A personal perspective on the changes in special education

by Mark Taylor, M.A., LCPC

I am a school psychologist. I finished graduate school and started my career 25 years ago. At first I worked with children who were in crisis, then after a few years moved into the schools. I also worked for a couple of years for the regional mental health center in Forsyth before starting my current job in a special education cooperative in 1988.

Much of my job as a school psychologist was to evaluate children and then tell people whether or not the children might qualify for special education services. The great majority of referrals I got were for learning disabilities evaluations.

The system I was taught to use, and which has been in use for decades, triggered a look at a student only after he had struggled for several years. Usually, a referral would have to wait until after the student finished third grade, then I would come in with a battery of powerful tests and I would find some “reason” why the student was not learning.

I do not wish to be contemptous of the old system. The way that it operated reflected the best knowledge of its time, and from a logical point of view, it made a lot of sense. Also, practically all of the children who were identified under this system really did have the disabilities we said they had and really did need special help. The problems were that it did not bring enough attention to all of the children who needed special help, and it made children wait too long for help.

In the old system, we had to wait too long before we could give services. It turns out that if we wait until the end of third grade we are only able to help a handful of students who are struggling in reading, for example, but if we could intervene in kindergarten, first grade or even second grade, we could turn most struggling readers into normal readers.

In recent years, changes were passed in the laws that would allow schools to identify kids early and help them when help is likely to be successful. These laws include the infamous "No Child Left Behind" (NCLB) and the new reauthorization of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA).

These new laws make changes that make schools accountable for student performance. Now, for the first time, schools that do not produce adequate student performance will suffer meaningful consequences.

As a person working in schools, I can tell you that it is going to be very difficult to meet the challenges put forward by NCLB and the new IDEA. Learning to read is extremely difficult for almost one in every five people. Even though we now know a great deal about reading, a lot of that information has not yet made its way into the classrooms. Lack of good information about well-researched programs and methods will make the task harder.

Even when the information is available, it is still often very difficult to deliver instruction that works. Many children require instruction delivered at a very high level of intensity, and with lots of repetition in order to get going on reading. The amount of effort required on everyone's part is really daunting.

My personal sense is that while many of the changes in the laws are good, teachers are going to need a lot of support over the next several years. The challenge before them is really not to be underestimated.