Woods, K. (2007). Access to General Certificate of Secondary Education (GCSE) examinations for students with special education needs: What is “best practice” ? British Journal of Special Education , 34 (2), 89–95. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-8578.2007.00461.x

This study investigated education specialist opinions regarding the manageability of a variety of accommodations on a nationwide large-scale assessment.

Two hundred-five (205) specialist teachers from the United Kingdom completed the survey.

An open-ended questionnaire containing three questions eliciting views and observations about aspects of feasibility, candidates’ assessment needs and future developments in access arrangements was the dependent variable in this study.

The findings are that the system for allocating access arrangements is considered ‘manageable’ by 20% of teachers and ‘fair’ by only 25% of teachers; 70% of teachers would consider extension of access arrangements to be appropriate, notwithstanding resource constraints. Qualitative data from the questionnaires demonstrated the reasons for this pattern of results and a call by teachers for wider access in examinations to readers, scribes, extra time and a word processing facility. Limitations of the study were reported, and future research possibilities were suggested.