If early signs are predictive, the bipartisanship President George W. Bush actively nurtured during Congressional consideration of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) may be more readily available when Congress takes up the Individuals with Disabilities in Education Act (IDEA).
While the IDEA will not be up for reauthorization for another year, two Washington think-tanks recently met in the aisle to collaborate on a preliminary review of the special education issues Congress will likely address.
The Thomas B. Fordham Foundation (TBF), led by former Reagan administration official Chester E. Finn Jr., and the Progressive Policy Institute (PPI), a “New Democrat” organization whose education director, Andrew Rotherham, once advised President Bill Clinton, recently released a volume of 14 papers by commissioned authors that investigates myriad questions surrounding the IDEA. The report is called Rethinking Special Education for a New Century.
The 25 year-old IDEA provides special services to some 6 million students nationwide at an estimated cost of $35 to $60 billion annually–between $5,800 and $10,000 per child. While “many people endorse special education’s intentions and hail its accomplishments, few are happy with how it’s actually working,” explains Finn.
But few are willing to challenge the IDEA’s precepts for fear of being labeled insensitive or worse; the program is often considered the untouchable “third rail” of education reform.
Bringing Research to Bear
Rethinking Special Education is intended to jumpstart the process of reauthorizing the IDEA by presenting a wide range of studies, findings, and recommendations to inform policymakers about the successes and failures of the program. For example, the report finds
- Millions of students are improperly identified as “learning disabled” when in fact they simply were not properly taught to read at a young age.
- Race is a key factor in determining who is enrolled in special education programs.
- IDEA creates “perverse” incentives for parents to want their children in special education programs.
- Standards-based reforms are prompting some schools to assign more students to special education classes so as to exclude them from participating in proficiency tests.
Full Funding or Fair?
The program’s weaknesses notwithstanding, some members of Congress are eager to increase federal spending on IDEA sooner rather than later.
Senators Chuck Hagel (R-Nebraska) and Tom Harkin (D-Iowa) successfully amended the ESEA on the Senate floor on May 3 to increase the federal contribution to IDEA by $2.5 billion each year over the next six years. That funding increase would bring IDEA, for the first time, to the full amount Congress originally authorized for the program in 1975.
President Bush and Education Secretary Rod Paige both have indicated they would prefer that the “full funding” debate take place as part of the IDEA reauthorization process, not before. Congress left the Hagel/Harkin measure out of the budget bill that would have provided the funds, making it unlikely the measure would remain in the final ESEA reauthorization.
The Fordham Foundation/Progressive Policy Institute report supports the notion of the federal government paying its fair share of special education costs. The report also recommends, however, that any increase in federal funding be accompanied by significant changes in the structure of IDEA. Among the recommendations offered in Rethinking Special Education:
- moving away from a “one size fits all” mentality and encouraging innovation and flexibility in the provision of services;
- making special education “performance based” and removing the strong emphasis on compliance with regulations;
- focusing on prevention and early intervention whenever possible; and
- streamlining the assortment of special education categories into a few broad groupings.
Kelly Amis is program director for the Thomas B. Fordham Foundation in Washington, DC. Her email address is [email protected].
For more information . . .
The full text of Rethinking Special Education is available at the Web sites of the Thomas B. Fordham Foundation, www.edexcellence.net, and the Progressive Policy Institute, www.ppionline.org.
