IDEA mandates that all students be included in state and district-wide assessments.

Process

Decisions regarding participation in MAP and required accommodations are to be made annually by the student’s IEP/504 team and based on the student’s needs, informed by their disability and any combination of the following:  curriculum, goals, present levels of academic achievement and functional performance. Students with disabilities must participate in the MAP in one of these ways:

• MAP assessments WITHOUT accommodations: Students with disabilities participate in the MAP assessments under the same conditions as other students.
• MAP Assessments with Universal Tools: Students would have the opportunity to utilize all provided Universal Tools available to the general student population. Any student may utilize Universal Tools when deemed appropriate by a team of educators. Universal Tools are not meant to give students an advantage and should not change the nature of what is being tested.
• MAP assessments WITH accommodations: Students with disabilities participate in the MAP assessments, but accommodations determined previously through the IEP/504 process are made to enable the student to demonstrate their knowledge, skills, and competencies in a way that addresses their disability.
• MAP-Alternate (MAP-A): A very small percentage of students with disabilities will not take the traditional MAP assessments and instead will participate in an alternative form of MAP assessment. For a student to take the MAP-A, the IEP/504 team MUST make the decision based on whether the student meets the criteria set by the DESE for exemption from traditional MAP assessments.

Parents are to be informed about:

• Information on each assessment and their purpose
• options for their child’s participation in state and district-wide assessments
• the benefits and/or any relevant information about their child’s participation in assessments
• the reporting requirements and practices regarding student achievement

Once assessment results are available, the District will report the test scores of all students, including those for students with disabilities.