Equality of Educational Opportunity: Race, Gender, and Special Needs Chapter 5 McGraw-Hill/Irwin ©2012 McGraw-Hill Higher Education. All rights reserved.

Timeline of Events: Equality of Educational Opportunity 1790 - Naturalization Law 1868 - Fourteenth Amendment 1895 - Plessy v. Ferguson 1923 - U.S. v. Bhagat Singh Thind 1924 - Native Americans granted citizenship 1954 - Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka 1964 - Civil Rights Act 1966 - National Organization for Women (NOW) formed 1972 - Title IX Higher Education Act 1975 - Federal regulations end gender discrimination in athletics 1975 - Public Law 94-142 Education for All Handicapped Children Act 1990 - Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) 1997 - Amendments to IDEA 2002 - President’s Commission Report: Revitalizing Special Education for Children and Their Families ©2012 McGraw-Hill Higher Education. All rights reserved.

Definition of Race Race is a social and legal construction. Courts have struggled to define race. Takao Ozawa v. United States United States v. Bhagat Singh Thind The U.S. Census Bureau uses personal self-identification, making race a matter of personal choice. ©2012 McGraw-Hill Higher Education. All rights reserved.

Takao Ozawa v. United States, 1922 “The test afforded by the mere color of the skin of each individual is impracticable, as that differs greatly among persons of the same race, even among Anglo-Saxons, ranging by imperceptible gradations from the fair blond to the swarthy brunette, the later being darker than many of the lighter hued persons of the brown and yellow races.” ©2012 McGraw-Hill Higher Education. All rights reserved.

U.S. v. Bhagat Singh Thind, 1923 “It may be true that the blond Scandinavian and the brown Hindu have a common ancestor in the dim reaches of antiquity, but the average man knows perfectly well that there are unmistakable and profound differences between them today.” ©2012 McGraw-Hill Higher Education. All rights reserved.

Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution, 1868 “No state shall…deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.” ©2012 McGraw-Hill Higher Education. All rights reserved.

Plessy v. Ferguson: The 1895 U.S. Supreme Court decision which determined that “equal protection” could also mean “separate but equal” ©2012 McGraw-Hill Higher Education. All rights reserved.

Oliver v. Michigan State Board of Education, 1974 “A presumption of segregative purpose arises when plaintiffs establish that the natural, probable and foreseeable result of public officials’ action or inaction was an increase or perpetuation of public school segregation.” ©2012 McGraw-Hill Higher Education. All rights reserved.

Reasons for recent increased segregation: Recent court decisions outlawing race as a main factor in student assignment Increased residential segregation Increased role of private schools in contributing to segregation ©2012 McGraw-Hill Higher Education. All rights reserved.

Second-Generation Segregation Second-generation segregation refers to forms of racial segregation that are the result of school practices, such as: Tracking Ability Grouping Misplacement in special education classes Unequal treatment among races in integrated schools Subtle forms of segregation Rigid racial boundaries ©2012 McGraw-Hill Higher Education. All rights reserved.

During its first years of activism, NOW focused on: Eliminating discriminatory quotas against women in college and professional school admissions Urging parents, counselors, and teachers to encourage women to pursue higher education and professional education Eliminating discriminatory practices against women in the awarding of fellowships and loans Investigating the problem of female dropouts ©2012 McGraw-Hill Higher Education. All rights reserved.

Achievements in providing equality of educational opportunity for women: 1972: Legal action against school systems with segregated courses in home economics and industrial arts 1974: More than 1,000 women’s studies departments created on college campuses 1975: Federal regulations to end sex discrimination in athletics 1976: Lawsuits regarding female participation in athletics and gender-biased hiring in school administration 1976: Educational Equality Act 1983: Last all-male school in Ivy League, Columbia University, becomes co-educational 1986: FairTest organized to counter sex bias in high-stakes testing 1996: Virginia Military Institute and the Citadel become coeducational. ©2012 McGraw-Hill Higher Education. All rights reserved.

Anti-discriminatory changes in educational programs: The number of female medical school graduates increased from 8.4 percent in 1969 to 34.5 percent in 1990. The percentage of doctoral and professional degrees awarded women increased from 14.4 percent in 1971 to 36.8 percent in 1991. Most discrimination in vocational programs ended. Female participation in high school athletics increased from 7 percent in 1972 to 37 percent in 1992 and in college athletics from 15.6 percent in 1972 to 34.8 percent in 1993. ©2012 McGraw-Hill Higher Education. All rights reserved.

Students With Disabilities The political movement for federal legislation to aid students with disabilities followed a similar path to rest of the civil rights movement. In Pennsylvania Association for Retarded Children (PARC) v. Commonwealth of Pennsylvania the court enjoined the state from excluding children with disabilities from public education and required that every child be allowed access to an education. ©2012 McGraw-Hill Higher Education. All rights reserved.

Disability Categories Autism Deaf-Blindness Developmental Delay Emotional Disturbance Hearing Impairment Mental Retardation Multiple Disabilities Orthopedic Impairment Specific Learning Disability Speech or Language Impairment Traumatic Brain Injury Visual Impairment ©2012 McGraw-Hill Higher Education. All rights reserved.

An Individual Education Plan (IEP) includes the following: A statement of the present levels of educational performance of the child; A statement of annual goals, including short-term instructional objectives; A statement of the specific educational services to be provided to the child, and the extent to which the child will be able to participate in regular educational programs; The projected date for initiation and anticipated duration of such services; Appropriate objectives criteria and evaluation procedures and schedules for determining, on at least an annual basis, whether instructional objectives are being achieved. ©2012 McGraw-Hill Higher Education. All rights reserved.

Inclusion The 1975 Education for All Handicapped Children Act called for integration of children with disabilities into regular classes. Isolation deprives disabled students from contact with other students Denies access to equipment found in regular classrooms Inclusion is believed to improve educational achievement and social development It is hoped that bias will decrease with increased interaction ©2012 McGraw-Hill Higher Education. All rights reserved.

Inclusion and No Child Left Behind 2003 regulations to the No Child Left Behind Act required that children with disabilities be included in state test systems Reasoning: Positive benefits to students when included in accountability systems Fear that more students would be labeled disabled in order to raise test scores ©2012 McGraw-Hill Higher Education. All rights reserved.

Teachers’ objections to inclusion programs: Disabled students are moved into regular classrooms without any support services. Experienced teachers have never received training in teaching students with disabilities or in teaching in an inclusive classroom. School districts implementing inclusion policies do not provide adequate training for general education teachers. Education schools do not provide prospective teachers with a basic knowledge of learning disabilities or situations they are likely to confront in inclusive classrooms. General education teachers are often excluded from the individualized education plan (IEP) team. Parents of nondisabled students worry that their children’s education will be compromised in inclusive classrooms. ©2012 McGraw-Hill Higher Education. All rights reserved.

Solutions for Inclusion Issues More education and training for experienced and future teachers Adequate support services for teachers in inclusive classrooms Teacher participation on the individualized planning team Education of parents about inclusive classrooms ©2012 McGraw-Hill Higher Education. All rights reserved.