Charge – Special education programs getting abused

Special education programs are important for students that really need them; but, as Manhattan Institute's senior researcher Jay Greene charges in “The Problems with Special Ed,” “Students who are struggling academically — but have no true disability — are being wrongly placed in special education.”

Here in Kentucky, there have been discussions that our rate of identification of special education students was also being driven by our CATS assessment. Special education students could qualify for a host of “test-busting” accommodations that even included reading the reading assessment to students!

Hopefully, when our new assessment program starts, it will take stronger action to prevent this sort of test-based special education abuse.