Cultural sensitivity and responsiveness are being advocated in reading assessments to reduce the impact of community speech patterns (CSP) on the accuracy of miscue analysis. This study, motivated by a high incidence of retention in 1st grade in a local school district, investigated whether CSP among students affected reading outcomes and educational decisions based on them. Social constructivism and cultural responsiveness undergird this study. Key guiding questions concerned the accuracy of oral reading scores and their impact on reading group placements, comprehension, and student retention. A quantitative repeated-measures design was applied to secondary archived data from the 2011-2012 school year. Specifically, previously identified oral reading miscues and reading group placements were re-evaluated, without penalizing CSP miscues as errors, to yield a second set of scores and placements for 93 1st grade students. In addition, 6 1st grade teachers completed a questionnaire anonymously regarding criteria for retention. Significant differences were observed between the archived and rescored data, but not between the comprehension scores of students who read with CSPs and those who did not. All the teachers reported believing that the Developmental Reading Assessment (DRA) level was most influential in determining student retention. Professional development was recommended and designed for retraining teachers on scoring DRAs with more cultural sensitivity and responsiveness for CSPs in the classroom. The implications for social change from this research include using assessment scoring guidelines that do not penalize students who use diverse dialect but rather increase reading achievement of at risk students who talk and read with different dialects. [The dissertation citations contained here are published with the permission of ProQuest LLC. Further reproduction is prohibited without permission. Copies of dissertations may be obtained by Telephone (800) 1-800-521-0600. Web page: http://bibliotheek.ehb.be:2222/en-US/products/dissertations/individuals.shtml.]