Racial Inequality In Special Education

Morgan Freeman once said, “Attacking people with disabilities is the lowest display of power I can think of”. According to the World Report on Disability , there is about 1 billion disabled people, 1 in 10 being children. Educational injustice has been one of the many attackers of children with disabilities. With lack of instructors and admissions, it makes it very difficult for a child with disabilities to reach the same educational and social level as someone in general education. When we focus on disabilities, we normally think of someone with a moderate to severe mental illness, but that is not just it. Someone with a physical injury, such as being in a wheelchair or having vision problems, is considered to be disabled. Children with disabilities
tend to be the most discriminated due to people’s lack of understanding and knowledge about their disabilities’ cause and stigma surrounding it. Statistics even show that a girl with disabilities is at a higher risk of becoming a victim of violence due to cultural barriers and traditional gender roles. Without the proper education and resources, children with disabilities tend to be left behind academically, economically and socially.
According to Global Partnership, an estimated 90% of children with disabilities come from low income areas and do not have access to a school education. Alongside this, disabled children and less likely to begin school compared to their general educated peers. This is due to schools not offering the proper services fit for their needs. Services such as lack of proper training of teachers, a detrimental environment, and lack of learning resources and facilities. Even if a student is enrolled in a special education course, they may still be excluded from learning. This is due to many schools not having the proper equipment fitted for them. For example, a disabled child in a wheelchair will need elevators and ramps to enter the building and get to their classes. By restraining them the right to an education, a lifelong impact is occurring. Through lack of proper education, disabled children’s learning, achievement and employment opportunities are skewed. This then becomes a domino effect, where the child’s economic, social and human development becomes troubled as well.
Racial inequality in special education raises a much larger concern about the inequality in education.
Data shows that minority children with disabilities often experience a low-quality curriculum, inadequate services and unnecessary isolation from their nondisabled peers. Daniel J. Losen observed that racial, ethnic and gender gaps are a result of the many complex factors within educational injustice. Some of these factors were due to unconscious racial bias expressed on the behalf of school authorities, resource inequalities, an unjustified reliance on evaluation tools and a student’s IQ and the power differences between minority parents and school officials. The education department has noticed that minority students, some as young as four years old, face unequal treatment from their school staff and administrators. Alongside this, analysts have found that many minority students are more likely to be taught by a first year instructor, compared to someone with experience. Meaning that more minority children with disabilities are treated as test experiments to see if a teacher is qualified or not, not taking into account the negative impact that it may hold over the student. Studies show that African American children are identified as mentally retarded or emotionally disturbed 1.5 times to 4 times the rate compared to a white student. Also, emotionally disturbed black children receive less counseling hours and related services compared to disabled white children. With the
lack of an early intervention, the child may develop behavioral problems and will contribute to the racial disproportion in the juvenile justice system.This brings the question of whether misclassification may have occurred. For the past 30 years, surveys conducted by the U.S. Department of Education and the Office of Civil Rights, have shown an overrepresentation of minority students with disabilities in the public school population . While Blacks are overrepresented, Latinx and Asian American children are being under identified in the cognitive disability area. This leads to question whether the special education needs of these children are being met. Losen and Orfield argue that disabled children are receiving tremendous benefits from today’s special education system.
They state that the children are being guaranteed their right to a free and appropriate public education, which gives them a higher chance of getting into secondary school and college. Although this may be true, we must pay attention to the difference between equality and equity. Equality is occurring by most , disabled and non-disabled, children getting the opportunity to receive a public education. The trouble with this is that not every child with a disability is getting this opportunity. This can be due to the school not having the resources fit for the child or it could be a socioeconomic factor. Instead schools, legislators and enforcement agents should focus on the ways they can provide equity. When forming policies or rules, students with needs aren’t normally prioritized. Special education should be considered as part of the whole education system, not just a side group. Most minority students with disabilities are more likely to be removed from their general educational environment and placed in a more restricted one. With the thought that they’ll learn at an easier pace, studies show that students with special needs actually benefit the most when they’re being taught in a less restricted environment. By having more trained teachers and professionals, you can have students with special needs in general education classes, just receiving extra help
and attention. Not only will they be learning at a pace they can handle and reach the same educational level as their nondisabled peers, but they won’t receive a negative social impact as well.