Executive Summary

To provide a national picture of the academic achievements of American students, the National Center for Education Statistics has administered the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) periodically since 1969, but there has been no similar national picture of the academic achievement of youth with disabilities. The National Longitudinal Transition Study-2 (NLTS2), funded by the National Center for Special Education Research in the Institute of Education Sciences in the U.S. Department of Education,¹ is filling this gap with information about secondary-school-age students with disabilities. It includes a nationally representative sample of more than 11,000 youth who were ages 13 through 16 and receiving special education services in seventh grade or above in the 2000–2001 school year. NLTS2 is the first national study to include assessments of the academic and functional abilities of youth who receivespecial education services in secondary school.

One assessment was attempted for each NLTS2 sample member during the biannual data collection cycle in which he or she was in the 16- through 18-year-old age range. The NLTS2 direct assessment uses research editions of subtests of the Woodcock-Johnson III (Woodcock, McGrew, and Mather 2001) that test language arts skills, mathematics abilities, and content knowledge in science and social studies. NLTS2 also includes a functional rating to provide information on youth for whom the direct assessment was reported to be inappropriate. The functional rating is the Scales of Independent Behavior-Revised (SIB-R) (Bruininks et al. 1996), a comprehensive measure of adaptive functioning in school, home, employment, and community settings. To determine the form of assessment for which youth qualified, assessors interviewed the school staff person who was most familiar with a youth and his or her school program; information was sought from parents if youth were no longer in school, including any accommodations that a youth required. If a youth did not meet the requirements for the direct assessment, even with accommodations, he or she was eligible for the functional rating, and a rating form was completed by a teacher if a youth was in school or by a parent if he or she was not.

Youth in the direct assessment and functional rating groups do not differ with regard to age, gender, race/ethnicity, or household income. However, the two groups are significantly different in the disability categories they represent, with the category of learning disability having the majority of youth in the direct assessment group, and mental retardation being the most prominent category in the functional rating group. Youth in the functional rating group first were identified as having a disability at a significantly younger age than those of direct assessment participants, and their functional abilities are lower. The functional rating group spends a greater percentage of class time in special education settings and has a higher rate of participation in some kinds of services. In contrast, direct assessment participants spend more time in social activities with friends and in organized groups at school than those in the functional rating group.

Results of the NLTS2 direct assessments and functional ratings, the focus of this report, are used to address the following questions:

• How well do youth with disabilities achieve in the areas of language arts, mathematics, science, and social studies?
• How does their achievement compare with the general population of same-age youth?
• What factors related to youths' disability and functioning, individual and household demographics, family support for their education, and previous school experiences are statistically associated with higher academic achievement among youth with disabilities?
• What are the results of the functional ratings of youth's abilities?

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