The New Push for Excellence: Widening the Schism between Regular and Special Education

Abstract

At least half of the children called learning disabled are misidentified; they need help in school but do not warrant the label handicapped. The costs of special services for these children are excessive because much of the extra resources are eaten up by the bureaucratic requirements of assessment and staffing. The authors of the foregoing articles are commended for their altruism because they are willing to give up power, to relinquish the separate dominion of special education. If special education were merged with regular education, children's needs could be met without bureaucratic costs. However, the national reports are an impediment to the merger of special and regular education because accountability demands make classroom teachers less willing to take responsibility for hard-to-teach children.