Assessment Services for students with disability
Supporting Department of Education in Victoria
Supporting applications for students with disability in Victorian government schools
For the latest news regarding delivery of our service, please see the latest newsletter. Alternatively, learn more about the steps we are taking to ensure the safe delivery of our service during COVID-19.
Assessments Australia, part of MAX Health, are an independent assessment service conducting assessments on behalf of the Department of Education (the department) for schools who wish to apply for support for students with disability in Victorian government schools through the Program for Students with Disabilities (PSD) or Disability Inclusion.
We conduct cognitive and language assessments to establish whether a student has an:
- intellectual disability, or
- severe language disorder with high functional needs (including students with complex communication needs).
These assessments determine whether students meet the eligibility requirements for the PSD, and assist schools and families to better understand a student's educational needs, providing valuable information for a Disability Inclusion Profile. These assessments also support enrolment processes for specialist schools (intellectual disability).
Further information about the assessment service can be found on the department’s website Assessment service for students with disability.
To make a referral to us, please call our team on (03) 9678 5100. Further information about this process is also located below.
Once a referral has been made, you can review the progress of your referral via your school dashboard. For help logging in to the dashboard, view the dashboard instructions.
Call us to make a referral
To make a referral or speak to the team, please call:
03 9678 5100Translated parent information sheets
Download parent information sheets in Arabic, Vietnamese, Karen, and Punjabi.
Access the dashboard
Review the progress of your referrals
Applying for a cognitive or language assessment through the Students With Disability Assessment Service
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1 Eligibility
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2 Referral
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3 Assessment
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4 Feedback
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5 Report
Eligibility for cognitive and language assessments through Assessments Australia
We conduct cognitive and language assessments to establish whether a student has an:
- intellectual disability, or
- severe language disorder with high functional needs (including students with complex communication needs).
These assessments determine whether students meet the eligibility requirements for the Program for Students with Disabilities (PSD), and assist schools and families to better understand a student's educational needs, providing valuable information for a Disability Inclusion Profile. These assessments also support enrolment processes for specialist schools (intellectual disability).
Schools can contact us on 9678 5100 to make a referral if there is evidence that the student is likely to have an intellectual disability or severe language disorder with high functional needs. We cannot assess students without this evidence or who require assessment for support under other PSD categories, including Autism Spectrum Disorder or Severe Behaviour Disorder.
Referrals cannot be made by kindergartens or parents – please talk to the school the student will be enrolling at to discuss whether an assessment by our service is appropriate.
Please note we cannot take a referral until you have received verbal consent from a parent/carer to share information about the student with us.
When you call, we will ask some questions about the student’s history, current needs and presentation. If there is enough information to show the student the student is likely to have an intellectual disability or severe language disorder with high functional needs, we will email you a referral pack. If there is not enough information, we will let you know what we need in order to progress the referral.
Call us to make a referral
When you have verbal consent from a parent/carer to share information about a student with us, you can start the referral process by calling 9678 5100.
If there is information to indicate the student may have an intellectual disability or severe language disorder with high functional needs, we will email you a referral pack. The referral pack for intellectual disability includes a link to a digital Vineland form.
The referral forms should be filled out with as much information as possible to assist us to determine if an assessment through our service is appropriate. It is important to use the referral pack that is sent to you for each individual student to ensure the most relevant and current forms are completed.
Once completed, the digital Vineland is automatically returned to us, but all other forms should be scanned and emailed to us at psd-as@assessments.com.au. We do not need hard copies and do not recommend posting documents to us.
Once we have all the referral documents, we will review the information provided to determine if an assessment through our service is appropriate. If we decide there is not enough information to progress to assessment through our service, we will email you with the reasons why we have decided this. You are always welcome to provide more information to us or to call us if you have any questions.
The assessment process
When a referral proceeds to assessment, it is allocated to one of our psychologists and/or speech pathologists. They will contact you by phone or email to set up an assessment date and time that is mutually agreeable. The assessment usually happens within three weeks of us receiving all the completed referral documents.
We will ask you to contact the parent/carer to inform them of the assessment date, and arrange for an interpreter if required.
Referrals to investigate a possible severe language disorder with high functional needs will usually have a cognitive assessment done first, with the language assessment occurring at a later date.
All our psychologists and speech pathologists specialise in assessments of this nature.
Feedback after the assessment
When the assessment is finished, we will provide feedback to you and to the student’s parent/carer. This usually happens on the same day of the assessment.
You should invite the parent/carer to attend school on the day of the assessment for this feedback. The assessor will let you know approximately what time, depending on the length of the assessment. Feedback can also be given over the phone if the parent/carer is not able to attend.
It is important that the school contact and/or the classroom teacher also make themselves available for feedback following the assessment.
Details of when and how feedback was provided are recorded on our dashboard, and you are welcome to contact us for further information.
Assessment reports
Once the assessment has been completed you will receive a comprehensive narrative report for parents/carers and teachers. This report will provide information about the reason for referral, the student’s history, previous assessments, and current presentation and needs. It will also talk about the testing that was done, how the student presented during the assessment and the results, as well as providing clear and functional recommendations to support the student.
The comprehensive narrative report will assist the school and parents/carers to better understand a student's educational needs, and provides valuable information for schools seeking to undertake a Disability Inclusion Profile.
Where a student meets the eligibility requirements to apply for the PSD, you will also receive an attachment report(s), to be submitted with the student’s PSD application.
You will usually receive the assessment report/s within three weeks of the assessment date.
It is the school’s responsibility to organise the application for support. Further information is available by following these links:
Your Regional Disability Coordinator can also help you with advice about this.
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Have a question or want to provide feedback on the service?
Support resources
A collection of resources to support your understanding of intellectual disabilities.
There is a range of information that can help you broaden your knowledge of supporting children whose ability to produce speech has been affected.
Other links
Here are some other links you may find useful:
All Play Learn - A great website for teachers and families, helping to create inclusive education environments.
Inclusive Teaching for Students with Disability - A document that provides ideas and strategies for inclusive education.
The Specific Language Impairment Handbook - a guide for parents to language and communication impairments in children.
Information to help you understand the impact on a child, how it might affect development and how to support them.
Parent and Teacher Resources
Plain English documents that can help with the process.
Key dates
- 1 September 2023 - From September, schools may submit PSD applications and specialist school disability category verification requests, to the department, for future students (including Preps) commencing school in 2024.
- 15 September 2023 - Term 3 ends
- 2 October 2023 - Term 4 starts
- 10 October 2023 - Completed referral documents should be provided to Assessments Australia by this date to enable an assessment and report to be completed by the end of the school year.
- 20 December 2023 - Term 4 ends