Curious if anyone else feels like "special education" and "accommodation" has gotten complement out of control. It seems like this falls into two broad categories:

1. Forcing students with serious mental or physical problems into non-SPED classes and asking teachers to create "accommodations"

2. Non-SPED students receiving accommodations for normal challenges like getting nervous to speak publicly, anxiety, etc.

I have many friends that are teachers, and they have to spent countless hours on "accommodation" for special needs students. It seems like - much of "murica - the theory is that if we just pretend they're normal they will be versus acknowledging reality and trying to help them where they are as well as over-exaggerating every possibly little mental issue.

Another reason the Chinese and most of the world are kicking our ass in education.

Yes it has gotten out of control.

When you can have a grade level of say 150 students and 40-50 of them are SPED that is a problem.

And don't forget the 504 students with accommodations.

And the English as a second language students (now called EB- Emergent Bilingual because .... well who knows)

And don't forget that there might be a student or two that has a behavior plan as well.....

When you have a class of say 25 and 12 of them have accommodations that is a problem. It is no longer a regular class but a SPED class with regular students mixed in.

Depending on the other two groups sizes at a school a teacher could have 25 students and every single one of them could have some sort of accommodation. Even if it is just 12 sped, 5 EB and 4 kids with 504 that is still the majority of the class out of 25.

Inclusion is a joke. This is where an aide or sometimes teacher comes into the classroom to work with the SPED students but they are not supposed to work with any other students. They are not supposed to just have a small group off to the side creating essentially 2 classes in one. Most of the time the teacher is not one that teaches that subject and the aide is a non certified person that is supposed to be able to help them in that subject that they have no training in.This means that inclusion tends to turn into the aide or teacher sitting in the back on their phone or computer and occasionally asking the student or students they are to help "need any help." Of course this all depends on how good that person is at their job.

The problem comes from the court cases that force schools to change or laws that have been passed. Least restrictive environment is a joke. Not being able to create different classes based on ability level is a joke. When those were done away with is when we saw big drops in test scores. There was a valid reason for having Below grade level, grade level and above Grade level (honors/GT) class splits.

Teachers have too much on their plate to be able to create essentially 25 different lessons or work for students. But that is what they are being asked to do. They have to accommodate for the SPED students which often means extra assistance, copies of notes, etc. and at the same time create extra work for the GT students who finish fast and try to keep them engaged, challenged, and interested.

Now add in all the extras that teachers have to do like data meetings, student data folders, PLCs and the forms that go with PLCs, ARD meetings, 504 meetings, parent conferences, etc. and it is a ton of work. All of it added to "improve scores" with very little of it having any impact on scores. But it is all added because one study somewhere done by a college professor showed that X school had minor improvements in scores doing it and suddenly every school is adopting it and 5 other things trying to improve scores but often they are not implementing it correctly and therefore it doesn't help scores.

El Oso said:

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Out of control depends on who you ask. If your school district is rich, not so much. If it's underfunded, out of control could be an accurate description.

I've seen hundreds of accommodations in over 20 years. On the surface, some have seemed strange. All have helped the student though. And if the point of education is to help children learn, shouldn'twe helpthe child as best we can?

I have a son with an extensive accommodations list. You'd be surprised to learn he has them if you met him on the street. Inside the classroom, it's clear he needs every one of them. He even had a teacher last year who told him she had his same disability as a kid and she got zero accommodations. She wouldn't let him have them in her class. Then she met me after he told me what she said when he told her his accommodation for an assignment, and discovered dad knows education law far better than she does and he would get each and every one of his accommodations.

Your China statement is problematic on several levels. Yes, they rank higher than us, but
1. The "31st" Ranking: This comes from indexes like the World Top 20 Project, which heavily weigh system metrics "on paper," such as raw enrollment rates, demographic graduation ratios, and state spending levels, rather than purely looking at student capabilities.

2. China's scores do not represent mainland China as a whole. They reflect only four affluent provincial-level regions (Beijing, Shanghai, Jiangsu, and Zhejiang), covering roughly 180 million people. US scores do represent our country as a whole. So basically what is happening here is you are comparing the most funded education systems in one country to the entire education system of another country.

3. Here's why #2 is important. China's reading PISA score is 555. It's number one in the world. The US score is 504. However, when adjusting for the cities China score doesn't include, experts estimate their score would fall to 487. 504>487 and China isn't beating us anymore. In 2015, China reported scores from Guangdong. Their PISA score was 494. That score hasn't been reported since. It's been replaced by Zhejiang which scores very high. This means expert estimates are probably spot on if we got the entire China picture instead of the one they want the world to get.

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Good point. I always hate the country to country comparisons when it is not an apples to apples thing.

Many of the countries that rank "higher" than us (at high school levels) it is often just their college bound students compared to all of our students. When rankings reflect more accurately our college bound students to X country's college bound students the difference is smaller and we rank higher.

But I would still point out we are not at the top like we should be of our top students compared to other countries top students and that should be a concern. As well as the growing number of our students that are falling from middle of the pack to lower.

cowboycwr said:

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When you can have a grade level of say 150 students and 40-50 of them are SPED that is a problem.

And don't forget the 504 students with accommodations.

And the English as a second language students (now called EB- Emergent Bilingual because .... well who knows)

And don't forget that there might be a student or two that has a behavior plan as well.....

When you have a class of say 25 and 12 of them have accommodations that is a problem. It is no longer a regular class but a SPED class with regular students mixed in.

