Taking a Look at Special Education

The special education programs in the United States have been designed to help children with special needs learn easier and fit in better with the education program. Unfortunately, many minority students get caught up in the mix and don’t get the proper attention they deserve. Furthermore, minority students are seriously over-represented in the educational programs. Many minority students are misdiagnosed and put into special education programs when in fact; they do not have a learning disability. This has become a growing problem in this country because it is seen as the easy way out. Schools all over the U.S. are doing this in order to not have to properly test and evaluate students for learning problems.

The amount of people who live with disabilities is a controversial number. Depending on what law and diagnostic tools used, a person may have a visible disability, or one that may lie beneath the surface of his or her appearance. Some people believe that the term “disability” is merely a label use to hold back, or prescribe helplessness. Meanwhile, individuals who have been properly diagnosed with disabilities struggle to maintain respect and acceptance every day. In plain language, there is a lot of misunderstanding between people with disabilities and those without. It is firstly important to get everyone on the same page regarding the definition of disability.

When Public Law 94-142 was passed in 1975 it had a positive impact on the education for children with disabilities. Millions of children in the United States were supported by the law. These children had previously been excluded entirely from the education system.

The problem of disproportionate numbers of minority students in special education can be attributed to a report by Lloyd Dunn in 1968 (as cited in Skiba et al., 2008) even though discrimination was evident long before that in America. The phenomenon of disproportionality as it relates to students from minority backgrounds being placed in special education refers to the percentage of students receiving services being a higher rate than is expected or that differs significantly from other races. Skiba et al. (2008) discuss the history of various aspects of the civil rights movement as they pertain to the issue of disproportionality of students from minority backgrounds in special education, the measurement tools used to determine the need for special education, the current status of disproportionality, and what factors have contributed to the discrepancies in numbers. Finally, recommendations are offered by the authors on how the existence of disproportionality of students from a minority background can be rectified.

I completed my field experience at Cedar Crest High School in Lebanon, Pennsylvania. Since I serve the role of building principal, I am exposed to many different special education situations on a daily basis. Through this leadership field experience, I have learned a few additional things. It has taught me to stop and listen to what is occurring in our special education classrooms. By completing classroom observations, I was able to focus on the students, instead of rushing through a classroom observation on a teacher.

In what type of school do you teach? (Type an “X” next to the appropriate description; if “other” applies, provide a brief description.)

In 2006, the U.S. Department of Education Office for Civil Rights reported that African American students represent 17.13% of the total public school population while they account for more than 26% of the children served in special education classrooms (Banks, J. j., & Hughes, M. S. 2013). Across all ethnic groups, African American students are at the highest risk of being placed in special education (Harry & Klinger, 2006). According to researcher Banks, once labeled as having a learning disability, African American students are less likely to be given the opportunity to be tested out of the remedial classes. (Banks, J. j., & Hughes, M. S. 2013)

Harry, B., & Klingner, J. K. (2006). Why are so many minority students in special education?: Understanding Race & Disability in Schools. New York, NY: Teachers College Press.

Morgan, an educational researcher says, that the need for minorities to have special education should be greater (Bidwell, 2015). Minorities are affected because they are lacking the services they need that can benefit their educational lives. The problem of disproportionality now extends from the controversy of overrepresentation and underrepresentation of African Americans in special education, to the availability and effectiveness of interventions and teaching methods provided. This is why there is a high need for

Disproportionate identification of minority students in special education is a major concern in schools today. This paper describes the issues in the assessment process with minority students and how we have arrived at a situation where minorities are being misdiagnosed into special education programs. Additionally, several legal cases are mentioned which show numerous actions and rulings that have tried to correct the disproportionate identification in special education. Some of the legal cases discussed include Larry P. v Riles, Diana v. State Board of Education, and Guadalupe v. Tempe Elementary School, which all significantly impacted special education today. Additionally, the Individual with Disabilities Education Act has enforced

Students from one racial class are often discriminated in different fields of practice, especially in education. Notably, black students have been seen to suffer most based on the statistics from a survey such as that highlighted in Beratan (2008). The issue becomes critical when the group being discriminated has a special need, and the effect is that stigmatization occurs where the learners feel uncomfortable and end up not gaining from the education they are given. According to Hornby (2015), one of the key factors leading to the disproportional placement of black students in special education is the case of overrepresentation in gift and talent schools. This digest presents recommendations that can be used to eliminate disproportional placement and representation in special education.

Education should be a fundamental and constitutional right for everyone. For minorities, this is not always the case. Researching the history of race in America, I question how did this topic develop and why is it still of concern? Consequently, the history of special education among minorities resulted from discrimination and exclusion (Skiba, Simmons, Ritter, Gibb, Rausch, Cuadrado, & Chung, 2008).

When I was asked to reflect on my experiences in EDSE 316 and the fieldwork, I had to think long and hard on how I would sum up four months of classes and fieldwork into four pages. I have learned so much about the various disabilities and how it has change the world of special education. I think a better term would be the “endless possibilities of education”. It wasn’t too long ago when children with disabilities would be stuck in a room in the back of school only to be seen in the beginning and end of the school day. They were the ones who rode the other buses and no one really talked about. This class has allowed me to speak of my own family and how special education impacted my life. I have a brother whose whole life was spent in the special education class, and my own sons with speech and learning disabilities who are now receiving special education services. It also allowed me to reflect on my own participation in the special education program in my early elementary years when I was struggling with my own speech disability. This class gave me the chance to see the timeline of special education, from its earliest beginnings to what it is now.

In order to be a teacher in the State of California an individual need to have a multiple subject, a single subject, student teaching, and teaching credential with a bachelor’s degree or higher from an accredited university. If a teacher would like to work in special education, then a special education credential needs to be obtained with an individualize induction plan. There are also state exams that need to be taking and passed.

If I had to choose someone who taught me by their example, I would have chosen my high school teacher named Mr. Easton. Before explaining the example that my high school teacher Mr. Easton taught me, I want to briefly explain my educational journey. To begin with, my educational journey mainly begins with me being diagnosed (I think that is the right word to use) with various types of learning disabilities as a child. Therefore, during my elementary school years, middle school years, and to my final four-years of high school, I have been placed in both special education classes and non-special education classes.