Racial Inequality In Special Education:
Implications For Idea’s Reauthorization

A Forum — September 23, 2002

Background

The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA), enacted in 1975 and amended most recently in 1997, emphasized the requirement that all students be held to high standards. As we approach reauthorization of IDEA, we find that despite great gains for many students, substantial racial inequity persists. In 1998, approximately 1.5 million minority children were identified as having mental retardation, emotional disturbance or a specific learning disability, with some minority groups identified at more than twice the rate of white children. African American children experience the largest degree of overrepresentation. Nationally, African American children were almost three times as likely as white children to be labeled “mentally retarded.”
Once identified, African American and Latino children are at far greater risk of being segregated from their non-disabled peers and educated in a substantially separate setting. Systemic problems with special education identification and placement put minority students disproportionately at risk of receiving inadequate or inappropriate special education services. Thus, minority children deemed eligible for special education are in double jeopardy of discrimination on the basis of both race and disability.

This forum featured the release of Harvard University Civil Rights Project’s new book, Racial Inequity in Special Education, and included briefings by co-editors Gary Orfield, co-director of The Civil Rights Project (CRP), and Daniel J. Losen, CRP Legal and Policy Research Associate, along with contributing author Darren Woodruff, Senior Research Analyst, American Institutes for Research. Following the authors’ briefing, two Congressional spokespersons, Roberto Rodriguez, Education Advisor to Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, and Charles Hokanson, Professional Staff Member on the House Committee on Education and the Workforce, offered their comments and discussed legislative remedies as Congress moves forward with the reauthorization of IDEA.

Forum Summary

Gary Orfield reported increasing inequity in American education, specifically in special education. While special education is a “great American accomplishment,” it can be misused. Racial Inequity in Special Education is about inequities for some groups of minorities in certain subparts of special education. Orfield did not suggest that special education programs should be cut; rather, he argued that access to effective special education supports and services needs to be equitable.

Daniel J. Losen described the scope of the problem of minority overrepresentation in special education. Black students are nearly three times as likely as white students to be identified as mentally retarded nationally, and in some states are over 4.5 times as likely. American Indian students are about 1.3 times more likely than whites to be identified as mentally retarded; Asian and Hispanic students are only half as likely as whites to be so identified. However, when it comes to the likelihood of being identified as having a specific learning disability, African American students are only about 1.3 times as likely to be identified as white students. American Indians are 1.5 times as likely as whites to be identified as having a specific learning disability, while Asian students in this catergory are less than half as likely and Hispanic students are about equally likely as whites.

A common explanation for these disparities is poverty. But while poverty and related factors correlate highly with the incidence of disability, once socio-economic factors are accounted for, the effect of gender and race remains significant. In fact, as factors associated with wealth and better schooling increase, black males are at greater risk of being disproportionately labeled “mentally retarded.” Black children, and especially black males, are also at increased risk for mental retardation and emotional disturbance identification as the white population of a district increases.

Losen reported huge differences in “risk ratios” for identification of mental retardation versus “hard” disability categories (e.g., hearing or visual impairment) between black and white students. For example, in Connecticut, black students are 4.76 times more likely than white students to be identified as mentally retarded, but only 1.22 and 1.60 times more likely to be identified as having, respectively, hearing or visual impairment. African American students are much more likely to be identified as mentally retarded in certain states, most of them southern states. Nationally, students identified with specific learning disabilities outnumber those identified as having mental retardation by about six to one; in four states—Arkansas, Georgia, Kentucky, and Ohio— more African American children are identified as mentally retarded than as having a specific learning disability. There are no states where this is true for any other racial or ethnic group.

Losen discussed the significance of the mental retardation categorization versus a specific learning disability, pointing out that more than 80 percent of students categorized as mentally retarded are educated in resource rooms or substantially separate settings, while only about half of students with specific learning disabilities are educated in such separate settings. Thus, overrepresentation for mental retardation significantly increases the risk for black students of being educated in less inclusive settings.

Darren Woodruff presented information to suggest that for minority students school itself may be a “risk factor.” Many schools are operating in ways that contribute to in-school and post-school failure of students of color. African American students are disproportionately identified for emotional disturbance; experience disproportionate placement in segregated classrooms and alternative schools once identified; and experience high suspension, expulsion, and failure rates in school. These are part of a process of negative outcomes for African American youth which goes beyond schools to include the correctional system and high unemployment.

Daniel Losen made the following recommendations for the reauthorization of IDEA:

• Collect and report data from every school and district, showing identification and placement rates by race, gender, and LEP status.
• Require technical assistance, incentives for compliance, and administrative intervention to remedy gross disparities.
• Ensure minority children have equitable access to high quality teachers.
• Provide greater supports for inclusive classrooms.
• Raise academic performance for the most disadvantaged students and track graduation rates.
• Improve early intervention.
• Protect existing rights and remedies and ensure that disciplined students receive a free appropriate education in the least restrictive environment appropriate.
• Boost the power of parents to seek remedies through parent education and provide private right of action.
• Guarantee that states receive full and adequate funding.
• Ratchet-up federal oversight and enforcement.

Without a clear message from the Federal Government, argued Losen, states and districts will not remedy the problem.

Roberto Rodriguez stated that we need to approach the IDEA reauthorization with the mindset that we have not delivered on the promise of IDEA until we ensure that all students get an appropriate education. The Senate has been quite productive regarding reauthorizing IDEA. The issues most important to Sen. Kennedy in IDEA are: 1) ensuring adequate enforcement of the law for all students, 2) improving the quality of personnel and personnel preparation, and 3) improving student services to support skills development to succeed and transition out of the special education system. Rodriguez argued that we must increase funding for special education to meet the federal promise.

Charles Hokanson discussed the IDEA reauthorization hearings, which began in 2001. The first hearing was on the overrepresentation of African Americans in special education. After six hearings, the growing bipartisan consensus is that there are areas that need to be addressed to improve and build upon previous reforms. The Committee is focusing on ways to 1) increase accountability and ensure quality for all students, 2) reduce the paperwork burden on administrators and teachers, 3) improve early intervention strategies, 4) restore trust between schools and parents, and 5) improve school safety with discipline provisions in IDEA.

In the question and comment portion of the forum, audience members discussed:

• The importance of not stigmatizing special education students
• The importance of fully analyzing the roots of racial inequity in special education in order to determine the most effective policy solutions
• The crucial need for professional development and training for teachers
• The critical significance of early intervention for students with behavior problems

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