Unproven Links

Abstract

The high degree of overlap of race and poverty in our society has led to the presumption in both research and practice that ethnic disproportionality in special education is in large measure an artifact of the effects of poverty. This article explores relationships among race, poverty, and special education identification to arrive at a more precise estimate of the contribution of poverty to racial disparities. District-level data for all 295 school corporations in a midwestern state were analyzed for this study. Records included information on disability category, general and special education enrollment by race, socioeconomic level, local resources, and academic and social outcomes for 1 school year. Simple correlations among the variables demonstrate that correlations between race and poverty of even moderate strength do not guarantee that the 2 variables will function in the same way with respect to outcome variables, such as identification for special education services. Results of regression analyses indicate that poverty makes a weak and inconsistent contribution to the prediction of disproportionality across a number of disability categories. On the other hand, rates of suspension and expulsion consistently predict district rates of special education disproportionality. Inconsistent relationships between special education disproportionality and achievement may indicate a developmental trend in the systemic contribution to racial disparity. Ideal-type analyses examining race— poverty relationships indicate that where poverty makes any contribution above and beyond race in predicting disability identification, its primary effect is to magnify existing racial disparity.

Minorities Are Disproportionately Underrepresented in Special Education

“…This is because, to date, the extant educational research has largely reported that minority children are more likely to be identified as having disabilities. This has led to characterizations of special education as “discriminatory” (Skiba et al, 2005, p. 142), maintaining “a new legalized form of structural segregation and racism” (Blanchett, 2006, p. 25), and constituting “institutionalized racism” (Codrington & Fairchild, 2102, p. 6). Yet, and despite these characterizations, our analyses of a longitudinal sample of U.S. schoolchildren followed from kindergarten entry to the end of middle school failed to yield any evidence of minority over-representation in special education.…”

“…Examples of child-, family-, and school-level factors that might confound estimates of minority children's risk of disability identification include being born at very low birthweight (Grunau, Whitfield, & Davis, 2002), being raised in poverty (Blackburn, Spencer, & Read, 2013; Costello et al, 1996; Emerson, Einfeld, & Stancliffe, 2011), receiving lower quality (e.g., fewer language-based interactions) parenting and being raised in lower-resourced home environments (Altarac & Saroha, 2007; Costello et al, 1996), experiencing multiple risk factors (Myers & Pianta, 2008; Shaw, Owens, Giovannelli, & Winslow, 2001), and the state of residence (Wiley & Siperstein, 2011). Most of the extant studies have either not adjusted for these potentially confounding factors or have done so using school- or district-level averages (e.g., Oswald et al, 1999; Skiba et al, 2005; Sullivan, 2011; Talbott, Fleming, Karabotsos, & Dobria, 2011), thereby introducing substantial measurement error into the resulting directional estimates (Harwell & LeBeau, 2010). …”

“…These findings have led to characterizations of special education as “discriminatory” (Skiba et al, 2005, p. 142), having “systemic bias” (Oswald, Coutinho, Best, & Nguyen, 2001, p. 361), constituting “a new legalized form of structural segregation and racism” (Blanchett, 2006, p. 25), and being “another manifestation of institutionalized racism” (Codrington & Fairchild, 2012, p. 6). Federal legislation and policies have been enacted to reduce minority disproportionate representation (MDR) in special education (e.g., Posney, 2007; U.S. Department of Education Office of Civil Rights, 2009).…”

Preventive Mental Health at School

“…Racial disproportionality cannot be attributed to demographic factors, SES, single-parent households, family income, or to the hypothesized differential behavior of some racial and ethnic groups (Skiba, Poloni-Staudinger, Simmons, Feggins-Aziz, & Chung, 2005 ;. Research on classroom processes has determined that the problem of disproportionality begins with the teacher in the classroom, where the teacher's expectations and beliefs clash with the culture of some ethnic minority students.…”

Standing out and Sorting in: Exploring the Role of Racial Composition in Racial Disparities in Special Education

“…higher rates of segregation from peers without disabilities (Blanchett, 2010; U.S. Department of Education, Office of Special Education and Rehabilitative Services, & Office of Special Education Programs, 2015). Education policy, the U.S. justice system, and a large body of research treat the ''overrepresentation'' of students of color in special education as likely evidence of bias and inappropriate identification of students of color (Donovan & Cross, 2002;Losen & Welner, 2001;Oswald, Coutinho, Best, & Nguyen, 2001;Skiba, Poloni-Staudinger, Simmons, Feggins-Azziz, & Choong-Geun, 2005). Yet some new research challenges previous conclusions of racial bias by examining the relation between race and disability in light of confounders (e.g., socioeconomic status) and by better accounting for the nested nature of students within school contexts MacMillan & Reschly, 1998;Morgan et al, 2015;Shifrer, 2018;Shifrer, Muller, & Callahan, 2011).…”