At the July meeting of the Southern California Special Education Task Force, members discussed how districts were reducing the number of SDCs (Special Day Classes)—-specialized classrooms for students with disabilities who need focused attention and customized learning—- in favor of general education classroom placements for Students with Disabilities. It’s important to note that this is part of a national trend to push mainstreaming and inclusion under what is being framed as integration by many public school districts and charter school corporations.
While we will always support families and students seeking integration and inclusion for their children with disabilities, public schools and charter corporations appear to be using this as a cost-cutting measure, rather than actually attempting to provide placement that meets the individual needs of students with disabilities. This is especially true when schools don’t provide the necessary additional support needed when Students with Disabilities are placed in general education classrooms. As we all know, the SDC’s and other kinds of specialized classes exist for a reason.
Special Ed Connection recently published a short article regarding the GAO’s (Government Accountability Office) report titled: “Special Education: More Students with Disabilities Were Educated in General Education Settings, but State Trends Varied Widely” (GAO-26-107814).
The webpage is here: https://www.gao.gov/products/gao-26-107814
The full report is here: https://www.gao.gov/assets/gao-26-107814.pdf
While the report doesn’t reach the overtly political conclusions we did earlier in this piece, it does note that California is among the states with the largest increase in SWD in general education. While, again, we support all families and students in their efforts to achieve inclusion for their children, this is potentially disturbing given the fact that many recent attempts at “inclusion” have been, in actuality, attempts to further disenfranchise students with disabilities by cutting their access to specialized education.
We will continue to provide updates on the situation.
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