[nfbwatlk] Taking the WASL Blind

[Nightingale, Noel]

The below article is disturbing on its face in its description of blind
Braille WASL test takers being essentially set up to fail the math
portion of the exam.  On a deeper level, it is even more disturbing as
it states that only 163 Braille WASL exams were produced last year,
which means that the Braille bill has not had a marked effect on how
many blind students are using Braille.



>From http://www.columbian.com/news/localNews/08312007news191496.cfm

The WASL's Unseen Imagery

Kandi Lukowski, Braille coordinator at the Washington State School for
the Blind in Vancouver, monitors machines creating pages of textbooks in
Braille and holds a bound sample. The machines also print Braille voter
pamphlets and will print new WASL tests in November. (JANET L.
MATHEWS/The Columbian)  
 
 
Friday, August 31, 2007
BY ISOLDE RAFTERY, Columbian staff writer

Craig Meador, principal of the Washington State School for the Blind,
describes watching blind students take the WASL: 

At first, they're excited, ready to tackle the exam in Braille. 

Then they're asked to find the area of a shadow at 5 p.m., but they may
not know what a shadow looks like. 

Find the volume of this object, the exam goes on to ask, but to the
touch, the raised image of the cylinder is nearly impossible to discern.


Before the math portion of the WASL is finished, many students have
quit, too upset with themselves to continue. 

Why include the imagery? Meador asked. Isn't there a more
straight-forward way to test blind students?

Meador and School for the Blind Superintendent Dean Stenehjem believe
the exam is more a measure of students' blindness, not reading or math
abilities.

"We have some extremely bright kids, and I doubt that any one will pass
the math WASL," Stenehjem said.

Catherine Taylor, director of alternative assessments for the state
schools office, said she's not convinced that nixing visuals from the
WASL would benefit blind students. In June, Taylor attended a conference
where educators said that blind students need to learn those skills. 

"Geometry and statistics are very visual, and they involve concrete
objects," Taylor said. "If we eliminate the visual elements, we may not
be holding these students accountable."

Further, Taylor said, should the WASL reduce its images for blind
students, who make up one-tenth of 1 percent of the total student
population in Washington?

At the American Printing House for the Blind in Louisville, Ky., Debbie
Willis, who oversees accessible tests, said she believes some shadow and
cylinder questions on the exam are OK, but that too many such questions
could burden students.

Willis reads through exams and works with exam publishers to substitute
visual questions for more straight-forward prompts. 

In Washington, the Braille WASLs are produced at the Braille Access
Center on the campus of the state School for the Blind. Last year, 163
Braille WASLs were produced.

The exam is first translated into Braille, then each one is laid out, by
hand, onto a machine that produces each page. After the students take
the exam, it is translated into print letters for review.