Association for Public Policy Analysis & Management

A persistent and critical issue facing education policy makers is closing the achievement gap between advantaged and disadvantaged students, including children with disabilities. The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) tasks the public school system with identifying students with disabilities and providing them with a free appropriate public education in order to close that gap. The special education system plays a large role in public schools, with 11.7% of public school students receiving special education services or accommodations in 2012 (NCES Digest of Statistics). These supports help make public education accessible to students whose functioning and academic performance in the typical classroom setting would otherwise suffer due to their disabilities.

An ample body of evidence suggests that students in special education are disproportionally placed into special education along a number of dimensions, including gender, race, ethnicity, and socioeconomic status (Losen & Orfield, 2002; Shifrer, Muller, & Callahan, 2011). This is a matter of concern because accurate placement into special education can help students fully access education, but unnecessary placement is costly and can hurt children’s education trajectory. Yet, little research has been conducted into the processes and settings through which disabilities are diagnosed. This analysis addresses the following research question: What are the factors and processes that predict identification of disabilities in early childhood, resulting in an Individualized Education Program (IEP) in kindergarten?

This study uses nationally representative data from the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study-Birth Cohort (ECLS-B). These data contain a wealth of child and family demographic characteristics, health care and preschool access, and cognitive, language, and motor development, which are drawn from administrative birth certificate data and surveys of parents, schools, and teachers. Using multivariate regression, this study examines whether having a regular doctor or being enrolled in a preschool center influences a child’s likelihood of being placed in special education, controlling for individual-level characteristics.

Preliminary results suggest that children are less likely to be placed into special education if they are black, female, or native English speakers, holding all else constant. Students who attend preschool are more likely to be identified as having disabilities, but having a regular doctor is associated with lower likelihood of special education placement, after conditioning on the full set of covariates. Results of this study will be of interest to those in education policy or disability policy and will aid in understanding the social stratification process in schools. Because states and school districts are afforded wide latitude in setting their own eligibility determination guidelines for special education, one possible implication of these findings is that this degree of discretion may be resulting in inequitable school settings that are not serving all students as intended. Students with disabilities who do not receive suitable interventions may experience poorer academic, socio-emotional, and behavioral outcomes, while students who are not disabled but are incorrectly placed in special education may suffer a psychic toll from inappropriate interventions and lowered teacher expectations.