Children with ADHD may or may not qualify for an Individualized Education Plan (IEP). If children are diagnosed with ADHD, it does not mean that they will qualify for special services. A study team is convened to determine if the child should be placed for these services. If it is determined that the child's condition may interfere with his educational progress, then the child may be considered. However, because most children respond to medication or other behavioral interventions, most children with ADHD do not qualify. However, if learning disability, physical disability, conduct disorder, or oppositional defiance are present, the person may qualify under specific provisions of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA). Another option for children with ADHD who do not qualify under the IDEA is to request a 504 plan.

The IEP is a formal document, developed by parents, teachers, and related services personnel, that sets forth how a child with disabilities is to receive a free appropriate public education in the least restrictive environment. PL-94-142 called the Education for All Handicapped Children Act was enacted in 1975 as a response to increased awareness of the need to properly educate children who had disabilities, and judicial ruling required states to provide an education for students with disabilities if the states was providing education for those without disabilities. Thus all 50 states were impacted by this legislation. Not only did the law require a ''free and appropriate education'' in the ''least restrictive environment'' but required an IEP for students. The IEP lays out a per-child plan of annual goals for the child, how the student's attainment of those goals will be determined, and the specific services the child may require and prescribes any adjustments or substitutions in the assessments to be used with the child.

In 1997 PL 94-142 was reauthorized and labeled the IDEA and called for states and districts to identify curricular expectations for special education students that were as equal as possible, given the curricular expectations established for all other students, and to report those results to the public. There were no penalties for those that did not comply, and therefore many states did not do so. Unlike IDEA, No Child Left Behind enacted on January 6, 2002 put in place serious penalties for noncompliance. Its aim was that all children would demonstrate improvement on state-chosen tests linked to each state's curricular aims. The law sets forth 12-year goals of having 100 percent of all students score at a ''proficient'' or higher level on No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) tests by the 2013-2014 school year.

Accountability is straightforward. Students' test scores must improve on a regular basis over a dozen years in order to reflect substantially improved student learning. States are allowed some flexibility in deciding how many more students must have a higher score each year on that state's test. If a school fails to make adequate yearly progress (AYP), the school is first publicly proclaimed to be deficient and then is placed on a sanction-laden improvement track that can, in a very few years, cause the school to be taken off the list by the state. Not making the AYP goal is quite serious and has district and state consequences.

An IEP must spell out accommodations or adaptations that must be provided for students with disabilities during instruction and assessment. The adaptations will give the student a fair opportunity to succeed and be assessed accurately. The purpose of the accommodation is to eliminate or at least reduce the effects of the student's disability. They do not lower expectations or alter what is being measured.

In 2005 the Council of Chief State School Officers (CCSSO) broke down these accommodations into four categories as follows:

1. Presentation. Allow the students to access information in ways that do not require them to visually read standard print. These alternate modes of access are auditory, multisensory, tactile, and visual.

2. Response. Allow students to complete activities assignments and assessments in different ways or to solve or organize problems using some type of assistive device or organizer.

3. Setting. Change the location in which a test or assignment is given or the conditions of the assessment setting.

4. Timing and scheduling. Increase the allowable length of time to complete an assessment or assignment and change the way the time is organized.

The IEP is a legal document that is intended to have parents work with teachers to improve their children's education. Parents can challenge a district is an IEP is not followed properly.

Bibliography:

1) Popham, W. James. 2006. Assessing students with disabilities. New York: Routledge.

2) Thompson, Sandra J. et al. 2005 Accommodations manual: How to Select, administer, and evaluate use of accommodations for instruction and assessment of students with disabilities. 2nd ed. Washington, D.C.: The Council of Chief State School Officers, August, 2005.

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