What is the 1% rule?
Federal rules limit the percent of students who may demonstrate proficiency by way of the alternate assessment. This rule is intended to constrain the anticipated push to place students in an “easier” testing environment in order to meet performance expectations. The rule actually places a 1% cap on the percent of students at the district level, in the grades tested, that may demonstrate proficiency by way of an assessment based on alternate achievement standards. Nationally, this often translates into a discussion of how many students may take this alternate assessment since we can’t accurately predict who will score well. NH understands this concern and has worked very hard to educate people on the appropriate use of this alternate assessment tool. We believe that IEP teams are making good decisions. By focusing on the decision making process of IEP teams, we are assured that students in the alternate assessment are correctly placed. Since we have many small districts, and some distr
