How to Use the Content Standards
The CEC Special Education Content Standards are made up of ten narrative standards. These identical standards are used across all programs. Prior to moving to performance-based reviews, CEC historically used the knowledge and skills items to assure that each were taught. Typically, reviewers would check syllabi to verify where items were taught. Under the new performance-based review procedures, the knowledge and skill items will not be used in this way. Under the performance-based review procedures, it is expected that faculty will use the knowledge and skill base in the
appropriate Area(s) of Specialization to inform their curriculum development to ensure that the Content standards are met. Please note that programs will not be expected to include a response to each of the knowledge and skills. Programs must respond to the ten Special Education Content Standards, not to each of the knowledge and skills. The program's evaluation system should ensure that the program's assessment system comprehensively addresses each of the ten standards.
Reflecting the diversity of programs in the field, CEC continues to provide options to preparation programs. CEC has disability specific knowledge and skill bases (e.g., Learning Disabilities, Emotionally and Behavioral Disorders, Visually Impaired), multicategorical knowledge and skill bases (Individualized General Curriculum and Individualized Independence Curriculum), and age-specific knowledge and skill bases (Early Childhood). These options provide programs the flexibility to select the set of standards that most closely aligns with their program.
The CEC standards are also found on their website at
http://www.cec.sped.org/ps/perf_based_stds/standards.html/.
The CEC Standards are designed to align with the
Interstate New Teacher Assessment and Support Consortium (INTASC) Standards, which are available at
http://www.ncate.lhup.edu/documents/intasc_standards.pdf/.
