Formal and Informal Testing

Formal and Informal Testing

Don't let the word “testing” scare you. This isn't something you can fail, and you have probably gotten used to testing procedures without even realizing it. Your school district tests you every three years as part of your IEP re-evaluation process. Transition Assessment aims to discover your occupational and vocational strengths and weaknesses may be conducted as part of this three-year re-evaluation process. You may wish to have outside agencies conduct your formal testing or you may select some of the manuals and take some of the tests independently. You can even go online and find various vocational aptitude tests. “A vocational aptitude test might consist of an instrument that assesses an individual's abilities, personality characteristics, and interests, and compares the individual's responses to those persons considered to be successful in their occupations and professions” (Gale, Barry. 1990).

“First, become familiar with the different types of transition assessments and their characteristics, including reading their respective manuals, seeking independent information (e.g., test reviews, professional articles) and talk with local adult service providers and employers. Again, it is recommended that you use multiple evaluations on an ongoing basis. Second, select assessment instruments and methods that help the student to answer the following questions:

• Who am I?
• What are my unique talents and interests?
• What do I want in life, now and in the future?
• What are some of life’s demands that I can meet now?
• What are the main barriers to getting what I want from school and my community? and
• What are my options in the school and community for preparing me for what I want to do, now and in the future” (NSTTAC, web 1 May 2010).
  

Your assessment procedures will need to take into account several key factors when determining the evaluation procedures to use. Knowing your reading level , your general I.Q. Scores, nature of your disability, post-secondary vision, and community opportunities and resources will help determine the type of testing your team will conduct. The team will also need to use reliable, valid testing measures to ensure the best outcome. You will be able to suggest testing measures of your own, such as the Armed Services Vocational Interest Survey (ASVAB) if you are interested in a career in military service or the Brigance Life Skills Inventory if you are considering independent living after high school.

There are several different types of assessment measures available. Some informal testing measures include interviews, surveys, environmental or situational analysis, and direct observation (NSTTAC, web 1 May 2010). Interviews, questionnaires, and surveys provide the Team with valuable information about your likes, dislikes, and plans after high school. Environmental analysis, conducted by a job coach, employer, or other professional, provide data on how you perform in various community and vocational settings. It gives a real picture of your functioning based on your current activities. Direct observation provides a similar picture to the environmental analysis and involves a data collector watching you work or utilize community resources and then recording his or her observations. Your school has their own performance measures as well, including state and district testing, progress reports, and classroom observation. These performance measures indicate how well you function in areas such as task completion, following directions, and on-task behavior.

More formalized transition assessments provide outside agencies with the information needed to assist you in your transition. They also provide valuable information to your Team regarding your strengths and aptitudes as well as where you would require accommodations. Formal testing includes achievement tests measuring your level of academic functioning, psychological testing quantifying your intellectual level of functioning and any learning disability you may have, and adaptive behavior or independent living scales evaluating the types of assistance you may need to function fully within the community and employment settings. Timmons et al (2005, web 1 May 2010) have written a guide for professionals detailing the transition assessment process that provides a valuable table (1.3) explaining a variety of testing procedures and their uses. You will find a link for this guide in the resources section of this booklet.

At your IEP team meetings, make sure you discuss formal and informal transitions assessment. Based on your level of functioning and your disability, your family and your Team will need to consider in which areas you require transitional assessment. Assessments can include some of the following: Interest testing, career exploration, work values, job skills, physical capacity, assistive technology, occupational therapy, physical therapy, speech and language, hearing, or vision. Chances are, you are not receiving services to address all of the above areas. You will need to assess only those areas in which you require a direct service or have a direct need or are required by your school district or outside agencies to determine eligibility requirements. Once you and the Team determine your assessment need, school district personnel can provide most, if not all, of the testing and will reconvene the team to share their results.

______________________________________________________________________________

Gale, Barry. "Discover What You're Best At," Simon and Shuster, New York, 1990 quoted in Encyclopedia of Psychology. April 6, 2001. Web 1 May, 2010. http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_g2699/is_0003/ai_2699000352/

National Secondary Transition Technical Assistance Center. Web 30 April, 2010.

http://www.nsttac.org/indicator13/indicator13.aspx , and 1 May 2010 http://www.nsttac.org/products_and_resources/tag.aspx

Timmons, J., Podmostko, M., Bremer, C., Lavin, D., and Wills, J. (2005). Career Planning Begins with Assessment: A Guide for Professinals Serving Youth With Educational and Career Development Challenges (Rev. Ed). Washington, D.C.: National Collaborative and Workforce and Disability for Youth, Institute for Educational Leadership. Available at www.ncwd-youth.info/resources_&_Publications/manuals.phpwww.ncwd-youth.info/resources_&_Publications/manuals.php

www.ncwd-youth.info/resources_&_Publications/manuals.php . Web 1 May 2010.  

