The Effect Accommodations Have on Overall Performance on SAT for Eleventh-Grade Students with Accommodations Based on Disability Program Type in High Schools

Background: Accommodations for Students under Section 504 and/or Individualized Educational Program (IEP) are essential for these students to take high-stakes tests given their appropriate assessment accommodations. Accommodations allow students with learning disabilities to test equitably as their peers. It is unknown whether a student’s assessment performance is based upon accommodations provided with fidelity and if all these students are provided that opportunity based on their documented accommodations. Purpose: The primary objective of this study is to review the types of appropriate accommodations for students with accommodation plans to access on the SAT. The research questions posed examined the distribution of approved accommodations outlined in the College Board for use in the SAT, the difference in the overall performance of eleventh-grade students who receive accommodations for the SAT and those who do not receive accommodations, the overall performance of students who received accommodations by campus, and the perceptions of accommodations based on the knowledge of the campus team requesting the accommodations. Methods: A medium, urban school district’s SAT data was selected that includes all juniors in all high schools and used quantitative methodology to analyze findings related to the research questions. Archival data was used from the 2019 – 2020 school year. Descriptive statistics were used to answer one question, but for all others, a group comparison quantitative analysis of variance (ANOVA), independent t-test, and means/standard deviations were used to determine if there were statistically significant differences in overall performance in mean. An analysis of survey results investigated the perceptions of accommodations by the campus team members. Results: More SAT test takers were vi classified under IDEIA than Section 504. Extra time was the most utilized approved accommodation for disability program types. An ANOVA using Games-Howell was run to determine whether student groups had any significant differences in overall scale scores. The following were found to have significantly different means from each other: 1) students with disabilities who had accommodations and students with disabilities who did not have accommodations with p=.020 and 2) students with disabilities who did not have accommodations and students who do not have disabilities or accommodations with p=<.001. The third question was whether a difference in performance based on disability category. Students with 504 plans who took the SAT with accommodations had no statistically significant difference than students under IDEIA, t(20) = -.737, p = .470. Finally, the survey showed that school personnel felt accommodations are effective and provide students an equitable opportunity to participate in high-stakes assessments. By contrast, agreement on whether the students receive appropriate accommodations was low. Appropriateness of accommodations found that reading or providing student directions in their home language and providing students with visual impairments with larger print was most appropriate to ensure equitable opportunity. Conclusion: Students who qualify for either disability category perform better and achieve higher overall scale scores on the SAT if provided the documented accommodation. The data is a small sample size and more research is needed with larger sample sizes.

Name thesis:degree_name

Doctor of Education

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Professional Leadership, Special Populations

Grantor

University of Houston

Year dc:date.issued

2023

Author dc:creator

• Montemayor, Matthew

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• Santi, Kristi L

Committee members dc:contributor.committeemember

• McCormick, Marina
• Cobb, Jennifer
• McCarley, Kendall

• Education, Special

Language dc:language.iso

English

Handle dc:identifier.uri

https://hdl.handle.net/10657/21041

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:uh-ir.tdl.org:10657/21041