For decades, public schools have been required by law to provide a “free and appropriate education” to children with disabilities. The system for making that happen is a complicated web of acronyms and regulations that govern services and support. We call it special education.
Special education refers to a set of federal and state laws and regulations designed to educate millions of children with disabilities and serve as a safety net for those unable to take advantage of the mainstream school curriculum without help.
“The special education laws are a recognition that students with disabilities aren’t able to access an education the way other students can without special supports,” says Ron hager, managing attorney for education and employment at the National Disability Rights Network. “Special education gives students with disabilities what they need to be successful.”
Special Education by the Numbers Special education in the United States is governed by the landmark Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, sometimes called IDEA. The law states that children with cognitive, physical, emotional and medical conditions are entitled to special services, supports, technologies and individualized planning and goals outside the general education curriculum.
More than 7 million students, or about 14% of those ages 3 to 21 in public schools, were entitled to special services and accommodations to help with learning in the 2019-20 school year, according to the National Center for Education Statistics.
The percentage of students in special education also varies by state, with differences likely due to inconsistencies in how states determine eligibility, as well as challenges that come with diagnosing disabilities. New York serves the largest percentage of disabled students. Nationwide, the system helps children with disabilities gain a basic education, acquire life skills and integrate with their peers.
During the pandemic, when schooling moved online, that support continued in many cases, says Lindsay Kubatzky, director of policy and advocacy at the National Center for Learning Disabilities.
“As school systems navigated the pandemic, [special education laws] ensured that educators continued to provide high-quality, tailored education to students with disabilities, regardless of circumstances,” he wrote in an email. “In any learning setting, students are still guaranteed the accommodations and resources they need to be successful. The law protects the rights of students with disabilities even in the most challenging of times.”
However, hager says there is still a great deal of work ahead.“During the pandemic, no student really got what they needed,” he says.
The majority of students with disabilities -- about two-thirds -- are male, according to data from the Pew Research Center on the 2017-18 school year.
Among all students receiving special education services that year, 34% had a specific learning disability, generally defined as a difference in the way they think, speak, read, write or spell. Dyslexia, a learning disorder that impacts the ability to read, is perhaps the most commonly known learning disability. But over the years, other key challenges have been identified, such as dysgraphia, which impacts writing, and dyscalculia, which impacts math and related activities.
Another 19% had a speech or language impairment. Autistic children made up about 10% of the nation’s disabled students in the 2017-18 school year, compared to about 1.5% in 2000-01, according to NCES data.
“It used to be that one in 10,000 people had autism, and now it is one in 100,” Hager says. “If you ask five different people why that is, you will get six different answers, including environmental factors. But the fact is, autism and the need for services is much more on people’s radars. And there is an understanding that autism is a spectrum, in which you can be high-functioning but also need special education services, particularly social-emotional services.”
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