Depending on the other two groups sizes at a school a teacher could have 25 students and every single one of them could have some sort of accommodation. Even if it is just 12 sped, 5 EB and 4 kids with 504 that is still the majority of the class out of 25.

Inclusion is a joke. This is where an aide or sometimes teacher comes into the classroom to work with the SPED students but they are not supposed to work with any other students. They are not supposed to just have a small group off to the side creating essentially 2 classes in one. Most of the time the teacher is not one that teaches that subject and the aide is a non certified person that is supposed to be able to help them in that subject that they have no training in.

---

So much truth here. In 13 years, I had two amazing inclusion teachers. The paraprofessionals (uncertified) filling the role because a certified teacher could not be found were just another person in the room I had to accommodate. But not all paraprofessionals were bad. Mileage varies from campus to campus.

cowboycwr said:

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But I would still point out we are not at the top like we should be of our top students compared to other countries top students and that should be a concern. As well as the growing number of our students that are falling from middle of the pack to lower.

---

There is absolutely a lot of room for improvement, but like you, I bristle when people point to the country comparisons. They inevitably have no idea how that list was comprised.

I cannot imagine this is a good idea. Seems like the added burdens on teachers and other students are not worth any supposed value, and I suspect the value to the SPED kids is dubious at best. I would love for someone to explain to me why trying to integrate SPED kids into normal classes is overall a positive good. I clearly am not in education, but common sense would point to have SPED classes would make more sense. I have had friends be told by the SPED people to just sit the kid in the corner and leave him alone - doesn't seem like the best option for the kid(s).

I get the "accommodations" are different, but common sense dictates it probably makes sense to use school to help a young person get over a fear of public speaking vs. getting an "accommodation" to not have to speak publicly.

I'm reminded of the ******ed kid I sat next to in third grade. 42 years later, I remember his name and could describe him in detail. I can't say that of the overwhelming majority of people I interacted with daily from kindergarten through two grad school programs. But him. I remember vividly. We all belong. In our own way, we all belong. I don't know what he learned from me, but I know what I learned from him.

what is wrong with you people? Accommodations are necessary and come in all different forms and I mean all different forms. Got news for you. college offer accommodations. Some Univerisities have centers for that. So what is the goal here? Validate you neanderthals or educate our next generation?

J.R. said:

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what is wrong with you people? Accommodations are necessary and come in all different forms and I mean all different forms. Got news for you. college offer accommodations. Some Univerisities have centers for that. So what is the goal here? Validate you neanderthals or educate our next generation?

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It's part of a broader effort to marginalize and ultimately institutionalize disabled people. See for example the recent policy reversal by the DOJ regarding the Olmstead rule.

For those of you that need remedial reading or really can only make emotional responses because specifics and reasons are too challenging, I'll repost what seemed obvious:

I cannot imagine this is a good idea. Seems like the added burdens on teachers and other students are not worth any supposed value, and I suspect the value to the SPED kids is dubious at best. I would love for someone to explain to me why trying to integrate SPED kids into normal classes is overall a positive good. I clearly am not in education, but common sense would point to have SPED classes would make more sense. I have had friends be told by the SPED people to just sit the kid in the corner and leave him alone - doesn't seem like the best option for the kid(s).

I get the "accommodations" are different, but common sense dictates it probably makes sense to use school to help a young person get over a fear of public speaking vs. getting an "accommodation" to not have to speak publicly.

Sports always is a good means to expose stupidity such as why are their not calls for Didn't Earn It programs in sports - there is little less diverse and inclusive than a high school football team.
Along those lines one could ask why are accommodations not made for high school sports to the same degree as in the classroom?

BTW - Has Hamas Harry explained to anyone how a "genocide" results in population growth? We got all the Jew haters together.

J.R. said:

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what is wrong with you people? Accommodations are necessary and come in all different forms and I mean all different forms. Got news for you. college offer accommodations. Some Univerisities have centers for that. So what is the goal here? Validate you neanderthals or educate our next generation?

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No one has said anything about accommodations not being necessary, to take them away, or anything close to what you are saying.

What has been said is that it creates a lot of extra work, can become unmanageable and can hinder their growth for the real world.

In some cases a student can thrive in a normal class with accommodations. In other cases they cannot and would be better served in a smaller SPED class. But that is not allowed except for the most severe cases. So these kids get thrown into regular classes to drown and get left behind.

The goal is to educate the next generation. But that can happen in multiple ways. It does not have to happen in the same way.

cowboycwr said:

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J.R. said:

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what is wrong with you people? Accommodations are necessary and come in all different forms and I mean all different forms. Got news for you. college offer accommodations. Some Univerisities have centers for that. So what is the goal here? Validate you neanderthals or educate our next generation?

---

No one has said anything about accommodations not being necessary, to take them away, or anything close to what you are saying.

What has been said is that it creates a lot of extra work, can become unmanageable and can hinder their growth for the real world.

In some cases a student can thrive in a normal class with accommodations. In other cases they cannot and would be better served in a smaller SPED class. But that is not allowed except for the most severe cases. So these kids get thrown into regular classes to drown and get left behind.

The goal is to educate the next generation. But that can happen in multiple ways. It does not have to happen in the same way.

---

It's amazing how some folks intentionally demonstrate their need for accommodations for basic English and reading. The Casey's must have been busy last night.

I am more convinced daily that people just have a emotional strawman in their heads for all situations and just start yelling nonsense at it.

