History of Special Education

1. History of Special Education Taken from Marvin Lazerson’s “The Origins of Special Education.” Published in Special Education Policies: Their History, Implementation and Finance edited by Chambers and Hartman. 1983

2. These sightless eyes, deaf ears, mute tongues and vacant minds are a perpetual witness against us; hereafter we cannot escape our responsibility by pleading ignorance of the fact. New Jersey Commission on the Deaf and Dumb, Blind and Feebleminded, 1873

3. You can’t put my Tony in the dumb-bell school. “Slavonian” woman in Los Angeles, mid-1930’s

4. There is nothing more repulsive to me and nothing more unwarranted than to single out little tots, under 12, put them in a separate room and label them….Before you give the child the Binet test, be sure to give him first the Borden and Sheffield test, and for the benefit of out-of-towners, by the Borden and Sheffield test, I men find out if they have enough milk—just plain cow’s milk. New York Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia to a conference of special educators, 1929

5. In general, crippled children in Boston are not allowed to attend school. As a regular practice, school officials make no distinction between those crippled children who doctors say are able to take part in normal school activities, and those who are not. Except for isolated instances, they are prevented from attending school altogether. • Take Force on Children Out of School, 1970

6. Exclusion • Protected the normal from the deviant • Created an outsider/a second class citizen • Public education never provided access to all who might benefit and has been used to exclude some from full participation with others

7. Who is handicapped? • Need aid to survive physically or economically? • Learning disability? • Couldn’t “get along” in schools. • Failed to stay on grade level? • Scored low on IQ tests.

8. Some said that special education did not do enough to help children while others said that special education too readily placed kids in special schools.

9. Special Education was the least accepted of all the public school programs • To paraphrase John Dewey…if a society ought to provide for its children that what the best parent would provide, special education stands out as a measure of the failure of public responsibility.

10. 19th Century • Disability was a private trouble • A few private charities/institutions • Value driven • Limited government • Individualism • Private responsibility for child rearing • Children were only institutionalized if: • Threat to themselves or others (determined by justice system) • Parents decided they could not control the child

11. 20th Century • Things changed • Complaints about institutions • Creation of mass public school • Compulsory education • # of students doubled • Average daily attendance increased • Length of the school day increased

12. Leonard Ayre’s “Laggards in the Schools” 1909 • 33.7% of all school children were retarded • Ayre’s concerns: illness, irregular attendance, late entrance, loosely enforced or non-existent compulsory attendance laws • U.S. Immigration Commission: Immigrants are to blame, can’t adjust to American Life • Numbers became a problem and school men began studying the issues and creating sp.ed. legislation

13. New Jersey 1911-find kids 3 or more years behind in schools. In each district with 10 or more of these children, the BOE shall establish a special classroom with no more than 15 kids.

14. Special Education received its impetus from the enforcement of compulsory attendence, the retardation studies which followed, association of retardation with foreign born truants and the mentally deficient. • Having fought to get all kids in schools we now had to teach them. • There was also the belief that gov’t interventions would have positive outcomes

15. Progressive Era expansion • Health care • Visiting nurses and social workers • Americanization classes • Vocational preparation • Counseling • Kindergartens • Special Education

16. HUMANITARIAN CONTROLLING

17. Who should be included? • Physically handicapped • Mentally handicapped • Three benefits • To handicapped students • Regular students and teachers • Society as whole • This was not always accepted and some officials argued to keep handicapped kids out of schools

18. The bad guys • Henry C. Goddard and Lewis M. Terman • The unattended or uneducated feeble-minded were carriers of social malignancy • The recommended: • 1% of students be institutionalized and sterilized • 2.5% go to special classes • 15% receive manual/vocational training to avoid a drain on society • Thus special education became a way to isolate children.

19. States begin to pass laws • New Jersey 1911 • New York 1917 • Massachusetts 1920 • Minnesota 1915 • Pennsylvania 1919 • Wyoming 1919 • Missouri 1919 • Connecticut 1921 • Washington 1921 • Oregon 1923 • California 1920 • Wisconsin 1921 • Louisiana 1921 • Ohio 1921

20. 1920’s • Due to advances in IQ testing special education expands in cities across the country

21. 1930’s • Special Education comes under question • Economic conditions led to slow down in sp.ed. Growth • Questions of the benefit of segregating sped students • Early finds on IQ test challenged • 1930 White House Conference on Child Heath Protection • Committee challenged that lot of kids remained un-served (10 million maladjusted kids, 1 million in sped) • Poor conditions in sped classrooms/programs • Poor attitudes toward the advancement of sped kids based on dollars

22. The response • Extend sped to more kids • Early diagnosis • Treatment • Training • Modify the curriculum • Vocational orientation • Establish a national council and state advisory councils • Public PR campaigns

23. 1930’s continued • Conditions did not change • Funding was cut • Kids were tolerated based on mandates not humanitarianism • Parents did not what kids in special classes for the dumb • The jargon changed • Opportunity classes • Programs for exceptional children • Emphasis on gifted • Department of Sped becomes International C.E.C. • Those who had led change in the 1920’s ceased to acknowledge Sped.

24. Post War Reassessment • Little Change • Focus leave values to economic benefit to society • Professionalization and a focus on assessment, pedagogy, classroom management and curriculum

25. Handicapped Children Book • Post war baby boom increases the number of handicapped children born • Improved medical technologies kept more babies alive • New concerns • Speech impairments • Reaction to polio epidemic • Discovery of learning disabilities • Kids with disabilities being born to middle class families

26. The move is on • Parent groups and professionals begin lobbying for additional dollars to fix the disparity between kids and spaces in programs • Parents from groups for different needs worked together • Parents agitated for better programs • Greater public criticism • The Civil Rights Movement

27. Legal Battles • Brown • PARC • Mills • Vocational Rehabilitation Act of 1973 • PL 94-142