The NYSTCE Students with Disabilities Content Specialty Test (Field 060) is the subject examination for New York’s students with disabilities teaching certificates: 90 selected-response items and 1 extended constructed-response item in 3 hours and 15 minutes of testing time, across six content competencies — from foundations of special education to instructional delivery in the general curriculum — plus an analysis competency examined through the written assignment. Scores run from 400 to 600 with a 520 passing score. PassProfessor’s Students with Disabilities CST program is in the works.
This program is part of the expanding PassProfessor catalog — join the notify list and we’ll email you when enrollment opens.
Special education is the teaching field where knowledge, law, and craft are least separable. The teacher of students with disabilities assesses and writes the individualized program, plans the specially designed instruction, manages the learning environment, teaches communication and functional skills alongside the general curriculum, and does all of it inside a legal framework that gives every step a procedure and every procedure a deadline. Field 060 examines that whole practice: a teacher who applies knowledge of disabilities, assessment, and research-based instruction to plan and implement specially designed instruction, works with the Committee on Special Education to build individualized programs, and fulfills the special education professional’s role in the classroom and the school community. PassProfessor’s Students with Disabilities CST program is in the works as part of the expanding PassProfessor catalog, organized on the seven competencies of NYSTCE’s published Field 060 framework, so preparation follows the test’s own architecture rather than a general special education survey.
Which examination is this?
This page covers one test: the Content Specialty Test (CST) in Students with Disabilities, Field 060, in the New York State Teacher Certification Examinations (NYSTCE) program — the subject-matter examination for New York’s students with disabilities certificates across their grade bands, taken alongside the Educating All Students test and, for the many dual-certificate candidates, alongside the Multi-Subject assessment for their grade band as well. Two distinctions protect candidates from expensive confusion. The first is the code that travels with this test in current certification guidance: NYSTCE lists Field 615 as NYSTCE Flex Students with Disabilities — a performance assessment requiring one written submission, open only to candidates who took Field 060 on or after February 26, 2025 and earned a scaled score between 512 and 519, through which an eligible candidate who passes meets the CST requirement without retaking Field 060. Flex 615 is a near-miss route administered by NYSTCE; it is not this test, not open to first-time candidates, and not what this program prepares candidates for — this program prepares them to pass Field 060 itself. The EAS also examines students with disabilities, at the level every teacher needs; Field 060 examines the specialist’s depth, and the two are complements, not substitutes.
What will the program cover?
Original practice material, written to the seven published competencies. The program is being built from scratch against the Field 060 framework: foundations of special education; knowledge of students with disabilities; assessment and individual program planning; strategies for planning and managing the learning environment and for providing behavioral interventions; instructional planning and delivery to promote success in the general curriculum; and strategies for teaching communication skills, social skills, and functional living skills. No practice item is an actual examination item or another provider’s material.
The two heavy blocks given their weight. Assessment and Individual Program Planning and Instructional Planning and Delivery each carry 23 of the 90 selected-response items — together more than half the selected-response paper. Preparation here is weighted to match: assessment literacy and individualized education program craft on one side, specially designed instruction in the general curriculum on the other.
The constructed response as artifact work. The extended assignment is scenario-based and requires the analysis of one or more artifacts — samples of student work, assessment results, an excerpt from an individualized education program form, teacher notes. This program practises reading exactly those document types and writing the analysis a special education professional would write from them.
Results you can read by competency. Practice is organized by the seven competencies, so results can be read competency by competency. A candidate strong in instruction but thin in assessment, or fluent in the law but unpractised in the written artifact analysis, sees that shape in time to repair it.
Preparation only. This program prepares candidates for NYSTCE’s examination. It is not a NYSED, NYSTCE, Pearson, or NES product, carries no credit from any of those bodies, and does not satisfy any certification requirement. Certificates are granted by the New York State Education Department, on its requirements, under its rules. PassProfessor is an independent preparation provider and is not affiliated with NYSED, NYSTCE, Pearson, or NES.
What are the verified facts of the real test?
| Fact of record | Detail |
|---|---|
| Test | Students with Disabilities Content Specialty Test — Field 060, New York State Teacher Certification Examinations (NYSTCE) |
| Format | Computer-based test: 90 selected-response items and 1 constructed-response item; both item types measure content knowledge and pedagogical content knowledge, and the constructed-response item is scenario-based, requiring analysis of one or more artifacts |
| Score weighting | Selected-response items carry 80% of the total score in aggregate; the constructed-response item carries 20% |
| Time | 3 hours and 30 minutes total appointment time, including 15 minutes for the tutorial and nondisclosure agreement; 3 hours and 15 minutes of testing time |
| Test dates and sites | By appointment year-round, Monday through Saturday excluding some holidays, at test centers in New York State and nationwide |
| Passing score | 520, on the 400–600 scaled-score range |
| Test fee (third-party) | $122 — the NYSTCE test fee for Field 060, paid to NYSTCE at registration; it is not a PassProfessor charge |
| Retakes | A candidate who does not pass may retake the test until a passing score is achieved, reregistering each time; NYSTCE’s retake policy sets a 30-day wait before retaking a test in Field 060’s category |
| Near-miss routes (program-administered) | NYSED’s waiver process is available to candidates who score within 0.5 standard error of measurement of the passing score on a Content Specialty Test and apply; NYSTCE Flex Students with Disabilities (615) is a written-submission assessment for candidates who took Field 060 on or after February 26, 2025 and scored 512–519 |
| Score reporting | Scores are reported to the candidate, to NYSED, and to institutions the candidate designates; the score report shows pass status, the total scaled score, and performance by competency |
How does the practice map to the test?
