Do You Think College Is The Next Step? The Creation and Validation of a Postsecondary Education and Experience Assessment for Individuals with Disabilities

Suk, Andrea

Do You Think College Is The Next Step? The Creation and Validation of a Postsecondary Education and Experience Assessment for Individuals with Disabilities

dc.contributor.advisor	Peltier, Corey
dc.contributor.author	Suk, Andrea
dc.contributor.committeeMember	Peterson, Lori
dc.contributor.committeeMember	Debacker, Teresa
dc.contributor.committeeMember	Crowson, Mike
dc.contributor.committeeMember	Reyes, Matthew
dc.date.accessioned	2020-07-10T16:27:42Z
dc.date.available	2020-07-10T16:27:42Z
dc.date.issued	2020-05
dc.date.manuscript	2020-05
dc.description.abstract	A transformation is underway affecting the way that students with disabilities access postsecondary education options. Historically, students with disabilities requiring direct supports have been unable to gain postsecondary learning opportunities at institutions of higher education. But, the demand for students to continue accessing education opportunities alongside their peers without disabilities, coupled with national funding opportunities, has created the prime occasion for postsecondary education programs for students requiring more direct supports to develop on college and university campuses. While each postsecondary education and experience program is unique and individualized with respect to how classes are offered, what other experiences are provided, the completion credential students earn, the length of the program, and living options for students, one common feature all programs share is the commitment to offer coursework to promote independence in employment and living environments. The diverse range of program structures and options requires a plethora of prerequisite skills from applicants. This study developed a concise assessment tool containing the most important skills and attributes for admission to postsecondary education and experience programs. Utilizing a modified Delphi procedure, 510 admission requirements were identified through a systematic review of postsecondary education and experience program websites. These admission requirements were reduced to 84 assessment items by (a) combining items with similar context and (b) eliminating items with few programs requiring them. A finite group of postsecondary education and experience directors served as experts to find consensus on the importance of items, wording of items, and the domain description for each item. Through multiple surveys, experts identified 71 items nested within 16 domains to create the assessment tool. The assessment tool was also reviewed by a larger group of postsecondary education and experience directors to evaluate if both groups’ opinions on the usefulness of the assessment aligned. Results indicated postsecondary education and experience directors valued many of the same skills and attributes related to admission. Furthermore, and overwhelmingly, the majority of postsecondary education and experience directors recommended the assessment tool for high school special education teams to use for planning purposes with students. The relation between domains of the assessment and specific postsecondary education and experience characteristics was measured through multiple regression analyses. Results indicated no statistical significance, suggesting users of the assessment do not need to focus on separate requirements based on specific postsecondary program requirements because the criteria were similar between various types of programs. Further development and research on the assessment tool is needed to determine which student scores on the assessment relate to acceptance into postsecondary education programs and which student scores on the assessment relate to successful completion of postsecondary programs.	en_US
dc.identifier.uri	https://hdl.handle.net/11244/325151
dc.language	en_US	en_US
dc.rights	Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International	*
dc.rights.uri	http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/	*
dc.subject	Education, Special.	en_US
dc.subject	Education, Tests and Measurements.	en_US
dc.thesis.degree	Ph.D.	en_US
dc.title	Do You Think College Is The Next Step? The Creation and Validation of a Postsecondary Education and Experience Assessment for Individuals with Disabilities	en_US
ou.group	Jeannine Rainbolt College of Education::Department of Educational Psychology	en_US