Crucial Needs

Last Friday, Governor Sarah Palin paused her campaign rhetoric to make her first policy speech, laying out a controversial plan intended to increase educational opportunities for children with special needs. Her proposal provides much-needed funding for a federal law enacted in 1975 that compels school districts to provide a “free, appropriate public education” to any student with a disability. Case law has dictated that, if an administrator or school decides that the public school is incapable of doing so, then the student may enroll in a more suitable private school at the expense of the government. The current problem is that this option is entirely under-funded; the federal government was originally set to pay 40 percent of the cost but currently only pays 17 percent. The onus then falls on individual schools and states to meet rising costs of education in a time when exponentially more students are being diagnosed with special needs.

Palin promised that a McCain administration would finally provide the funding necessary for the government to ensure such students are always placed in appropriate, specialized learning environments—like private schools—entirely free of charge to parents. Parents who are tired of their children receiving inadequate educations have, understandably, enthusiastically supported Palin’s plan. Teachers unions and school districts, however, have challenged the initiative, asserting that it will support private education via a diversion of funds that could otherwise be employed to enhance public schools.

We agree with the teachers and schools that Palin’s plan of federally subsidizing private education is not a sustainable way of improving public schools’ special needs capabilities. All parents have the right to make sure their child receives the best education possible, but patching the failure of public schools by sending students to private institutions ultimately perpetuates the problem rather than solving it. To continuously utilize federal funding solely to pay for tuition rather than new and improved programming may work in the short-term but will be ineffective in the long-term.

Instead, the government must make a more concerted effort to develop special-needs programs within the existing public education infrastructure. The money should be channeled directly into the public schools in order to overhaul current failures in the system and make public schools more appropriate learning environments for all students with special needs.

Reconstructing schools’ special education capacities is undoubtedly a long-term goal, so the government should explore a number of concrete measures to immediately improve educational experiences for children with special needs. One such improvement is increasing funding and resources for teacher training. It is the government’s responsibility to help all teachers become more adept so that the quality of public school education reaches that of private schools. Moreover, when possible, schools should consolidate special needs classrooms to make the most of existing teachers and both tangible and intangible resources, such as funding and experience teaching children with special needs.

Additionally, schools should generate more comprehensive Individual Education Programs. Mandated under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, an IEP addresses the particular needs of each child and theoretically ensures that the school focuses instruction in a way that is receptive to the child’s needs. By creating more thorough IEPs, schools could identify which children would, in the short-term, be best suited to the atmosphere currently found in private education and which students benefit from being in public schools’ environments. This distinction would then allow the schools to, over time, institute programs that are responsive to different students’ needs.

One suggestion that reaches outside of the classroom is encouraging social services agencies to conduct early screenings for disabilities. Due to the increasing belief in critical periods of development, researchers say that early diagnosis—especially with an autism spectrum disorder—is correlated with a better prognosis. An extra burden is placed on schools when children with special needs enter undiagnosed. If parents are informed of their children’s special needs earlier, they can work with the schools to better ensure that their child receives an appropriate education.

We recognize that both short-term and long-term measures of improving special-needs education require a significant amount of funding that Palin has said a McCain administration will provide as an exception to an overall funding freeze. We are appreciative of such a promise. We do, however, lament that the funding freeze will broadly constrain educational improvements. Although special-needs education is an exceptional case, there are many faults with the general education system that we believe extra funding would help fix.

According to a study done by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, autism spectrum disorders are 10 times as prevalent today as they were in the 1980s. This amplification also translates to other disabilities; unfortunately, the increase in children diagnosed with special needs comes attendant to a public school system that simply fails to achieve its goals. Although Palin’s focus on improving education for such students is well-intended, her suggestions will not truly fix the current problems. Instead of merely funneling resources into private schools, the government should use the money to revamp public schools’ programs and thus give all children—including those with special needs—the education they truly deserve.