| Competency | Items | Share of total score | What it covers |
|---|---|---|---|
| 0001 Foundations of Special Education | 11 | 10% | The field’s historical and theoretical foundations; federal and state law, regulation, and ethics; rights and responsibilities; collaboration and professional practice |
| 0002 Knowledge of Students with Disabilities | 11 | 10% | Typical and atypical development; characteristics, identification, and educational implications of the disability categories; factors affecting development and daily living |
| 0003 Assessment and Individual Program Planning | 23 | 20% | Assessment types, uses, and limits; unbiased selection and administration; interpretation; eligibility; and building, implementing, and monitoring individualized education programs with the Committee on Special Education |
| 0004 Strategies for Planning and Managing the Learning Environment and for Providing Behavioral Interventions | 11 | 10% | Structuring the learning environment; behavior support and intervention planning and implementation |
| 0005 Instructional Planning and Delivery to Promote Students’ Success in the General Curriculum | 23 | 20% | Specially designed instruction: planning and delivering research-based instruction and intervention that gives students with disabilities access to, and progress in, the general curriculum |
| 0006 Strategies for Teaching Communication Skills, Social Skills, and Functional Living Skills | 11 | 10% | Teaching the skills that carry independence — communication, social participation, and functional living |
| 0007 Analysis, Synthesis, and Application | 1 (constructed response) | 20% | The extended assignment: analysis of artifacts such as student work, assessment results, an individualized education program excerpt, or teacher notes |
Foundations and Knowledge of Students — the Frame
The first two competencies frame everything else. Foundations covers the field’s history and theory, the laws and ethical guidelines that govern referral, assessment, eligibility, placement within a continuum of services, behavior planning, mandated reporting, and confidentiality, the rights and responsibilities of students, families, teachers, and schools, and the collaborative web inside which special education actually happens. Knowledge of Students covers development typical and atypical across the cognitive, linguistic, social, emotional, physical, and sensory domains, and the characteristics and educational implications of the disability categories themselves. Neither block is large; together they are the vocabulary and the law the heavy blocks are written in.
Assessment and Individual Program Planning — the First Heavy Block
Twenty-three items examine the assessment cycle end to end: the terminology of the field; the characteristics, uses, and limitations of formal and informal assessments; selecting and administering assessments without bias; interpreting what they yield; and converting evaluation data into an individualized program — developed with the Committee on Special Education, implemented, and monitored against annual goals. This is the competency where special education’s procedural precision is examined most densely, and it rewards candidates who can run the sequence in order and name the safeguard at each step.
Instructional Planning and Delivery — the Second Heavy Block
The matching 23 items examine the teaching itself: planning and delivering specially designed instruction and research- or evidence-based interventions that promote students’ success in the general curriculum. The emphasis the framework’s title carries — in the general curriculum — is the competency’s thesis: the special educator’s craft is access and progress in the same curriculum their peers study, engineered through goals, adaptations, and instruction derived from the individualized program.
Environment, Behavior, and the Independence Skills
The learning-environment competency covers structuring settings where students with disabilities can learn, and behavioral intervention within the legal and ethical frame the foundations competency establishes. The closing selected-response competency covers the skills that define the field’s long purpose: communication, social participation, and functional living — the abilities that carry a student toward independence in school and beyond it, taught deliberately rather than left to incidental learning.
Analysis, Synthesis, and Application — the Constructed Response
The extended assignment requires the analysis of one or more artifacts — the framework’s own examples are samples of student work, assessment results, an excerpt from an individualized education program form, and teacher notes — and it counts for a fifth of the score. The framework’s design estimate allows up to 60 minutes for it.
Who takes this test — and where does it sit in certification?
The candidates are prospective teachers of students with disabilities across New York’s grade bands — early childhood, childhood, middle childhood, and adolescence certificates — a population in which dual certification is the norm rather than the exception: most candidates pair the specialty with a general education certificate at their band and therefore sit Field 060 alongside a Multi-Subject assessment or another Content Specialty Test, with the Educating All Students test common to the whole pattern. The exact requirement for a specific certificate is confirmed through NYSTCE’s testing-requirements guidance; this page covers Field 060 itself.
How is the sitting approached — and what happens after it?