The IEP Transition Goal

The IEP Transition Goal

In 1990, the Individuals With Disabilities Act (IDEA) extended their requirement of a Free and Appropriate Education (FAPE) for all children regardless of a disability to include transition planning (Wehman, 5). IEPs must now include formal transition plans that include vocational, educational, and community involvement to facilitate the transition process for individuals with disabilities.  The hope was that this would lessen the vocational gap between those with and those without disabilities.

Your educational liaison, the person in charge of your IEP should meet with you personally to determine your future plans. This would be a good person to invite to your person-centered planning meetings. The IEP Transition Goal should incorporate your likes and dislikes and the vision and action plan you set in your Person-Centered Planning meeting will help your IEP team set a comprehensive transition goal with you.  You should update the transition goal annually and include benchmarks that are appropriate to improve the student's post-school outcomes.   By outlining the specific steps needed to reach your transition goals, the Team increases the likelihood of your success by breaking down the process into small, manageable pieces. Your IEP team will meet with you and your family when you are sixteen, and sometimes earlier if the team feels this is appropriate, and begin discussing your post-graduate plans.

When you attend your IEP meeting, the team will ask you if where you see yourself after high school. Will you attend college or a technical school? Will you pursue full- or part-time employment? Will you attend a day-hab program? Will you live at home, with friends, or in a group home? These questions will drive your transition plan and I urge you to discuss them openly with your Person Centered Planning Team before your IEP meeting because your transition plan will reflect these plans and will have objectives listed in your IEP that will reasonably ensure you accomplish your goals. Once you have established the type of post-secondary activities you want to pursue, share these with your IEP team. You will need to become a strong self-advocate and identify both your goals and the obstacles to those goals so that the team can put supports in place to help you accommodate your disability and achieve your aspirations.

The IEP team can help you identify your strengths and accommodate your weaknesses through formal and informal testing. You can request these tests as part of your three-year re-evaluation process or you can ask for them to be conducted outside of the three-year time-line. We will discuss the types of formal and informal testing in the next chapter, but these measures provide additional data on you and how you learn and work. They will help educate the team about the best way for you to reach your goals and I recommend you request these testing measures as you approach the transition age and discuss them at your IEP meetings as they relate to your transition goals. Doing so will bolster your transitional experience and increase your likelihood of success.  

______________________________________________

Wehman, Paul, Ph.D. Life Beyond the Classroom, Transitions Strategies for Young People With Disabilities. Paul H. Brooks Publishing Company, Baltimore, 2006.

Formal Testing Areas

In special education, there are a number of formal tests.  Vocational assessment also uses a variety of formal assessments to ascertain a student's ability to work at various jobs as well as his or her interest level in a variety of work experiences.

Vocational and Career Interest Assessments measure interests, preferences, values, and temperaments.  They are used by schools and work-force preparation programs to match and individual's interests and values to employment opportunities.  They include interest testing, personality inventories, career exploration and experiences, and work values assessments. 


Job Aptitudes and Skills  measure aptitudes, work behaviors, and skills.  These assessments are used by schools and work-force preparation programs to ascertain an individual's ability to find, perform, and hold onto specific jobs.  Work experiences and other related programs give the individual an opportunity to experience performance that document actual work potential.

Occupation Specific Certification  measures mastery of knowledge, skills, or abilities in specific occupations.  These are tests and assessments given at the end of apprenticeships, educational programs, or other job-training programs focused on a specific job or career area.  They are used by licensing boards, businesses apprenticeship programs, and prep. programs for students to issue a credential or license.

Physical and Functional Capabilities  measures the work capacities and tolerance for jobs through work tolerance, physical capacity scales, work samples, and community-based assessments.  These are used by the work force and preparation programs to ascertain an individual's ability to do a certain job.

Physical and Functional Capactities  measures the need for diagnoses and medical therapies.  These include Occupational Therapy Assessments, Physical Therapy Assessments, Speech and Language Assessments, Hearing Assessments, and Vision Assessments that are used schools and work-force prep. programs to determine the need for any necessary medical intervention, accommodations, and independent living supports.  These are used to determine eligibility for special education and vocational rehabilitation.

What is Person-Centered Planning?

