Elliott, S. N., Kratochwill, T. R., McKevitt, B., Schulte, A. G., Marquart, A., & Mroch, A. (1999, June). Experimental analysis of the effects of testing accommodations on the scores of students with and without disabilities: Mid-project results [Paper presentation]. Council of Chief State School Officers (CCSSO) National Conference on Large-Scale Assessment, Snowbird, UT, United States.

Two accommodation conditions were studied: a standard accommodations condition (composed of extra time, support understanding directions, and help reading words) and an individualized accommodation condition. Students with disabilities took the assessment both without accommodations and with the accommodations listed on their IEPs. Students without disabilities were placed in either a non-accommodated, standard accommodations, or teacher-recommended accommodations condition.

One-hundred students in grade 4—59 students without disabilities and 41 identified as students with disabilities—participated. Disability categories included: learning disabilities, emotional disturbance, cognitive disabilities, speech and language disabilities, autism, health impairments, and hearing impairments.

Science and math performance assessments were developed as part of the Wisconsin Student Assessment System project in 1993-1995.

Accommodations had a large positive effect on 63.4% of students with disabilities and 42.9% of students without disabilities receiving the teacher-recommended accommodations and on 20% of students with disabilities receiving the standard accommodation package. Accommodations had a medium to large positive effect on more than 75% of students with disabilities and also on 55% of students without disabilities. Accommodations had a negative effect on scores of 17% of students with disabilities and 7% or less of students without disabilities. [See also McKevitt, 2000; McKevitt et al., 1999; McKevitt et al., 2000; Elliott et al. 2001.]