Using Individualized Education Plans to Support the Evaluation of Special Education Programs

• In Event: AERA Roundtable Session Saturday 5:10 pm Four Seasons Ballroom 2-3
  In Roundtable Session: Enhancing Accessibility in Education: UDL (Universal Design for Learning) and Behavioral Supports (Table 10)

Abstract

Students receiving Exceptional Student Education (ESE) services, also known as special education services, are an understudied population within rigorous group design methodology. Situated in an intervention study of an ESE curriculum, this proposal outlines efforts to standardize Individualized Education Program (IEP) service descriptions into categories used to create a stronger evaluation of program impact and implementation. Over 23,000 IEP service descriptions were coded into 38 unique categories that could be used to create a strong matched sample and to describe implementation in intervention and comparison conditions.
This method of standardizing IEP service descriptions has implications for ESE practitioners’ efforts to translate IEP services across schools and the feasibility of rigorous evaluation of ESE intervention programs.

Authors

• Melissa G. Kuhn, RMC Research Corporation

• Jennifer L. Weston-Sementelli, RMC Research Corporation

• Emma Espel Villarreal, RMC Research Corporation

• Stephen J. Meyer, RMC Research Corporation

• Michelle Guffee, Seminole County Public Schools