The appointment runs 3 hours and 30 minutes: 15 minutes of tutorial and nondisclosure agreement, then 3 hours and 15 minutes of testing time paced by the candidate. The framework’s design estimates give the intended internal rhythm — up to about 135 minutes across the selected-response items and up to about 60 minutes for the constructed response — and the artifact-based written assignment is the pacing item to protect. Results arrive as a scaled score from 400 to 600 against the 520 passing score, with performance by competency. A candidate below the line has three distinct paths to weigh, set out in full in the companion guide: retake Field 060 after the 30-day wait; check eligibility for NYSED’s certification exam waiver, which covers candidates within half a standard error of measurement of the passing score on a Content Specialty Test; or, if the score falls between 512 and 519 and the sitting was on or after February 26, 2025, the NYSTCE Flex Students with Disabilities (615) written submission. The companion exam guide walks the competencies, the artifact assignment, and a study plan in full.
What makes this test demanding?
First, the double density of its heavy blocks: assessment and instruction are each a fifth of the score, and each demands the other — an assessment answer that cannot become a program, or an instructional answer with no assessment basis, is the half-answer the distractors are built from. Second, procedural precision: eligibility, evaluation, program development, and placement each have an order and safeguards, and items are keyed on the sequence, so candidates who know the field’s values but not its procedures lose those marks. Third, the artifact assignment’s realism: the documents are the profession’s real documents, redacted into a case, and a general response instead of an analysis of the documents provided has answered an easier question than the one set.
An honest note on format
PassProfessor practice works in the test’s own formats — selected-response items across the six content competencies and the extended artifact-analysis assignment — because that is what NYSTCE administers. NYSTCE does not release its examination questions, and no provider can offer them. Practice results are a study gauge: a way to see which competency is thin while there is time to strengthen it, not a prediction of an examination outcome.
How should you use this page while the program is in the works?
- Join the notify list today. Enrollment is not open yet, and the notify list is how you hear the moment it is. While you wait, read the exam guide — it walks the format, each competency, and a study plan in full.
- Sequence Field 060 against your other tests deliberately. Dual-certificate candidates owe a grade-band assessment as well; the common pattern — EAS first, specialty depth after — lets each sitting build on the last.
- Practise on the real document types. Individualized education program excerpts, assessment summaries, and student work samples are the constructed response’s native evidence; fluency in reading them is a trainable, schedulable skill.
- Learn the procedures as sequences, not facts. Referral to evaluation to eligibility to program to placement to review: candidates who hold the chain can reason through items set at any link of it.
Frequently asked questions
What is the Students with Disabilities CST? Field 060 of the NYSTCE program: the Content Specialty Test for New York students with disabilities teaching certificates, comprising 90 selected-response items across six content competencies and one extended constructed-response item requiring analysis of artifacts.
What score passes Field 060? A scaled score of 520, on the 400–600 range. Scores are reported with pass status and performance by competency.
What does the test cost? The NYSTCE test fee for Field 060 is $122, paid to NYSTCE at registration — a third-party examination fee, separate from any PassProfessor program.
What is NYSTCE Flex Students with Disabilities (615)? A separate NYSTCE performance assessment, listed by NYSTCE under its Flex assessments rather than as this Content Specialty Test. It requires one written submission and is open only to candidates who took Field 060 on or after February 26, 2025 and scored between 512 and 519. A candidate who passes Flex 615 meets the relevant CST requirement. Field 060 remains the current Students with Disabilities CST, and this program prepares candidates for it.
Which competencies carry the most weight? Assessment and Individual Program Planning and Instructional Planning and Delivery to Promote Students’ Success in the General Curriculum, at 23 items and 20% of the total score each — together with the constructed response, also 20%. The remaining four content competencies carry 11 items and 10% each.
What artifacts does the constructed response use? The framework names samples of student work, assessment results, an excerpt from an individualized education program form, and teacher notes as its artifact types. The assignment requires analysis of one or more such artifacts within a scenario.
How long is the test? 3 hours and 15 minutes of testing time inside a 3-hour-and-30-minute appointment that includes 15 minutes for the tutorial and nondisclosure agreement.
How is Field 060 different from the disabilities material on the EAS? Depth and role. The Educating All Students test examines every teacher’s working knowledge of teaching students with disabilities. Field 060 examines the specialist’s practice: assessment and eligibility, individualized program planning with the Committee on Special Education, specially designed instruction, behavioral intervention, and the communication, social, and functional skills curriculum.
What happens if I score just below 520? Three program routes exist, each with its own rules on the administering bodies’ sites: retaking Field 060 after the 30-day wait; NYSED’s certification exam waiver for candidates within 0.5 standard error of measurement of the passing score on a Content Specialty Test; and, for scores of 512–519 on a Field 060 taken on or after February 26, 2025, the NYSTCE Flex Students with Disabilities (615) written submission.
When will the PassProfessor Students with Disabilities CST program open? The program is in the works and enrollment is not open yet. Join the notify list on this page and you will be emailed when enrollment opens; the companion exam guide is available to read now for planning your preparation.
Is PassProfessor affiliated with NYSED or NYSTCE? No. PassProfessor is an independent preparation provider, not affiliated with NYSED, NYSTCE, Pearson, or NES, and this program is preparation only. The certificate is granted by the New York State Education Department on its own requirements.