El Oso said:

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I'm reminded of the ******ed kid I sat next to in third grade. 42 years later, I remember his name and could describe him in detail. I can't say that of the overwhelming majority of people I interacted with daily from kindergarten through two grad school programs. But him. I remember vividly. We all belong. In our own way, we all belong. I don't know what he learned from me, but I know what I learned from him.

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Is your case that we should craft Special Education around how those students can help non-SPED students?

Harrison Bergeron said:

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El Oso said:

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I'm reminded of the ******ed kid I sat next to in third grade. 42 years later, I remember his name and could describe him in detail. I can't say that of the overwhelming majority of people I interacted with daily from kindergarten through two grad school programs. But him. I remember vividly. We all belong. In our own way, we all belong. I don't know what he learned from me, but I know what I learned from him.

---

Is your case that we should craft Special Education around how those students can help non-SPED students?

---

My response was to your post that indicated the inclusion of any SPED kid is "dubious." Simply put, you could not be more wrong. SPED kids bring value to education and they should be included in traditional classrooms whenever practically possible. SPED education is, and should be, designed around the best needs of the SPED student. This means content, methodology, or delivery of instruction are adapted to meet a student's unique disability-related needs. Those things can, and do, happen in a regular ed classroom when SPED students are present, so if it is possible and practical, yes, a SPED student should be in a regular classroom.

J.R. was right as well. Accommodations happen at the college level. I implement accommodations all the time in my college classrooms and it is almost always seamless. I can also tell you I use a lot of the accommodations, especially the ones I give to dyslexic students, with the students without accommodations, and they have no idea they are receiving an accommodation. They don't need it according to their records, but I can tell you that giving it to them often improves the quality of their learning too.

El Oso said:

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Harrison Bergeron said:

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El Oso said:

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I'm reminded of the ******ed kid I sat next to in third grade. 42 years later, I remember his name and could describe him in detail. I can't say that of the overwhelming majority of people I interacted with daily from kindergarten through two grad school programs. But him. I remember vividly. We all belong. In our own way, we all belong. I don't know what he learned from me, but I know what I learned from him.

---

Is your case that we should craft Special Education around how those students can help non-SPED students?

---

My response was to your post that indicated the inclusion of any SPED kid is "dubious." Simply put, you could not be more wrong. SPED kids bring value to education and they should be included in traditional classrooms whenever practically possible. SPED education is, and should be, designed around the best needs of the SPED student. This means content, methodology, or delivery of instruction are adapted to meet a student's unique disability-related needs. Those things can, and do, happen in a regular ed classroom when SPED students are present, so if it is possible and practical, yes, a SPED student should be in a regular classroom.

J.R. was right as well. Accommodations happen at the college level. I implement accommodations all the time in my college classrooms and it is almost always seamless. I can also tell you I use a lot of the accommodations, especially the ones I give to dyslexic students, with the students without accommodations, and they have no idea they are receiving an accommodation. They don't need it according to their records, but I can tell you that giving it to them often improves the quality of their learning too.

---

What values do SPED kids bring to traditional classrooms that are not possible in an other channel?

Do SPED kids receive superior (practical) education in a traditional classroom and has this resulted in better outcomes for both SPED and traditional students? (is there proven causality)

Is the trade-off net positive given SPED puts a significant burden on teachers in terms of time, curricula, classroom management, additional requirements, etc.? Have studies shown this enhances the teachers' overall fulfillment and more likely to teach better, extend their tenure?

Thanks. While from an common sense perspective it seems silly but I could be easily convinced with the data and outcomes.

On the second piece, while I appreciate Engrish is really hard, not sure where anyone argued that accommodations should be eliminated or they do not exist in the Casey's training program; the question was whether they have gotten a little out of control.

Much like diagnoses of autism, tying public education funding to the numbers of students required "accommodations" sure would have nothing to do with their proliferation. (Econ 101)

El Oso said:

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Harrison Bergeron said:

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El Oso said:

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I'm reminded of the ******ed kid I sat next to in third grade. 42 years later, I remember his name and could describe him in detail. I can't say that of the overwhelming majority of people I interacted with daily from kindergarten through two grad school programs. But him. I remember vividly. We all belong. In our own way, we all belong. I don't know what he learned from me, but I know what I learned from him.

---

Is your case that we should craft Special Education around how those students can help non-SPED students?

---

My response was to your post that indicated the inclusion of any SPED kid is "dubious." Simply put, you could not be more wrong. SPED kids bring value to education and they should be included in traditional classrooms whenever practically possible. SPED education is, and should be, designed around the best needs of the SPED student. This means content, methodology, or delivery of instruction are adapted to meet a student's unique disability-related needs. Those things can, and do, happen in a regular ed classroom when SPED students are present, so if it is possible and practical, yes, a SPED student should be in a regular classroom.

J.R. was right as well. Accommodations happen at the college level. I implement accommodations all the time in my college classrooms and it is almost always seamless. I can also tell you I use a lot of the accommodations, especially the ones I give to dyslexic students, with the students without accommodations, and they have no idea they are receiving an accommodation. They don't need it according to their records, but I can tell you that giving it to them often improves the quality of their learning too.

---

Agreed.

Where it crosses the line is when the student is so low, has a disability that interferes with others (like an extreme behavior type thing) or a disability that impacts the learning so much that a teacher cannot give accommodations for in a normal class.

Fore example, a blind student is hard to adapt the regular instruction for. It requires specialized books, computers readers, etc. that a teacher might not have. It also creates issues when the curriculum that is used by schools is very visual heavy (same for the state tests).

