I’ve watched, in my own lifetime, how educational access has increased for kids with Down syndrome and other disabilities. Life expectancy for people with Down syndrome has also doubled. Some of that increased lifespan has to do with medical advances. And yet I suspect that for kids to move from segregated and institutional settings into communities where they are interacting with peers and contributing to classrooms, community, and family life has also increased longevity. Special education makes a difference.
Fifty years ago, many children and teenagers with disabilities lived in institutions. Many had been deemed “ineducable.” Doctors, parents, and teachers assumed that kids with Down syndrome, like our daughter Penny, couldn’t learn to read or do basic math or live outside of an institutional setting. But in 1975, the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) passed, and for the first time, kids with disabilities were guaranteed the right to an education in the “least restrictive environment.”
Our family (and our community) has been the direct beneficiary of this historic legislation. Penny loves reading and writing. She loves school. She’s even a part of a vanguard of kids with intellectual disabilities going to college.
Many Americans have no idea that the current administration is systematically dismantling the Department of Education, with profound consequences for students with disabilities. In light of how much it matters to our whole society that kids with disabilities continue to receive the supports and services they deserve, I wanted to let you know:
1. Historically speaking, and even before this second Trump term, students with disabilities often did not receive the supports they are guaranteed by law.
The most recent annual review of states from the Department of Education concluded that only 19 of the 50 states met the requirements for serving kids with disabilities. Let’s pause on this for just a minute—that’s fewer than half of the states that meet the requirements. In general, when parents recognize that states are not meeting the requirements of the law on behalf of their kids, they can petition the federal government to enforce the law on a local level. Right now, the agency that should be responding to these civil rights’ violation has been decimated of its staff and cannot respond to these needs.
2. Just ten percent (you read that right – just ten percent!) of the original staff remain in the Office of Special Education Programs.
This office is intended, among other things, to create and disseminate federal policy information, fund research and innovation in special education, and promote training for parents, teachers, and professionals in the field.
3. Federal funds provide around ten percent of the funding states use to educate students with disabilities (even though the original IDEA act authorized up to 40% of funding).
Removing that funding further curtails the ways states can support teachers and kids. If we actually cared as a society about including kids with disabilities in the classroom (and, later on, in workplaces and community life), we would call on Congress to increase the funding nationally, not shut it down entirely.
4. In keeping with everything I’ve already noted, the Trump administration has canceled millions of dollars of grants intended to support students with disabilities.
To find out more, here’s one article I found helpful: Disability Advocates Cry Foul Over Dismantling of Special Ed.
I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: these laws matter for all of us.
They matter for our family personally because we’ve seen the difference it makes for Penny to learn and grow among her peers. They matter for kids with disabilities and their families if we want to live in a just society where we care for the vulnerable ones in our midst. They also matter for all of us who believe that disability is a part of our common humanity and if we can learn to receive vulnerability and look for the gifts within everyone around us, we will all become people who belong and who know that we matter to one another.
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