• General
• 01 Right to Education
• 02 Opportunity Goal
• 03 Identification
• 04 Eval and Elig
• 05 IEP
• 06 Placement LRE
• 07 Safeguards
• 08 Confidentiality
• 09 Transition
• 10 Private Schools
• 11 Gen Supervision
• 12 Pers Standards
• 13 Ensuring Services
• 14 Goals
• 15 Assessment
• 16 Susp/Expulsion
• 17 Use of Funds
• 18 State Advisory
• 19 Pub. Participation

SECTION XV: PARTICIPATION IN ASSESSMENT

Policy Statement

It is the policy of the ROP’s MOE that every student, including students with disabilities, participate in all Palau statewide assessments with appropriate accommodations and alternate assessments where necessary and as indicated in their respective individualized education programs. The Ministry is currently revising its performance assessment system to meet this commitment. To the extent feasible, the MOE will use universal design principles in developing and administering any assessments.

Implementation Procedures

A. Participation in Assessments.

1. Each student, including a student with a disability, will participate in the Palau statewide general assessments, the Palau Achievement Test at grades 4, 6, 8, 10, and 12, unless it is determined by the IEP Committee that the student is unable to do so. If a student with a disability is determined by her/his Eligibility/IEP Committee to be unable to participate in the Palau Achievement Tests or Quarterly Assessments, without accommodations, such a statement and accompanying explanations will be incorporated at the time of IEP development, and the specific accommodations to be afforded that student will be described in his/her IEP.

2. If a student with a disability is determined by her/his Eligibility/IEP Committee to be unable to participate in the Palau statewide general assessments even with accommodations, that student will be provided the opportunity to demonstrate performance in an alternate assessment. The need for an alternate assessment will be described in the student’s IEP at the time of its development. The MOE has developed and implemented guidelines for the participation of children with disabilities in alternate assessments for those children who cannot participate in regular assessments with accommodations as indicated in their respective individualized education programs. The MOE has revised its guidelines to provide for alternate assessments that are aligned with the challenging academic content standards and adopted alternate academic achievement standards. The MOE is using the 4-Step Process to access the learning target goals and student objectives to implement its alternate assessments.

3. The MOE is responsible for:

a. developing guidelines for the participation in alternate assessments, of children described in (2) above, who cannot participate in Palau statewide assessment programs;

b. developing alternate assessments to implement these guidelines; and,

c. conducting these alternate assessments.

B. Reporting Assessment Results.

1. The MOE compiles the results of Palau’s statewide assessments for students with disabilities, reporting the number and performance of students with disabilities who participate in the regular assessments. At this time, the MOE does not produce a public annual report on the performance of children without disabilities on Palau statewide assessments.

2. In keeping with this goal, since July 1, 1998, the MOE reports annually to USED the numbers of students with disabilities by grade levels specified above who take Palau statewide assessments or alternate assessments, and their performance by grade. Although the MOE does not publicly report results for nondisabled students, the MOE will report to USED through its APR on the aggregate performance of students with disabilities on Palau statewide assessments.

3. The Republic’s small total population, the population of students with disabilities, and the number of those students with disabilities who would be participating in alternate assessments may weigh against reporting the performance of those students for reasons of statistical soundness and/or confidentiality, in certain reporting years.

4. To meet the intent of IDEA ’04 to keep the public informed of educational progress, and to include results for all students in educational reform efforts, the MOE has in place these steps:

a. individual student results will be conveyed to the respective IEP Committee to include in considering progress and goals in developing or revising IEPs;

b. the MOE will review the information internally to target systemic areas for in- service and technical assistance to school personnel and parents;

c. the MOE will make an annual report of results for students with disabilities in the aggregate through its APR. The Special Education Advisory Committee participates in the development of the APR and provides input on improvement activities for improving the delivery of special education and related services and improvements in assessments.

d. Should the MOE change its policy and begin to publicly report student performance on assessments, the MOE will report with the same frequency and in the same detail as it reports on the assessment of nondisabled children, the following:

(1) The number of children with disabilities participating in regular assessments, and the number of those children who were provided accommodations in order to participate in those assessments.

(2) The number of children with disabilities participating in alternate assessments.

(3) The performance of children with disabilities on regular assessments and on alternate assessments compared with the achievement of all children, including children with disabilities, on those assessments (as long as the number of children with disabilities participating in those assessments is sufficient to yield statistically reliable information and reporting that information will not reveal personally identifiable information about an individual student).

XVI: SUSPENSION/EXPULSION

Policy Statement

It is the policy of the MOE to ensure to the maximum extent possible, the education of students with disabilities, including students with emotional disabilities, in the LRE and to minimize the need for removal of students from their most appropriate placement. To this end data will be collected annually to monitor removal of students with disabilities for disciplinary reasons and to compare these rates with the general student population.

As Palau’s student population is virtually 100% “Asian/Pacific Islander,” it has been determined by the OSEP that disaggregating these data by race/ethnicity for the purposes of considering disproportionality is not required in Palau. Implementation Procedures

A. The MOE will examine data on suspension and expulsion rates to determine if significant discrepancies are occurring in the rate of long-term suspensions and expulsions of children with disabilities:

1. among certain schools in the Republic; or

2. compared to the rates for non-disabled children within the public school system.

B. If discrepancies are found in these rates, the MOE will review and, if appropriate, revise its policies, procedures and practices relating to the development and implementation of IEPs, the use of behavioral interventions, and procedural safeguards, to ensure that these policies, procedures and practices comply with IDEA ’04.

It should be noted that the long-term suspension or expulsion of students with disabilities is a rare practice in Palau. Such numbers, should they exist in a given year, will be quite small and easily tracked as part of annual data collection activities.