Special Education Screening System: Group Achievement Test

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to assess the efficacy of standardized group achievement testing in screening and identifying mildly handicapped students for referral to special education programs. Stanford Achievement Test scores of students already placed in either regular or special education programs in four elementary schools were arranged according to four cutoff points: 20th, 15th, 10th, and 5th percentiles. At the 10th percentile cutoff, 71% of the special education and 97% of the regular education students were correctly identified. These results were cross-validated for students at two other elementary schools. The potential uses of this identification method as a preliminary screening device are discussed—particularly at a lower cutoff point of the 5th percentile.