As rates of autism and other similar disorders are on the rise, I can't help but think about funding for special education. For those who don't know what special education is, it is education for physically or mentally handicapped children whose needs cannot be met in an ordinary classroom. Because there are more children with special needs, the funding should increase for the special ed. departments right? In fact, since 1980, there has been a 2.4 million increase in children receiving special education at school.
Wrong. According to the University of Michigan, in 1975, "the legislation included the goal that 40 percent of the extra costs of the inclusion of special needs children into regular classrooms would be covered by the federal Government". However in over 25 years later, the government only provided 18% of extra costs for special education.
Some possible reasons special education is underfunded are because people care more about core classes and tests scores. Nowadays, high schools are ranked by the number of APs students take and how well they do on the exams. Since a child who is mentally disabled will most likely not be in AP classes, they will not contribute to having their high school highly ranked. Also states issue standardized tests each year to see how well a school is doing. Kids in special ed. will generally do worse than mainstreamed kids, making the school seem that it is doing "more poorly" than it actually.
Since kids in special ed. don't positively contribute as much as mainstreamed kids to having a "highly ranked high school" or a "successful" high school, I think their programs are unfortunately underfunded.
Why do you think special education departments in high school are underfunded?
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