CEC Policy Insider

CEC Wishes you a Happy Thanksgiving!!!

Report Finds Students with Disabilities Making Some Progress; But Achievement Gap and Inconsistent Policies Complicate Results

Last week, the Center for Education Policy released Has Progress Been Made for Raising the Achievement of Students with Disabilities?, which found that while students with disabilities have made progress on fourth grade reading and math assessments between 2005-06 and 2007-2008 school years, there is still a large achievement gap between students with disabilities and their non-disabled peers. The report also concluded that state policies and the implementation of federal policies regarding the assessment of students with disabilities vary widely and complicate data collection and analysis. 

CEC Supports 2009 ABLE Act

Families of children with disabilities are often faced with extraordinary expenses in providing appropriate services to enable their child to have the same opportunities for a productive, independent life as their non-disabled peers. This week, CEC joined with 40 other national groups to support the Achieving a Better Life Experience Act (ABLE) of 2009 (S 493/HR 1205) in an effort to combat this problem.

CEC Supports Rosa’s Law

Last Tuesday, Senators Barbara Mikulski (D-MD) and Michael Enzi (R-WY) introduced "Rosa's Law"(S. 2781) a bipartisan bill to substitute outdated, stigmatizing terms in federal health, education and labor laws. If enacted, this bill will remove the terms "mental retardation" and "mentally retarded" and replace them with "intellectual disability" and "individual with an intellectual disability."

IES re-launches Monthly Newsletter

The Institute of Education Sciences (IES) launched "Education Research News," which highlights their recent activities and accomplishments of IES and its four centers.

Some of the items featured on the home page are include the latest on research initiatives from John Easton, who was recently sworn-in as IES director, an update on the 2010 research conference, a link to the new financial aid calculator, and new staff introductions.

Read the IES Education Research News.