This paper is in response to Dr. Jim Kauffman and colleagues' article titled Problems Related to Underservice of Students With Emotional or Behavioral Disorders, which was published in volume 33, issue 1, of Behavioral Disorders. We thank the editors of Behavioral Disorders for the opportunity to submit this response. With full acknowledgment of Dr. Kauffman's unquestionable qualifications as a leader in the of special education, we respectfully disagree with some key assumptions in that article and with specific statements regarding our own work. The work referenced by Kauffman et al. was a report of a 4-year ethnographic study of the processes by which Black and Hispanic children were placed into special education (including emotional and behavioral disorder [EBD]) programs (Harry & Klingner, 2006). The issue that fueled our research was ethnic disproportionality in special education.On reading the Kauffman et al. argument, we were puzzled by the conflict between the authors' criticisms of our work and their eloquent explanation of the challenges facing special education, such as the ambiguity of the categories, the confounding effect of comorbidity, the difficulties of assessing EBD, and the influence of context on perceptions of appropriate behavior. These are precisely the issues that concern those of us who study the disproportionate placement of minorities in EBD programs. This is what our research was about.There are, however, some points of departure between our views and theirs. The main point of disagreement is whether diverse children, specifically African American boys, are among those considered underserved in EBD programs. We have serious questions about the notion of of children in general in EBD programming, particularly in light of intransigent and decades-long rates of overrepresentation of specific subgroups in this category. On most other points, we agree with the principles espoused by Kauffman et al. but disagree on the means of arriving at them. We address the arguments as follows: First, we explain why we disagree with the belief that children representing all groups are underserved in EBD. We underscore our agreement with Kauffman et al. that the category itself is ambiguously defined, but we emphasize the challenges that cultural difference and the country's history of racism bring to this issue. We then turn to an explicit defense of our research methodology and the resultant findings because Kauffman et al. seem not to be aware of the rigor with which we approached our task. Third, we address some of the implications of our findings, namely, issues of stigma, restrictive placement in EBD programs, and the concept of prevention. Finally, we take issue with view of Kauffman et al. that scholars who criticize special education should leave the field (p. 47). Overall, throughout our argument, we contend that an ecological approach and current proposals for multitiered models of intervention that emphasize matching targeted, research-based, early intervention efforts to students at risk for behavioral problems will improve practice as well as outcomes, replacing the notion of of disability with one of prevention and support.The Premise of Under and UnderserviceTwo premises underlying the Kauffman et al. article are the following: first, that there is a problem of underidentification and underservice of children with EBD and, second, that children's access to special education services should be dependent on identification of disability.Regarding the first premise - that the rate of placement in EBD indicates we are aware that this is a widely accepted perspective (Kerr & Nelson, 2006). However, although Kauffman et al. base this premise on figures from mental health services, these prevalence rates are highly variable, with estimates ranging from 2% to 20% of the school-age population (Kauffman, 2005; U. …