Improving Test Performance of Students With Disabilities

Martha L. Thurlow, Ph.D., is Director of the National Center on Educational Outcomes in the Institute on Community Integration (University Center for Excellence in Developmental Disabilities) at the University of Minnesota. In this position, she addresses the implications of contemporary U.S. policy and practice for students with disabilities and English Language Learners, including national and statewide assessment policies and practices, standards-setting efforts, and graduation requirements. Dr. Thurlow has conducted research for the past 35 years in a variety of areas, including assessment and decision making, learning disabilities, early childhood education, dropout prevention, effective classroom instruction, and integration of students with disabilities in general education settings. She has published extensively on all of these topics, and also recently completed serving as co-Editor with Bob Algozzine of Exceptional Children, the research journal of the Council for Exceptional Children. Dr. Thurlow is a co-author of several books, including Testing Students with Disabilities, Improving Test Performance of Students with Disabilities, Alternate Assessments for Students with Disabilities, and Critical Issues in Special Education. Dr. Thurlow was one of the original developers of the dropout prevention program Check and Connect, which was empirically tested, and replicated in several settings. She is the author of numerous reports, journal articles and chapters on the topic of dropouts and dropout prevention, and also addresses the dropout problem within the current context of federal legislation, high stakes testing, and standards-based education.