this question deserves discussion, i have heard it debated for many years now and also discussed in regards to prison populations...
a good part of the reason for overrepresentation of minorities in public special education services could be that if you are rich you can afford to send your special needs kids to private schools, as well you can afford all of the augmentive/wrap around/ related services above and way beyond the level of public education / less wealthy entities. out of sight, out of mind - or at least not in the public system.
which leaves lower income minority students to battle with the system and the services provided to them, or rather - the services their mother has to fight the iep system for....we both know how harrowing the special education system can be for even informed people...but take a lower income family struggling for money and a calm place to raise their kids....add to that the clusterfuck that is the iep process.....or rather..it is that unless you have an advocate, lawyer, sped degree or supreme patience and a lot of time on your hands.......
i am making presumptions here that you can agree with or not..up to you...above i said mother....because if you look in the black community in special ed....it is most likely the mother or the grandmother or aunt that is taking care of this kid/s. men leave. from working in special ed myself for a while i do see a plethora of similarities amongst all students and their families, more so with minority students...
the students come from broken families, there is drug addiction as well as incarceration, missing parents, violence, instability, deep financial need, lack of nutrition, lack of good parenting modeled as well as apathy and depression. and this is just whitey i am talking about, it increases exponentially with minorities.
this question deserves discussion, i have heard it debated for many years now and also discussed in regards to prison populations...
a good part of the reason for overrepresentation of minorities in public special education services could be that if you are rich you can afford to send your special needs kids to private schools, as well you can afford all of the augmentive/wrap around/ related services above and way beyond the level of public education / less wealthy entities. out of sight, out of mind - or at least not in the public system.
which leaves lower income minority students to battle with the system and the services provided to them, or rather - the services their mother has to fight the iep system for....we both know how harrowing the special education system can be for even informed people...but take a lower income family struggling for money and a calm place to raise their kids....add to that the clusterfuck that is the iep process.....or rather..it is that unless you have an advocate, lawyer, sped degree or supreme patience and a lot of time on your hands.......
i am making presumptions here that you can agree with or not..up to you...above i said mother....because if you look in the black community in special ed....it is most likely the mother or the grandmother or aunt that is taking care of this kid/s. men leave. from working in special ed myself for a while i do see a plethora of similarities amongst all students and their families, more so with minority students...
the students come from broken families, there is drug addiction as well as incarceration, missing parents, violence, instability, deep financial need, lack of nutrition, lack of good parenting modeled as well as apathy and depression. and this is just whitey i am talking about, it increases exponentially with minorities.
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