Profiling development of students with intellectual disabilities will help teachers monitor and intervene accurately. Techniques of assessment and tailored intervention offer new insights to curriculum and teaching. The methodology has been developed over a twenty-year period, tailored to competency-based assessment, and applied in this project to assessment of students with intellectual disabilities. The project combines disciplines of the Specialist School, Department of Education section responsible for student wellbeing, Assessment Research Centre and the publisher PPI, specialising in profiles and their assessment and teaching implications. The multidisciplinary team brings together each of the facets needed for a successful project.

This project addresses an area of educational assessment that has been traditionally neglected as ‘too hard’. It offers hope to students with intellectual disabilities. If developmental progress can be mapped and identified in competency terms and linked to successful teaching and learning strategies, the students can expect to make more rapid progress towards achieving their potential. Teachers in mainstream schools can also expect to be helped in recognising development and given advice for intervention. The materials will be made available world wide to help all students in this challenging area.