Or a handful of other disabilities that create issues. They should be in a specialized class and can join regular classes when it allows.

Harrison Bergeron said:

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What values do SPED kids bring to traditional classrooms that are not possible in an other channel?

Do SPED kids receive superior (practical) education in a traditional classroom and has this resulted in better outcomes for both SPED and traditional students? (is there proven causality)?

---

Decades of research support everything i have said in this thread.

A landmark study from Indiana University (2022) tracked thousands of high school students. It revealed that SPED students who spent 80% or more of their time in a general education classroom scored an average of 24.3 points higher in English/Language Arts and 18.4 points higher in Math than their peers in low-inclusion or separated settings. That would not have happened in a SPED only class.

A prominent meta-analysis by Szumski, Smogorzewska, and Karwowski (2017) evaluated the impact of inclusive classrooms. They found a statistically significant, positive though mild effect on the academic achievement of students without special needs.

Furthermore, a broader global review by Kefallinou et al. (2020) confirmed that the inclusion of students with disabilities resulted in zero detrimental impact on the learning outcomes of their peers. To accommodate diverse needs, teachers in inclusive rooms heavily rely on cooperative learning, dialogic learning, and peer tutoring. The data shows that these exact strategies boost engagement and memory retention for the entire class.

I agree with this except your blind kid scenario. I sat next to a blind kid in 8th grade pre algebra. He had a full table to accommodate all the stuff he needed the rest of us did not. I wasn't a teacher then, so you'd have to ask her just how much this impacted teaching and learning. I would say it didn't. I wonder what he and his parents would say as well. I know he passed. He belonged. That was Dallas ISD late 80s.

El Oso said:

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Harrison Bergeron said:

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What values do SPED kids bring to traditional classrooms that are not possible in an other channel?

Do SPED kids receive superior (practical) education in a traditional classroom and has this resulted in better outcomes for both SPED and traditional students? (is there proven causality)?

---

Decades of research support everything i have said in this thread.

A landmark study from Indiana University (2022) tracked thousands of high school students. It revealed that SPED students who spent 80% or more of their time in a general education classroom scored an average of 24.3 points higher in English/Language Arts and 18.4 points higher in Math than their peers in low-inclusion or separated settings. That would not have happened in a SPED only class.

A prominent meta-analysis by Szumski, Smogorzewska, and Karwowski (2017) evaluated the impact of inclusive classrooms. They found a statistically significant, positive though mild effect on the academic achievement of students without special needs.

Furthermore, a broader global review by Kefallinou et al. (2020) confirmed that the inclusion of students with disabilities resulted in zero detrimental impact on the learning outcomes of their peers. To accommodate diverse needs, teachers in inclusive rooms heavily rely on cooperative learning, dialogic learning, and peer tutoring. The data shows that these exact strategies boost engagement and memory retention for the entire class.

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Thanks for sharing. That is interesting. I honestly am not going to go look for the studies likely - if they're available for free - but would be curious to the point above what level special needs was evaluated. Certainly no quibble with the kids that are not disruptive, but I have a friend who is going to have a blind kind in an audio / video production class. Seems like an odd choice.

So a blind kid can't succeed in an audio visual course?

Studies show you are mistaken here as well. In fact, they indicate his sighted peers are at a disadvantage to him. Studies in cognitive psychology demonstrate that congenitally blind individuals exhibit significantly higher auditory memory and pitch discrimination capabilities than sighted peers. They are measurably more resilient to background noise, which translates directly to a high aptitude for audio cleaning, dialogue editing, and sound design. Recent studies have also proven that blind students can edit video directly by treating visual information textually and auditorily. Research shows that when automated tools convert these visual elements into auditory scores, blind creators navigate video timelines up to 40% faster than when trying to skim a visual interface blindly.

Yes, the teacher is going to need to redesign the course, but studies show that needs to be done. Recent academic, cognitive, and computing studies offer concrete evidence regarding how blind and low-vision (BLV) individuals perform in media and audio-visual disciplines. Rather than treating blindness as a barrier, modern research focuses on neuroplasticity, innovative script-based editing systems, and the "accessibility gap" in classroom design.

The disability is not the problem. It's being close minded because all you see is the disability.

El Oso said:

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I agree with this except your blind kid scenario. I sat next to a blind kid in 8th grade pre algebra. He had a full table to accommodate all the stuff he needed the rest of us did not. I wasn't a teacher then, so you'd have to ask her just how much this impacted teaching and learning. I would say it didn't. I wonder what he and his parents would say as well. I know he passed. He belonged. That was Dallas ISD late 80s.

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The curriculum and materials needed were different in the 80s than today.

Also, there was no STAAR test (or any test) then.

The tests are heavy on visuals (charts, maps, diagrams, etc). So there would have to be a majorly changed test for a blind student.

Now that creates essentially a different curriculum and style of test for the teacher to prepare students for. They would have to spend time getting the other 24 ready while also spending a ton of time getting that one student ready.

Especially if the teacher doesn't have the correct resources. Like no books in braille. No txt to speech software for some of the online curriculum. No way to change STAAR styles questions that have a visual to a format the student can understand. A blind student will not be able to answer any questions about maps, charts, pictures, political cartoons, etc.


It basically creates a small classroom for one student within the regular class.

It is just too big of an ask for a teacher.

El Oso said:

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So a blind kid can't succeed in an audio visual course?

