[Assessment_Advisory_Committee] Oregon Extended Assessment Observational Rating Assessment

[Marshall, David]

My apologies for the delay in responding.  I agree with Brian and Catherine's summaries.  This tool does add needed clarification to the test selection process for special needs students.  In the past, this process was definitely one of the more "fuzzy" areas of state assessments.

So, specifically addressing the question of the ORA, it seems to provide needed decision process guidance.

It appears that the ORA and the extended assessment manual are intending to get us as a system to truly having only the most impacted 1-2% of disabled students in the state take the extended assessments.  That part seems appropriate and valid.  I am concerned about the combination of SBAC being potentially harder to access for special needs students AND the lack of a "3-5%" assessment.  The gap between extended and OAKS was large.  The gap between SBAC and extended appears to be ginormous (ok, really, really big).

So while the ORA appears to provide some good guidance, the much larger issue is the lack of a more complete assessment system for our disabled students.

Sorry if I got a bit off topic, but I'll take every opportunity I can to get on my "3-5%" soapbox.


David

From: Assessment_Advisory_Committee [mailto:assessment_advisory_committee-bounces at listsmart.osl.state.or.us] On Behalf Of HEIDE Jordan
Sent: Friday, September 25, 2015 7:48 AM
To: assessment_advisory_committee at listsmart.osl.state.or.us
Subject: [Assessment_Advisory_Committee] Oregon Extended Assessment Observational Rating Assessment

We'd like to request your review of the attached proposed Oregon Extended Assessment Observational Rating Assessment (ORA)(see attached Administration Instructions and ORA) designed to provide instructional and functional information for teachers and parents in in four domains: attention, math concepts, receptive and expressive communication.  The ORA is designed to be administered to students who are not able to access the academic tasks presented on the Oregon Extended Assessment (ORExt), even when extensive, universal supports are provided. The ORA will be incorporated into the Extended Assessment beginning 2015-16.
Given the description and purpose of the ORA, we are seeking feedback on the questions below by 9/30/15:

  1.  Is the purpose of the ORA clearly stated?
  2.  Is the intended population who will participate in the ORA clear (i.e., is the decision rule used to determine whether to administer the ORA clear)?
  3.  Does the ORA appear to be a useful tool for the intended population (i.e., face validity)?
  4.  Are the ORA administration instructions clear, particularly in the areas of describing the LOI and COM scales?
  5.  Are the ORA scoring instructions clear?
  6.  Do you feel that IEP teams will be able to use this information for students who are so low functioning that they cannot access the academic demands of the ORExt?
  7.  Do you feel that clear directions regarding the use of the results from the ORA have been provided?
  8.  Do you have any recommended edits/changed to the ORA?

Please submit your feedback to Brad Lenhardt (brad.lenhardt at state.or.us<mailto:brad.lenhardt at state.or.us>). Finally, we would appreciate it if you would keep this information confidential at this time. Once we finalize the ORA we will distribute it through the typical ODE communication channels.

Sincere thanks for your expert consideration and assist
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