Meanings of Intelligence and Adaptive Behavior

Until several years ago, many students who were classified as having ID or assigned into an inclusion classroom were not expected to participate in standardized testing, however as late, everyone in public schools is expected to participate in standardized assessments. Some educators are happy with the change while others are concerned the assessments are not an accurate assessment of what students actually know. For many students with learning disabilities, standardized assessments often don’t accurately indicate what the student truly knows and where they have deficits.
One problem with assessing students with ID is the identification and classification of ID is that they differ greatly between states and is often inconsistent. According to Kortez, students with specific learning disabilities are served under the IDEA, however we use the word “classification” when referring to the category of and indentified student’s specific disability or disabilities (Kortez). The major problem that arises is the fact that identification is being highly inconsistent which is raising the concern students being mislabeled. It seems as though some educators are either over identifying or under indentifying students. However, this is not just a problem on the educator’s level; it is also showing up on the state level. It seems as though when the combined across the nation, identification is inconsistent. More than half of all students being served are doing so under the IDEA part B umbrella, students with specific disabilities, while the number of students recognized as” learning disabled ranges from 3% to 9%” across the United States (Kortez). According to Kortez, not all states implement the same policies, guidelines, or criteria, therefore some states have a significant higher or lower number of