Special Education Not Draining Schools

It has been readily apparent to me that special education has not been the drain on the school systems that administrators and the media claim. Finally there is a data-driven research paper from the conservative Hoover Institute that bears out the facts of the costs for special education.  The results are startling only in that the data finally drives a stake in the heart of the anecdotal and fantastic claims that special education and parents of children with special needs are ruining the education system for "the rest of us."  The bottom line conclusion that I draw from this report is that there is a core prejudice and bias against children with special needs that has not been overcome in the generation that IDEA has been in existence.  The media and lobby groups for schools tend to perpetuate ugly myths to the detriment of students with special needs. Well, here is the data to fight  the unfounded claims once and for all.

The main findings are as follows:

• Private placements account for slightly more than 1% of all placements and many of these placements were initated by the school district. If the totally dysfunctional D.C. school system were factored out the number would be much lower;
• Private placements are often a cost-effective means to educate children with special needs. [In my experience schools are sometimes willing to make a problem go away if that means funding a private placement instead of making an LRE in-district work];
• Total cost for special education represented roughly 8.3% of total education spending in 1977 and as the total spending for education generally has increased over the decades, the costs for special education adjusted for inflation is roughly the same in 2003;
• The majority of parents of children with special needs are unhappy with the services and placement that their children are receiving, but they rarely file complaints or fight with schools; so much for the cottage industry of special education attorneys making a mint from suing schools.

So the next time a school district complains about the cost of this service or that placement and how your child is ruining it for all the rest of the children, clobber them with this report.  They will have no objective data of any kind to fire back at you and you will walk out smiling !

Comments

[Kathryn]

Great, GREAT post. Thanks for this.

[Sue Keller]

This research paper needs to be brought to the attention of the mainstream media, so that the public as well as school admininstrators can get a reality check. How can we get attention paid to this important paper in the national media?

[Cyn]

I've read this paper a couple of times with the thought in my mind of how my own school district is concerned about how high the current percentages are for the special needs program are. In short the superintendant feels that these are too high and need to be addressed (brought down).

Just how does one go about decreasing these percentages?

Are school districts more concerned about their egos and reputations if children are recommended for outside placement? Is money the real issue?

What is the cost difference for providing services for (certain) children in-district versus out of district?

What about the child who actually needs to be in another environment? What about the frivilous cost of lawyers, mediation, and due process; all to avoid the necessary placement?

Who's wasting money?

And yes, parents find out far too late that they could have exercised their parental rights and filed complaints or acted more proactively. Sometimes by that point in time, they are far too busy "advocating" more aggressively than ever anticipated.