Studies show you are mistaken here as well. In fact, they indicate his sighted peers are at a disadvantage to him. Studies in cognitive psychology demonstrate that congenitally blind individuals exhibit significantly higher auditory memory and pitch discrimination capabilities than sighted peers. They are measurably more resilient to background noise, which translates directly to a high aptitude for audio cleaning, dialogue editing, and sound design. Recent studies have also proven that blind students can edit video directly by treating visual information textually and auditorily. Research shows that when automated tools convert these visual elements into auditory scores, blind creators navigate video timelines up to 40% faster than when trying to skim a visual interface blindly.

Yes, the teacher is going to need to redesign the course, but studies show that needs to be done. Recent academic, cognitive, and computing studies offer concrete evidence regarding how blind and low-vision (BLV) individuals perform in media and audio-visual disciplines. Rather than treating blindness as a barrier, modern research focuses on neuroplasticity, innovative script-based editing systems, and the "accessibility gap" in classroom design.

The disability is not the problem. It's being close minded because all you see is the disability.

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That's definitely a take.

El Oso said:

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Harrison Bergeron said:

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El Oso said:

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I'm reminded of the ******ed kid I sat next to in third grade. 42 years later, I remember his name and could describe him in detail. I can't say that of the overwhelming majority of people I interacted with daily from kindergarten through two grad school programs. But him. I remember vividly. We all belong. In our own way, we all belong. I don't know what he learned from me, but I know what I learned from him.

---

Is your case that we should craft Special Education around how those students can help non-SPED students?

---

My response was to your post that indicated the inclusion of any SPED kid is "dubious." Simply put, you could not be more wrong. SPED kids bring value to education and they should be included in traditional classrooms whenever practically possible. SPED education is, and should be, designed around the best needs of the SPED student. This means content, methodology, or delivery of instruction are adapted to meet a student's unique disability-related needs. Those things can, and do, happen in a regular ed classroom when SPED students are present, so if it is possible and practical, yes, a SPED student should be in a regular classroom.

J.R. was right as well. Accommodations happen at the college level. I implement accommodations all the time in my college classrooms and it is almost always seamless. I can also tell you I use a lot of the accommodations, especially the ones I give to dyslexic students, with the students without accommodations, and they have no idea they are receiving an accommodation. They don't need it according to their records, but I can tell you that giving it to them often improves the quality of their learning too.

---

I have a story that reflects accommodation in College. This kid started undergrad at his university as a part of the center that helps manage this. His issue was an audio processing issue. He got to where he felt he didn't need it anymore , but it was important. Same kid now has an MBA from SMU with a finance concentration and it is killing it in the business world.

El Oso said:

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Harrison Bergeron said:

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What values do SPED kids bring to traditional classrooms that are not possible in an other channel?

Do SPED kids receive superior (practical) education in a traditional classroom and has this resulted in better outcomes for both SPED and traditional students? (is there proven causality)?

---

Decades of research support everything i have said in this thread.

A landmark study from Indiana University (2022) tracked thousands of high school students. It revealed that SPED students who spent 80% or more of their time in a general education classroom scored an average of 24.3 points higher in English/Language Arts and 18.4 points higher in Math than their peers in low-inclusion or separated settings. That would not have happened in a SPED only class.

A prominent meta-analysis by Szumski, Smogorzewska, and Karwowski (2017) evaluated the impact of inclusive classrooms. They found a statistically significant, positive though mild effect on the academic achievement of students without special needs.

Furthermore, a broader global review by Kefallinou et al. (2020) confirmed that the inclusion of students with disabilities resulted in zero detrimental impact on the learning outcomes of their peers. To accommodate diverse needs, teachers in inclusive rooms heavily rely on cooperative learning, dialogic learning, and peer tutoring. The data shows that these exact strategies boost engagement and memory retention for the entire class.

---

I know this is an area ripe with emotion and agendas, but I would be a little suspicious of the Indiana University study. It's authors are advocates more than academics, so I suspect the goal was to get a specific result. Yes, I realize that's an assertion and suspicion, but the results are negligible and amount to a < 5% impact on test scores - not sure that would be a positive ROI.

Here is some analysis and research you might enjoy.

"But the evidence that full inclusion works best is "extremely weak" and "fundamentally flawed," concludes a new paper, writes Hechinger's Jill Barshay. Scholars Douglas Fuchs, Allison Gilmour and Jeanne Wanzek of Vanderbilt and the American Institutes for Research are challenging the consensus. "

"In 2023, Barshay talked to Nina Dalgaard, lead author of an inclusion study for the nonprofit Campbell Collaboration. The meta-analysis also found no evidence that inclusion is positive for all students. "For some children, it appears that being taught in a segregated setting is actually beneficial," said Dalgaard."

There's been little debate on inclusion's effect on non-disabled students and general-education teachers, wrote Gilmour, one of Fuchs' co-authors, in Education Next in 2018.

"Students without disabilities have lower academic and behavioral outcomes when they are taught in classrooms" with disabled students, especially those with a behavior disorder, she wrote. Teacher turnover is higher when the number of special-needs students rises.

Teachers with lots of special-needs students spend less time on teaching, more time keeping order, according to the 2013 Teaching and Learning International Survey. That's largely due to an increase in behavior problems.

That's the question you keep glossing over: the negative impacts of having special needs students in normal classes negative impact on normal students and if having SPED kids there is ROI positive or negative for the entire school not just those kids. Seems so simple that asking teachers - already taxed and often low morale - having effectively to teach two completely different classes and punish 20 kids just so we can feel good about one SPED kid. When the education system started to neglect the best students in favor of the worst things seem to have gone downhill for everyone.