Person-Centered planning helps an individual with disabilities achieve their dreams and goals.  Many people with disabilities may get discouraged or feel that their disability prevents them from achieving their dreams.  I've heard some of my students complain that they will never find a good job or that they will never get to do what they really want because they have a disability.  Having a disability, however, does not mean that you cannot achieve goals and dreams.  Achieving these goals and dreams just takes a bit more planning and often some help from the caring people in one's life.  Everyone, regardless of a disability, can do some things well.  Person-centered planning helps someone with a disability discover their gifts and talents in a friendly, supportive environment. 

To begin with person-centered planning, you can draft a list of people who know the individual well.  These can be teachers, service providers, family members, friends, and community members.  The most important thing they will all have in common is that they care about you and that they can help identify your gifts and talents.  It's important to have a variety of invitees because different people often see you in a different light.  A boss will notice work-related talents that may not be seen at home and a classroom teacher or service provider will have different insight than a best friend. 

Once you have your list ready, you can choose a date and time for a first meeting.  It's a good idea to have a location away from the school in a friendly atmosphere that will put everyone at ease.  At the first meeting, you can brainstorm the likes, dislikes, talents, and areas that will need additional support for you to meet your goals.  You do not need to have any specific goals in mind at the time.  One of the benefits of having a whole team of people at your service is that they might recognize things about you that you enjoy that maybe you never thought could be turned into a job.  Most people in their teens do not know what they would like to do for the rest of their lives, and many people have more than one career in their lives.  It's okay to be unsure or uncertain about your future.  That's why you have people in your corner to help you.  They can recognize things in you that you are not yet aware exist. 


The first meeting is a brainstorming session that will help to get the ball rolling.  Everyone should share their ideas on what you do well, what you like to do, and identify possible areas where you could use these skills.
This is a positive meeting where people share with you the best they see in you.  If anyone has any networking ideas or contacts, these should also be shared at the initial meeting.  Then, follow-up tasks can be assigned to members of your planning team and you can reconvene to follow-up on the networking activities.  During this meeting, you will develop some idea of possible goals for your future and subsequent meetings will help you to map your your course of education or employment for your future.

“Person-centered planning involves the development of a "toolbox" of methods and resources that enable people with disability labels to choose their own pathways to success” (Blessing, Carol.  Cornell University Employment and Disability Planning and Education Site).  The process involves people chosen by you, the individual, who come together as a team to map out your skills and accomplishments and provide insight into possible career or educational paths.  It takes time and dedication from you and from the caring people in your life who truly want you to succeed.  Success is possible and identifying a team of people to help you is the first and best step toward the a successful future.

Blessing, Carol.  Employment and Disability Planning Education Site.  Employment and Disability Institute,  Cornell University School of Industrial and Labor Relations, Ithaca, New York 14853-3901. Web 21 April 2010.   http://www.ilr.cornell.edu/edi/pcp/index.html

Unemployment Statistics for Adults with and without Disabilities

Below is a basic profile of people with disabilities in Massachusetts from the Massachusetts Rehabilitation Commission.  This study was published in 2004 and is available through the website at www.mass.gov/Eeohhs2/docs/mrc/executive_summary_05.doc.

• According to the 2002 American Community Survey (ACS)¹, there were 865,000 persons ages five and over with a disability in Massachusetts, representing about 15.0% of the population in this age group.

• These individuals had disabilities that fell into one or more of the following categories: sensory disabilities (213,000), mobility disabilities (443,000), and cognitive disabilities (293,000).

• 445,000 of these 865,000 individuals who reported having one or more disabilities were of prime working ages (18-64).

These individuals face multiple barriers to labor force participation, employment, job retention and career advancement.

• Only 219,000 or 49% of working age adults with disabilities were in the labor market, compared to 70% for the entire working age population.

• Of the 219,000 who were in the labor force, 194,000 were working and 25,000 were unemployed but looking for work, an unemployment rate of more than 11%, about two times the rate of the working age population in Massachusetts and the nation (2002).

1 The Center for Personal Assistance Services of the University of California at San Francisco has compiled state and national data on the prevalence of overall disability and of self-care difficulty by gender, age, race and ethnicity, type of disability, family income, benefit recipiency, employment status, and living arrangement.

Uvin, Johan; Karaaslanli, Devrim; White, Gene.  Evaluation of Massachusetts’ Public Vocational Rehabilitation Program, Commonwealth Corporation, 2004.  

The Institute for Community Inclusion also published a study in 2006, reporting unemployment rates for individuals with disabilities from the years 2000-2004.    They found that only 36% of people with disabilities were employed at that time, as compared to 73% of adults of working age without disabilities.  

Sulewski, Jennifer Sullivan and Butterworth, John.  Massachusetts Employment and Disability Snapshot Report, 2000-2004.  Institute for Community Inclusion, Boston MA, 2006.