Assessment - Overview

The New Voices Assessment Program will work in partnership with five school districts to conduct comprehensive, multidisciplinary assessments with structured follow-up that they are not equipped to do. Children with severe communication and mobility problems represent complex problems requiring multiple areas of intense, skilled intervention as well as access to an array of cutting-edge assistive technology. Because these multiple problems represent a low-incidence disability, teachers may only see one or two of these children throughout their careers. Even if there were some school support personnel involved, assessment of these children is often too time intensive, too difficult and too costly to be successfully completed by the school. Teachers do not now receive training in how to integrate the use of assistive technology into the classroom curriculum after that child has been provided the equipment. New Voices will provide this support.

How do you determine what a child knows if he cannot speak or use his hands? How do you teach a child if he cannot tell you what hurts, what he likes or dislikes or what he is afraid of?

Fortunately in North Carolina we have access to a skilled and experienced group of professionals whose careers have been dedicated to these children, and whose knowledge of the newest technology and learning strategies can be brought to bear on behalf of these children. There are too few of these professionals to put together a group in each school system and the equipment needed is too costly for a small system to maintain.

The New Voices Assessment Program represents a new regional concept employing economies of scale, a central location, and direct links with the schools in order to provide essential assessment services and subsequent follow-up supports in the most cost effective and efficient way possible.

We have completed a focused needs assessment in the five-district area and know that there are currently nearly 300 children with severe communication and mobility problems in these districts who are in need of this service. These children are currently served either in classes for children with severe disabilities or in regular education classrooms. Some of the children attend special, segregated schools for handicapped children, some are home schooled, and others receive home tutoring provided periodically by the school district. A few receive services out of state. Appropriate placement of these children in the least restrictive environment is often a matter of guessing what the child may know or what he may or may not achieve. We propose the development of an assessment program that will serve as the first step in a series that will assure that children with severe communication and mobility problems are given every opportunity to achieve their full potential.