On a related note: do you think SPED students should be automatically placed in A.P. / Advanced / Honors courses? Would that not similarly improve their performance based on the Indiana study logic?

That's a pretty blatant misrepresentation of the Indiana research team.
Dr. Sandi Cole (Ed.D.): She is the director of the Center on Education and Lifelong Learning (CELL) and manages the Special Education Leadership Program at the IU School of Education. Before her academic career, she spent 22 years as a public school teacher and administrator at both elementary and secondary levels. She has directed over $20 million in state and federal educational grants.
Dr. Hardy R. Murphy (Ph.D.): He is a clinical professor in the School of Education at Indiana University. His career spans roles as a public school teacher, principal, and assistant superintendent. His primary research focuses on urban education, systemic school improvement, educational equity, and special education inclusion.
Dr. Teresa A. Grossi (Ph.D.): She holds a Ph.D. in Applied Behavior Analysis and Special Education from The Ohio State University. She has worked as a community-based instructor, vocational transition coordinator, and expert witness for the Department of Justice regarding transition services for individuals with disabilities. She has secured more than $30 million in external research grants

Dr. Cole and her team are highly regarded for applying advanced statistical models specifically propensity score matching to educational policy. This method isolates the "placement" as the only variable, solving a massive, decades-old flaw in previous special education research. Read that last sentence again. They solved a flaw in existing research. That's pretty high end work.

There's a ton more on why these three are at the top of research on this issue.

Here's the problem with these studies and our discussion. These studies focused on SPED severe emotional or behavioral disorders. I have not once on this thread advocated for these students to be included. I have argued for SPED students to be included when that inclusion would be practical. Ive worked in a school with an emotional behavioral SPED unit. Those students were never put in gen ed and I know of zero people who would argue they should be.

A ******ed student isn't always emotionally or behavioral SPED. Neither is an autistic student (something you specifically mentioned in an earlier post). And neither is a blind student (a specific problem student in your opinion you also mentioned in a post).

You're bringing in a separate field of research and claiming it disproved mine. Theyre apples and oranges fields of study.

Harrison Bergeron said:

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On a related note: do you think SPED students should be automatically placed in A.P. / Advanced / Honors courses? Would that not similarly improve their performance based on the Indiana study logic?

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This question shows you understand little to nothing of how education works. The courses you list here have no such thing as automatic placement. I've had five children progress through public school in Texas. Three of them qualified for these courses. Of those three, only one qualified in all four core content areas. My SPED kid qualifies for AP in one core class, and he takes it because with the proper medication and his other accommodations, he's been known to correct his math teacher on more than one occasion. He even skipped an entire grade level in math based on test scores. (He took 8th grade math in 7th grade having been in 6th grade the year before. This puts him on pace to start taking collegemath courses when he is in 11th grade if he continuesto show mastery.) He earned a spot in that room and he belongs in that room. And he's SPED in more ways than one.

You're also misapplying what that Indiana study found. Instead of asking ChatGPT to find a flaw in it, which it didn't when you examine your rebuttal to it, you should go read it. Lucky for you, I already posted the important part. The study only examined general education classrooms. It can't speak to what it didn't explore, and we can't apply what it found to something it did not study.

Two things here. First, to the best of my knowledge, the STAAR test is available in braille. I never had a blind student until college though. Second, I never taught to the test so it wouldn't have been an issue (speculation since I never actually had to work with a blind student in K12). College was a challenge and it was one of those times meeting an accommodation was not seamless.

El Oso said:

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Two things here. First, to the best of my knowledge, the STAAR test is available in braille. I never had a blind student until college though. Second, I never taught to the test so it wouldn't have been an issue (speculation since I never actually had to work with a blind student in K12). College was a challenge and it was one of those times meeting an accommodation was not seamless.

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Yes it is but it is a different test than what everyone else takes. Which goes back to my two classroom situation.

I am not talking about teaching to the test but at least providing test type questions so the students can be prepared for what they see. Like on the new test where there are short response, multiple choice, drag and drop (like drag a vocab word to the box in front of the definition to match them), drop down (where you choose the answer from 3 choices), etc.

The braille test is different from those above. So a teacher has to prepare 24 students to practice those and one student to practice something else.

A blind student in a regular class creates a small one student class inside the rest of the classroom as everything they do is different than the other students. Group work is nearly impossible. A blind student spends half the class period or more with headphones in listening to the screen reader instead of the teacher. They should be in another class as it causes the teacher to have to spend way too much planning time and instruction time on one student and the others suffer so that the blind student can be "included."

cowboycwr said:

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El Oso said:

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Two things here. First, to the best of my knowledge, the STAAR test is available in braille. I never had a blind student until college though. Second, I never taught to the test so it wouldn't have been an issue (speculation since I never actually had to work with a blind student in K12). College was a challenge and it was one of those times meeting an accommodation was not seamless.

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Yes it is but it is a different test than what everyone else takes. Which goes back to my two classroom situation.

I am not talking about teaching to the test but at least providing test type questions so the students can be prepared for what they see. Like on the new test where there are short response, multiple choice, drag and drop (like drag a vocab word to the box in front of the definition to match them), drop down (where you choose the answer from 3 choices), etc.

The braille test is different from those above. So a teacher has to prepare 24 students to practice those and one student to practice something else.

