Who Are the Children Special Education Should Serve and How Many Children Are There?

Abstract

Determining the number of school-age children who need special education has been a persistent problem for many years. The crux of the problem is to clearly identify the population of children who are to be served by special education. A specific concern is OSE's use of the 12.035% prevalence figure for handicapping conditions and the implication that states not serving this percentage of school-age children are not in compliance with the law. A review of over 10,000 special education students indicates that about 1.6% of the total school-age population have quantifiable handicapping conditions. The remainder of the children served in special education have performance deficits. Perhaps special education is serving too many children with only performance deficits and by so doing is perpetuating the reluctance of regular education to alter instructional procedures for all children who are experiencing performance problems.