Dr. Shu Jing Yen
(202) 219-2126
shujing.yen@ed.gov

Through the research program on Special Education Policy, Finance, and Systems (Policy/Systems), the Institute intends to contribute to the improvement of education for students with disabilities or at risk for disabilities by: (1) exploring malleable factors¹ (e.g., procedures for allocating resources, education finance practices, school organization and structure) that are correlated with outcomes for students with or at risk for disabilities, as well as mediators or moderators of the relations between these factors and student outcomes, for the purpose of identifying potential targets of intervention; (2) developing innovative systems or policies that are intended to improve student outcomes either directly or indirectly by improving the education environment for students with or at risk for disabilities; (3) evaluating the efficacy of systemic practices or policies that are intended to improve student outcomes either directly or indirectly by improving the education environment for students with or at risk for disabilities; (4) evaluating the impact of systemic practices and polices that are implemented at scale and are intended to improve student outcomes either directly or indirectly by improving the education environment; and (5) developing assessments that can be used to evaluate organization, management, or implementation of systems-level programs or policies and validating these or existing assessments against student outcomes, as well as developing and validating accommodations for large-scale assessments (i.e., assessments used for accountability purposes) that would permit measurement of the proficiency and growth of students with disabilities.

The long-term outcome of this program will be an array of systems-level practices and policies that have been documented to be effective for improving the education or intervention environment and thereby improving outcomes for students with or at risk for disabilities from kindergarten through Grade 12.