A blind student in a regular class creates a small one student class inside the rest of the classroom as everything they do is different than the other students. Group work is nearly impossible. A blind student spends half the class period or more with headphones in listening to the screen reader instead of the teacher. They should be in another class as it causes the teacher to have to spend way too much planning time and instruction time on one student and the others suffer so that the blind student can be "included."

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Could this be handled in a way similar to how some school districts are handling dyslexic students in ELAR and the different ways they take the STAAR? For example, in Richardson ISD (where I ended my K12 teaching experience), dyslexic students in elementary school are pulled out of language arts courses one-three times a week (based on the severity of their dyslexia) and in those pullouts they work on strategies for not only handling their dyslexia but in how to take the STAAR test since they will take it differently than general ed students (many have the test read to them by a proctor throughout elementary school. Others start that way and then switch to headphones because only portions of the test are read to them).

Basically, this student remains in gen ed as much as possible and the accommodations for the test are coached in pull out session throughout the year. There's little impact to the teacher this way. Let's say they assigned a short story for a grade, but the child missed that day for pullout. The pullout teacher sends the core teacher a grade for what the child is doing in pullout and that becomes the grade the teacher assigns for the "missed" assignment. If the student is in class for an assignment, well, the teacher assigns the grade the student earned, and hopefully the pullout sessions are helping the student succeed on those assignments.

There is still a pullout available in middle school (where I taught), but it is either less frequent than the elementary schedule (as needed) or it becomes a period on the student's schedule (intervention still needed frequently). Now I just used the grade you earned in your accommodation class as your grade in my class. Your STAAR score still was considered my responsibility though even though for some students they saw their dyslexia person far more than they saw me.

El Oso said:

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cowboycwr said:

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El Oso said:

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Two things here. First, to the best of my knowledge, the STAAR test is available in braille. I never had a blind student until college though. Second, I never taught to the test so it wouldn't have been an issue (speculation since I never actually had to work with a blind student in K12). College was a challenge and it was one of those times meeting an accommodation was not seamless.

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Yes it is but it is a different test than what everyone else takes. Which goes back to my two classroom situation.

I am not talking about teaching to the test but at least providing test type questions so the students can be prepared for what they see. Like on the new test where there are short response, multiple choice, drag and drop (like drag a vocab word to the box in front of the definition to match them), drop down (where you choose the answer from 3 choices), etc.

The braille test is different from those above. So a teacher has to prepare 24 students to practice those and one student to practice something else.

A blind student in a regular class creates a small one student class inside the rest of the classroom as everything they do is different than the other students. Group work is nearly impossible. A blind student spends half the class period or more with headphones in listening to the screen reader instead of the teacher. They should be in another class as it causes the teacher to have to spend way too much planning time and instruction time on one student and the others suffer so that the blind student can be "included."

---

Could this be handled in a way similar to how some school districts are handling dyslexic students in ELAR and the different ways they take the STAAR? For example, in Richardson ISD (where I ended my K12 teaching experience), dyslexic students in elementary school are pulled out of language arts courses one-three times a week (based on the severity of their dyslexia) and in those pullouts they work on strategies for not only handling their dyslexia but in how to take the STAAR test since they will take it differently than general ed students (many have the test read to them by a proctor throughout elementary school. Others start that way and then switch to headphones because only portions of the test are read to them).

Basically, this student remains in gen ed as much as possible and the accommodations for the test are coached in pull out session throughout the year. There's little impact to the teacher this way. Let's say they assigned a short story for a grade, but the child missed that day for pullout. The pullout teacher sends the core teacher a grade for what the child is doing in pullout and that becomes the grade the teacher assigns for the "missed" assignment. If the student is in class for an assignment, well, the teacher assigns the grade the student earned, and hopefully the pullout sessions are helping the student succeed on those assignments.

There is still a pullout available in middle school (where I taught), but it is either less frequent than the elementary schedule (as needed) or it becomes a period on the student's schedule (intervention still needed frequently). Now I just used the grade you earned in your accommodation class as your grade in my class. Your STAAR score still was considered my responsibility though even though for some students they saw their dyslexia person far more than they saw me.

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It could be. But currently it isn't. The difference is that Dyslexia is allowed to have those pullout classes due to it being a different curriculum. Braille is not considered separate so it is supposed to be delivered in class. At most you get an inclusion aide, which then runs into the problems mentioned earlier or in some cases turns into the aide basically doing the work for the student as they give verbal answers.

Also, there are changes now in the reading of the test. Since it is all online from grade 3-high school it is read by the computer. For it to be read by a person it has to be an extreme case and get state approval to be an accommodation.

Another change is now dyslexia is not a separate classification but falls under the SPED umbrella so those students are now SPED for classification purposes.

El Oso said:

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That's a pretty blatant misrepresentation of the Indiana research team.
Dr. Sandi Cole (Ed.D.): She is the director of the Center on Education and Lifelong Learning (CELL) and manages the Special Education Leadership Program at the IU School of Education. Before her academic career, she spent 22 years as a public school teacher and administrator at both elementary and secondary levels. She has directed over $20 million in state and federal educational grants.
Dr. Hardy R. Murphy (Ph.D.): He is a clinical professor in the School of Education at Indiana University. His career spans roles as a public school teacher, principal, and assistant superintendent. His primary research focuses on urban education, systemic school improvement, educational equity, and special education inclusion.
Dr. Teresa A. Grossi (Ph.D.): She holds a Ph.D. in Applied Behavior Analysis and Special Education from The Ohio State University. She has worked as a community-based instructor, vocational transition coordinator, and expert witness for the Department of Justice regarding transition services for individuals with disabilities. She has secured more than $30 million in external research grants

Dr. Cole and her team are highly regarded for applying advanced statistical models specifically propensity score matching to educational policy. This method isolates the "placement" as the only variable, solving a massive, decades-old flaw in previous special education research. Read that last sentence again. They solved a flaw in existing research. That's pretty high end work.

