Tool for Determining Eligibility for Special Education: Opportunities and Challenges

The purpose of the Washington Group tools is to provide a method for obtaining cross-nationally comparable measures of disability. At a national level, the tools are intended to help a country monitor the implementation of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) and to help inform policy on equalization of opportunities for the population with disabilities. In order to assess the equalization of opportunities for persons with disabilities, the Washington Group tools must be used in conjunction with other census or survey indicators such as questions about employment or education. Disability status can then be cross-classified with, for example, a measure of education participation to gauge the equalization of opportunity.