NY1 Exclusive: Number Of Special Needs Students On The Rise
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The number of local students with learning disabilities has been rising dramatically, and officials think it's going to keep going up. NY1’s Education reporter Lindsey Christ filed the following report. There are a lot of shocking statistics coming out of School Chancellor Joel Klein’s mouth recently – including news of a $750 million deficit and 4,400 teacher layoffs. But one other startling fact almost got lost this week.
“For this school year, the current one, our schools enrolled 14,000 more students than had been projected and about half of them require special education services,” Klein said.
And that number does not even begin to describe the dramatic increase in the number of special education students in recent years.
The biggest jump came this year. The total number enrolled increased by 18,000 – rising from 159,000 to 177,000 students.
The city expects enrollment will continue to climb next fall, with 60 percent of those new students needing special ed. services.
Officials still don't know for sure why there are so many more special education students. Is it better diagnosis? Less of a stigma? Or is special ed being promoted by school officials who see it as a source of federal aid?
“We really don't want to speculate,” said Laura Rodriguez of the Department of Education. “Part of what we do is analyze our data, get better at it, and have more consistent numbers, but we do understand that there is a rise in the numbers.”
But advocates say DOE should at least know more about these children, since fewer than 25 percent of special education students graduated last year.
“It's important to understand who those new students will be, why there's an upsurge, and what needs to be done to get ready to serve them,” said Kim Sweet of the group Advocates for Children.
The numbers are going up just as the department is reorganizing how special education students are taught. During the next two years, almost all special ed. students will be mainstreamed – able to enroll in all of the city's 1,500 schools instead of being sent to special schools.
“It is an ambitious plan, but I think an ambitious plan is needed because the results have been so low,” Sweet said. “And as you can see, the numbers are rising all the time.”
But until more is known about exactly why so many more students are requiring special education services, it may be hard to prepare to serve them best.