The Pull of Societal Forces on Special Education

Abstract

Special educators are inclined to believe that what they think and do is having a major impact on the American educational enterprise. Actually, articles such as those by Dunn and by Deno seem to have been merely a part of a larger societal movement, rather than its driving force. One major outside force influencing special education today is the disproportion of minority students in some of the programs, which produces a consequent fear of charges of discrimination (this despite the fact that children must fail in the regular program, either academically or socially, before being assigned to special education). This is, in part, encouraging special educators to put their charges back into the regular classroom and to embrace the idea of inclusion. How inclusion fits into the concept of a differentiated curriculum is a major unsolved issue. In fact, special education has a huge responsibility—as of yet unmet—to provide a developmental and integrated curriculum for its major programs.

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