Here are some potential questions that all stakeholders should ask schools, teachers, parents, and administrators based on the issues raised in the article:
For Schools and Administrators:
- How are we using data to track academic progress and guide instruction for our special education students? Do IEP goals align with standards and link to intervention plans?
- Are we overidentifying minorities, ELL students, and those from lower socioeconomic backgrounds for special education? How can we reduce bias in referrals and evaluations?
- Do our special education services focus more on compliance and legal protection or on meaningful academic outcomes? How do we build in accountability for learning results?
- Are students remaining in special education throughout their academic careers, or are they transitioned out when possible? What is our process for evaluating when mainstreaming is appropriate?
- How equitably are special education resources allocated? Do high-need schools and students receive adequate support? Is funding following the student?
For Teachers:
- Do I view special education students through a "deficit lens" or focus on their strengths and potential? How do my expectations and mindset affect instruction?
- Are my IEP goals concrete and measurable? Do I regularly collect data to track student progress and adjust strategies?
- Am I focused more on procedural compliance or on tailoring instruction and accommodation to promote growth? Do I have flexibility to exercise professional judgment?
- Do I spend more time on paperwork than personalized teaching? How can I maximize time working directly with students?
- How do I encourage inclusion and interaction between general education and special education students? Could I partner more with general ed teachers?
For Parents:
- Is my child's IEP filled with boilerplate language or concrete goals tailored to their needs? How can I better advocate for specificity?
- How much progress is my child making toward IEP goals? How often is this progress monitored and reported?
- Is my child receiving inclusive instruction alongside typical peers when appropriate? How do I work with the school to facilitate mainstreaming?
- Have I been viewed as an adversary or partner? How can I enhance collaboration with the IEP team?
- Is my child developing academic skills or just receiving custodial services? What enrichment programs or supplemental supports could help them thrive?
These questions aim to spur productive self-reflection and action steps to better serve special needs students. Collectively, we must hold ourselves accountable. Sean D. Taylor M.Ed
Nearly seven million children - fully 14% of the student population - now receive special education services. Yet few are excelling academically. On the 2019 NAEP, just 17% of special education students scored proficient in reading, compared to 36% of general education students. This, despite the fact that special education students receive double the per-pupil spending.
So where are the billions spent on special education going, if not to effective instruction and interventions?
IEPs: Boilerplate Gibberish
At the core of special education is the Individualized Education Program (IEP). This legal document is supposed to outline customized goals, accommodations, services, and instruction tailored to each student's unique needs. In practice, most IEPs are cookie-cutter documents filled with edu-speak but little substance.
Vague goals like "improve reading comprehension" and "increase math reasoning ability" are the norm. These boilerplate objectives are virtually impossible to measure and track. Yet we continue going through the motions, holding laborious IEP meetings where teams spend hours regurgitating the same generic plans from year to year.
This complacency continues because there is no accountability. With no tracking of academic growth tied to IEP goals, nobody bothers to see if students are actually making progress. When the only metric is compliance with bureaucratic procedures, actual learning falls by the wayside.
Perverse Incentives: Bloated Identification Rates
Why are school districts so eager to identify children for special education if not to provide them with meaningful services? One need only look at the perverse incentives created by high-stakes accountability measures.
The push for standardized testing and teacher evaluation based on test scores has put intense pressure on schools to boost proficiency rates. Classifying more students as learning disabled offers a convenient loophole. Once placed in special education, these children are exempted from standardized testing reporting on state and federal metrics. Voila! School test scores rise, even if students are not receiving effective support. Students on IEPs do not have to meet these standards to graduate either.
Gaming the system comes at the expense of children's education. Learning disabilities, which make up over a third of special education cases, have become a catch-all for low achievement. Moreover, political correctness has created a culture where any child struggling academically may be funneled into special education, whether due to a true disability, disciplinary issues, lack of English mastery, or just poor teaching.
Once identified, children often remain in special education throughout their schooling, even when their issues could have been resolved with early intervention. Again, schools have political and financial incentives to maintain large special education rolls. With billions in state and federal dollars allocated for these students, swelling the ranks becomes irresistible.
There are now almost twice as many special education students as there were in 1995, even though general education enrollment has risen by just 7%. Can we really believe learning disabilities are soaring? Or is special education becoming a dumping ground to hide those who make education more challenging?
Warehousing: Where Accountability Goes to Die
Sadly, special education has become more about compliance than academic achievement. Once students are identified, the priority becomes documentation - drafting legally bulletproof IEPs and providing the required minutes of service. Whether students are actually learning is secondary.
Unlike general education, there are no real accountability measures for special education student growth and outcomes. In 2004, Congress gutted much of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act's (IDEA) accountability provisions, reducing schools' responsibility for special education academic performance.
With no penalties for failure, schools focus on procedural compliance, not meaningful improvement. Special education becomes the place where accountability goes to die. Once students are classified, educators can essentially wash their hands of ensuring they achieve academic proficiency.
This marginalization of special education students enables a two-tiered system of academic expectations to persist. General education students are pushed toward high standards and college readiness. Special education students are simply expected to exist, receiving custodial services rather than intense remediation and accommodation to close achievement gaps.
The results are sobering. Just 65% of special education students graduate high school, compared to a national average of 85%. Of those who do earn a diploma, only 20% enroll in academic college programs. Clearly, the status quo is failing far too many children with special needs.
