When students are having academic or social/behavioral problems at school they are often referred for a special service assessment. They are given a battery of norm referenced tests with the goal of finding some type of disability. A significant discrepancy between their higher intellectual scores and lower achievement scores is required to identify children with learning disabilities. Scores that fall below a certain level are required to identify children with developmental disabilities. Children with emotional and behavioral disorders also are required to meet specific criteria.  These norm based scores are then subjected to various formulas to ‘qualify’ students for special education services. Qualifying students for special education assistance allows districts to capture state and federal money.  

This is the process schools follow to capture special education funds even though it is well understood that the formulas are flawed and the criteria is arbitrary. This process requires hours of testing time for each student, a number of staff and parent meetings and a great deal of paperwork and record keeping. The flaws inherent in this process result in inaccurately identifying children to be admitted or excluded from special education services.  

A large study done at the University of Minnesota found that approximately 90% of children referred for school difficulty  were evaluated with psychometric measures with 73% eventually receiving special education service. It seems teachers and parents identify children that are likely to have problems with a high level of accuracy. If a high percent of children referred for special education services eventually receive special education assistance, the question becomes, "Why bother testing?"

Students who are experiencing difficulty at school can be easily identified.  Instead of wasting time assessing students to fit them into formulas, why not simply work with struggling students. Apparently the same students will be helped either way. Why not turn qualified staff members into real educators who work to meet each child’s unique needs. Find the staff willing to try a variety of interventions and then to monitor each child’s learning to ensure the interventions selected are appropriate.

Don’t hold your breath. When individualized and self paced learning is suggested, schools make endless lists explaining why it is not feasible: "We do not have the resources", "We are already overloaded with paperwork", "That is a nice theory". No doubt, schools talk about the importance of focusing on the individual needs of each learner, but their practice is treating students as though they are all alike.  

The individualized and self paced learning that children receive using My Learning Partners flies in the face of this educational theory and practice. When a child is having difficulty we know that norm referenced testing is not going to explain why the child is having difficulty or what can be done about it. We already know the answers to these questions. The child is having difficulty because the school has not identified the intervention necessary to make the child successful. Making certain the child is placed into material appropriate to his skill level and then systematically monitoring his progress daily, is the approach to follow. Daily monitoring will reveal the effectiveness of different interventions to the instructor. Only through sensitive monitoring, such as sampling the child’s learning, can one discover the keys to each child’s learning style.

Norm referenced testing can be very useful. It can identify changes a group makes over time and how specific individuals compare to a defined group. Pretest and posttest gains made by individuals and groups can be very useful.  However, it is not useful for making specific learning or educational decisions.

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