PREDICTIVE VALIDITY OF SAT^® I: REASONING TEST FOR TEST‐TAKERS WITH LEARNING DISABILITIES AND EXTENDED TIME ACCOMMODATIONS

Abstract

The predictive validity of the SAT® I: Reasoning Test was examined for students who took the test with an extended time accommodation for a learning disability. The sample included college students with learning disabilities who took the SAT I between 1995 and 1998 with extended time accommodations. First year grade point average (FGPA) was used as a measure of student performance. Although positive, the adjusted correlation between FGPA and SAT scores was lower for test‐takers with a learning disability than has been shown in prior research on test‐takers without disabilities. In addition, the SAT scores obtained with an extended time accommodation appear to overpredict FGPA for male test‐takers with a learning disability and accurately predict FGPA for female test‐takers with a learning disability. When the same students were examined using both SAT I test scores and self‐reported high school grade point average (HSGPA) to predict FGPA, the scores and grades of male test‐takers did not under‐ or overpredict while the scores of female test‐takers underpredicted FGPA. Due to the relatively small sample size, additional research is required to examine group differences (e.g., type of learning disability, severity of disability) and the impact of differential support received from college disability service offices during the first year of college.

The Role of Extended Time on the SAT® for Students with Learning Disabilities and/or Attention‐Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder

“…Also note that in both groups, students performed better on the Math section compared to the Critical Reading and Writing sections of the SAT. Furthermore, as previous researchers (Morgan & Huff, 2002;Cahalan et al, 2002) have found, the standard deviations are larger in the SWD-T group, indicating greater variability in the scores for students with learning disabilities than for the group of individuals without disabilities.…”

The validity of the Spelling and Grammar Waiver as a reasonable accommodation in Leaving Certificate examinations in Ireland

“…These studies indicate that there is an over-prediction of grade scores obtained during college years for students who utilized testing accommodations (Cahalan, Mandinach, & Camara, 2002;Camara, Copeland, & Rothschild, 1998;Zurcher & Bryant, 2001). This would suggest that, for some accommodations at least, accommodated scores do not have the same meaning as scores from standard administrations, to the extent that one cannot make the same predictions from each.…”

Advancing Human Assessment: A Synthesis Over Seven Decades

“…For students with disabilities, two research lines dominated, one related to testing and validation concerns that included but went beyond the postsecondary admissions focus of the 1980s and 1990s (Ekstrom and Smith 2002;Laitusis et al 2002), and the second on accessibility (Hansen et al 2004;Hansen and Mislevy 2006;Hansen et al 2005). For English learners, topics covered accessibility (Hansen and Mislevy 2006;Wolf and Leon 2009), accommodations (Young and King 2008), validity frameworks and assessment guidelines (Pitoniak et al 2009;Young 2009), and instrument and item functioning (Martiniello 2009;).…”