Excessive Legal Wrangling: Roadblocks to Progress
Trying to secure adequate, appropriate education for a special needs child frequently descends into an epic battle against school districts. Risk-averse administrators adhere rigidly to eligibility criteria and service minutes, often refusing supports until ordered by a hearing officer or court.
Excessive legal wrangling over IEP details becomes a distraction from actual teaching and learning. Instructors lack autonomy to make professional judgements to help students, instead having to defer to procedural compliance. Teachers of the learning disabled must become masters of bureaucratic red tape just to do their jobs.
Even engaged parents find themselves out-gunned by districts' legal firepower. Seeking private therapies or extra services is an uphill fight when schools oppose them. Lengthy disputes that should focus on a child's needs end up revolving around arcane regulatory definitions and technicalities.
Litigation has secured the educational rights of many students with disabilities. But it has also led to an arms race of rules and regs that too often inhibits flexibility and innovation. Students get lost in the shuffle of procedures and legal positioning. There must be a better way forward.
The Forgotten Children: Underserved Populations
Certain special education populations find themselves particularly ill-served by the current system. Many groups - including English Language Learners (ELL), students with Emotional and Behavior Disorders (EBD), children from racial minorities, those in foster care, and the economically disadvantaged - are both overidentified for special education and underserved by it.
English Language Learners
ELL students are 70% more likely to be assigned to special education services. While some certainly have true disabilities, often language and academic struggles are confused. Children may be labeled developmentally delayed just for exhibiting the natural language acquisition process.
Once designated special needs, ELL students languish there. Fewer than 20% will be reclassified to general education within 3 years, compared to over 30% of non-ELL students. Too often, these children are viewed through a deficit lens. With proper linguistic development support, many could thrive in mainstream classes.
Students with Emotional and Behavioral Disorders\
A child who misbehaves or acts out is not necessarily disabled, yet many are treated as such. African American students, in particular, are twice as likely to be labeled EBD compared to white students exhibiting similar behaviors.
Once designated EBD, children receive predominantly punitive interventions rather than therapeutic supports. They are more likely to be isolated in restrictive settings and have highest dropout rates of any special ed subgroup. Impulsivity is punished rather than patience taught, further excluding troubled students from academic success.
Minorities and the Economically Disadvantaged
Disturbing racial and economic disparities pervade special education identification. Black students are 20% more likely to receive special education services. Children from low-income families are 50% more likely to be designated special needs.
Yet minority and poor children often receive lower quality IEP services. Because of funding inequalities, poorer neighborhoods cluster large special education populations into few overwhelmed classrooms. Special education becomes permanent remediation, not a pathway back to academic excellence.
The most vulnerable students are getting lost in an indifferent system. We are failing marginalized children twice - first by over-identifying them as disabled when often environmental factors are the issue. Then, once labeled, they receive subpar support that entrenches stigmatization and failure.
True Reform: Restoring the Promise of Special Education
How can we reform this broken system? First, by remembering the ideals that launched special education in the first place.
In 1975, Congress promised customized and inclusive education for children with disabilities, vowing they would have instruction tailored to their unique needs alongside typical peers. This affirmed the dignity and worth of all children, no matter their challenges. It acknowledged that fair treatment is not always equal treatment, and equity requires responding to individual needs.
That guiding purpose has been lost in subsequent bureaucratization. Today, we speak of compliance, not conscience. We have made special education about serves and minutes, not students. Process trumps purpose.
Restoring the promise of special education requires returning to core ethical commitments:
- All children deserve equal dignity, worth, and opportunity to reach their potential. Disability does not define a child's limits.
- Children with special needs should receive intensive intervention and accommodation to maximize academic and social growth in the mainstream. Special education is a service, not a place.
- Form must follow function. The purpose of rules and regulations is to protect children's rights, not an end unto themselves. Process exists to serve pupils, not inhibit their progress.
- Educators must be empowered to make professional judgements to meet each child's requirements, not merely fulfill quotas of time and paperwork. They are the linchpins to success.
- Experimentation and innovation are essential. We need the flexibility to find new solutions, not just recycle ineffective interventions. Progress emerges from creativity, not rote compliance.
- Schools must be held accountable for meaningful academic outcomes, not just bureaucratic markers. Testing and data should inform teaching, not constrain it.
- Parents must be viewed as partners, not problems. By working collaboratively with families, schools can enhance every child's education.
- Resources should be allocated based on equity, not equality. Historically disadvantaged students require more support. Funding must follow the student to meet their needs.
- Policy and pedagogy should emphasize inclusion. Children with disabilities are general education students first. Special education is a supplementary service.
Restoring these moral commitments can reorient special education into the effective, ethical system it was meant to be. The path forward requires dialogue, not further polarization. We must bring all voices - families, teachers, administrators, policymakers - together to find solutions.
Of course, reforming special education is no easy task. Entrenched mindsets and bureaucracies resist change. But our most vulnerable children cannot wait. The moral obligation is clear: we must come together and demand better on their behalf.
This will require great effort and courage. It will require acknowledging harsh truths - that despite best intentions, we have allowed special education to degrade into a deficit-focused bureaucracy. We will need to listen humbly, discard worn-out assumptions, and summon the will to change.
But this is not beyond us. Problems of practice created by humans can be solved. By returning to first principles of inclusion, flexibility and empowerment, we can reclaim the original vision of special education. We can build a system that unlocks every child's potential, no matter their challenges.
The task is immense, the stakes immense. Yet if we commit to equity and justice, with compassion and tenacity, progress is possible. Our children deserve no less. The time for excuses is over. The work begins now.
No comments:
Post a Comment
Thank you!