Colin Ong-Dean
- Published in print:
- 2009
- Published Online:
- February 2013
- ISBN:
- 9780226630007
- eISBN:
- 9780226630021
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University of Chicago Press
- DOI:
- 10.7208/chicago/9780226630021.001.0001
- Subject:
- Education, Early Childhood and Elementary Education
Students in special education programs can have widely divergent experiences. For some, special education amounts to a dumping ground where schools unload their problem students, while for others, it ...
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Students in special education programs can have widely divergent experiences. For some, special education amounts to a dumping ground where schools unload their problem students, while for others, it provides access to services and accommodations that drastically improve chances of succeeding in school and beyond. This book argues that this inequity in treatment is directly linked to the disparity in resources possessed by the students' parents. Since the mid-1970s, federal law has empowered parents of public school children to intervene in virtually every aspect of the decision making involved in special education. However, this book reveals that this power is generally available only to those parents with the money, educational background, and confidence needed to make effective claims about their children's disabilities and related needs. The author documents this class divide by examining evidence including historic rates of learning disability diagnosis, court decisions, and advice literature for parents of disabled children. In an era of expanding special education enrollment, the book provides an analysis of the way this expansion has created new kinds of inequality.Less
Students in special education programs can have widely divergent experiences. For some, special education amounts to a dumping ground where schools unload their problem students, while for others, it provides access to services and accommodations that drastically improve chances of succeeding in school and beyond. This book argues that this inequity in treatment is directly linked to the disparity in resources possessed by the students' parents. Since the mid-1970s, federal law has empowered parents of public school children to intervene in virtually every aspect of the decision making involved in special education. However, this book reveals that this power is generally available only to those parents with the money, educational background, and confidence needed to make effective claims about their children's disabilities and related needs. The author documents this class divide by examining evidence including historic rates of learning disability diagnosis, court decisions, and advice literature for parents of disabled children. In an era of expanding special education enrollment, the book provides an analysis of the way this expansion has created new kinds of inequality.
Thomas W. Payzant
- Published in print:
- 2005
- Published Online:
- November 2020
- ISBN:
- 9780195169591
- eISBN:
- 9780197562178
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/oso/9780195169591.003.0029
- Subject:
- Education, Schools Studies
Approaches to education reform rarely follow a simple, linear path. Rather than pursuing one approach single-mindedly over an extended period of years, school reform—informed by research, changes ...
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Approaches to education reform rarely follow a simple, linear path. Rather than pursuing one approach single-mindedly over an extended period of years, school reform—informed by research, changes in public policy, and differences in the dynamic needs of students from changing communities—tends to be characterized by continuous change and sometimes seems to recycle approaches that have been tried before. For those of us who have worked toward education reform throughout our careers, this process of change does not betray a lack of consistency or commitment but constitutes a necessary response to the continually changing conditions in which public schools must operate. The demographics of our schools are dynamic, particularly because of escalating numbers of immigrants from around the world. Our fiscal circumstances are in continual flux. Community expectations of what schools should provide are subject to change as well, often through a growing national awareness of the connection between the quality of America’s schools and the character of our democratic institutions. Two of the most significant reform strategies to emerge during the past decade may seem contradictory: on the one hand, those strategies that concentrate relentlessly on instructional improvement, and, on the other hand, those that seek to establish the school as a community centerpiece for addressing a broad range of personal, social, and family needs that relate to the health of the community as a whole. At first glance these two strategies—a narrow focus on teaching and learning contrasted with a wider focus through what are called extended-service or full-service schools— appear to be at cross-purposes. Poor student performance, particularly when combined with difficult economic times, gives rise to a set of tough questions that all educational leaders sooner or later must confront: Can schools be all things to all people? Are educators being asked to take on too much? Can schools be expected to solve all of society’s problems with very limited resources? Is it not better for schools to do a few things well, rather than taking on too much and risking superficial results?
Less
Approaches to education reform rarely follow a simple, linear path. Rather than pursuing one approach single-mindedly over an extended period of years, school reform—informed by research, changes in public policy, and differences in the dynamic needs of students from changing communities—tends to be characterized by continuous change and sometimes seems to recycle approaches that have been tried before. For those of us who have worked toward education reform throughout our careers, this process of change does not betray a lack of consistency or commitment but constitutes a necessary response to the continually changing conditions in which public schools must operate. The demographics of our schools are dynamic, particularly because of escalating numbers of immigrants from around the world. Our fiscal circumstances are in continual flux. Community expectations of what schools should provide are subject to change as well, often through a growing national awareness of the connection between the quality of America’s schools and the character of our democratic institutions. Two of the most significant reform strategies to emerge during the past decade may seem contradictory: on the one hand, those strategies that concentrate relentlessly on instructional improvement, and, on the other hand, those that seek to establish the school as a community centerpiece for addressing a broad range of personal, social, and family needs that relate to the health of the community as a whole. At first glance these two strategies—a narrow focus on teaching and learning contrasted with a wider focus through what are called extended-service or full-service schools— appear to be at cross-purposes. Poor student performance, particularly when combined with difficult economic times, gives rise to a set of tough questions that all educational leaders sooner or later must confront: Can schools be all things to all people? Are educators being asked to take on too much? Can schools be expected to solve all of society’s problems with very limited resources? Is it not better for schools to do a few things well, rather than taking on too much and risking superficial results?