There's a ton more on why these three are at the top of research on this issue.

---

I acknowledged it was a subjective comment, but both are advocates not traditional academics. There is zero percent chance the goal was presented and the research laid out to meet that goal. What has been demonstrated clearly during the last 10 years is the so-called academic research is much less objective than we were led to believe 50 years ago. This is a world where Jason Arday can be a "world renowned" scholar at Cambridge. If you're honest, if a guy that worked 20 years for the NRA released a research paper saying more guns reduce gun deaths, you would question it. Just be intellectually honest and consistent (I would too question it).

El Oso said:

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Harrison Bergeron said:

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On a related note: do you think SPED students should be automatically placed in A.P. / Advanced / Honors courses? Would that not similarly improve their performance based on the Indiana study logic?

---

This question shows you understand little to nothing of how education works. The courses you list here have no such thing as automatic placement. I've had five children progress through public school in Texas. Three of them qualified for these courses. Of those three, only one qualified in all four core content areas. My SPED kid qualifies for AP in one core class, and he takes it because with the proper medication and his other accommodations, he's been known to correct his math teacher on more than one occasion. He even skipped an entire grade level in math based on test scores. (He took 8th grade math in 7th grade having been in 6th grade the year before. This puts him on pace to start taking collegemath courses when he is in 11th grade if he continuesto show mastery.) He earned a spot in that room and he belongs in that room. And he's SPED in more ways than one.

You're also misapplying what that Indiana study found. Instead of asking ChatGPT to find a flaw in it, which it didn't when you examine your rebuttal to it, you should go read it. Lucky for you, I already posted the important part. The study only examined general education classrooms. It can't speak to what it didn't explore, and we can't apply what it found to something it did not study.

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I know how education works.

No education course has automatic placement. Every single course has a requirement yet those requirements regularly are lowered for SPED students in traditional classes. So why not modify the AP requirements and put more SPED kids in AP classes. Make the case for why this would be a bad idea?

I noted the Indiana study revealed a < 5% improvement in test scores - that seems immaterial.

The question you keep avoiding is:
- Where is the study that demonstrates putting SPED students in normal classes improves the outcomes for traditional students and teachers?
- Where is the study that demonstrates it has a positive ROI?

Silly comments are the first sign you're losing the debate. I addressed the Indiana study. You ignored the multiple myriad studies that disproved not only the Indiana study but those of similar ilk. You seem to want to sort of selectively address a few things but ignore the rest, which I get ... specifics always are the landmine.

Harrison Bergeron said:

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El Oso said:

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That's a pretty blatant misrepresentation of the Indiana research team.
Dr. Sandi Cole (Ed.D.): She is the director of the Center on Education and Lifelong Learning (CELL) and manages the Special Education Leadership Program at the IU School of Education. Before her academic career, she spent 22 years as a public school teacher and administrator at both elementary and secondary levels. She has directed over $20 million in state and federal educational grants.
Dr. Hardy R. Murphy (Ph.D.): He is a clinical professor in the School of Education at Indiana University. His career spans roles as a public school teacher, principal, and assistant superintendent. His primary research focuses on urban education, systemic school improvement, educational equity, and special education inclusion.
Dr. Teresa A. Grossi (Ph.D.): She holds a Ph.D. in Applied Behavior Analysis and Special Education from The Ohio State University. She has worked as a community-based instructor, vocational transition coordinator, and expert witness for the Department of Justice regarding transition services for individuals with disabilities. She has secured more than $30 million in external research grants

Dr. Cole and her team are highly regarded for applying advanced statistical models specifically propensity score matching to educational policy. This method isolates the "placement" as the only variable, solving a massive, decades-old flaw in previous special education research. Read that last sentence again. They solved a flaw in existing research. That's pretty high end work.

There's a ton more on why these three are at the top of research on this issue.

---

I acknowledged it was a subjective comment, but both are advocates not traditional academics. There is zero percent chance the goal was presented and the research laid out to meet that goal. What has been demonstrated clearly during the last 10 years is the so-called academic research is much less objective than we were led to believe 50 years ago. This is a world where Jason Arday can be a "world renowned" scholar at Cambridge. If you're honest, if a guy that worked 20 years for the NRA released a research paper saying more guns reduce gun deaths, you would question it. Just be intellectually honest and consistent (I would too question it).

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1. Combined Dr. Cole (22 years), Dr. Hardy (33 years) and Dr. Grossi (40 years) have 95 years of classroom experience. As college professors now, they research educational issues. In what way are they not academics. You say you know education but you don't even know what the word academic means. An academic is a person who works, teaches, or does research at a college or university.

2. I'm not listing single studies. I've listed at least half a dozen, which you have admitted you haven't and won't read. You're right. A single study proves nothing. Multiple studies, done the same way, reaching similar conclusions create a consensus. My studies do the latter, but you don't know that because you haven't read them. You also aren't in the field.

3. I would question his study. See number two. It's one study saying one thing. Does it hold up when we put it up against other research. If the answer is yes, it gains credibility and leads to consensus. If it doesn't--it's a single study and it may be right. It may be wrong.