NPDCI Responds to Wall Street Journal Article on Inclusion
In response to a November 27, 2007 Wall Street Journal article, entitled “Parents of Disabled Students Push for Separate Classes,” FPG Senior Scientist Pamela Winton prepared the following letter to the editor. An abbreviated version of the letter appears in the December 6, 2007 issue of The Wall Street Journal. We invite your ongoing comments.
Letter to the Editor:
Robert Tomsho’s article, “Parents of Disabled Students Push for Separate Classes,” is the WSJ’s second recent front page story to attack the merits of inclusion. While these articles raise legitimate concerns, they distort the issue by focusing only on the symptoms (the conflict), rather than the actual problems that need to be addressed.
Inclusion is like anything else. When done poorly, it doesn’t work. And simply calling something inclusion, does not make it so. In the most basic terms, inclusion flips the old special education model on its head. Instead of moving children to isolated classrooms to receive specialized services, inclusion requires that the services be brought to the child in the regular classroom—the same one that his or her typically developing peers attend. And far from the disastrous outcomes reported by the Wall Street Journal, when done correctly research shows that all children benefit—those with and without disabilities.
For inclusion to be successful, specialists, teachers and families must actively collaborate to best meet the needs of children with disabilities. There must be active support for inclusion from the administration and ongoing professional development. In other words, the resources to support inclusion must be in place to allow all children to reap its benefits. This was clearly not the case in the situations the Journal described.
In some early childhood education programs effective inclusion practices are becoming the norm. And when done well, it is producing significant results for children across a range of abilities. Research shows that children with disabilities make developmental gains in inclusive classroom. They engage in more positive behaviors. Parents report gains in social skills, acceptance by peers, and developmental gains.
Typically developing children also benefit. In one study parents reported that their child was more accepting of human differences, more aware of other children’s needs, had less discomfort around people with disabilities, and had less prejudice about people who behaved differently.
The articles do raise valid concerns for what happens when educators call something inclusion, but in reality practice “dumping”—simply placing children with disabilities in the same classroom as their typically developing peers. Inclusion is much more. Rather than using inclusion as a scapegoat for problems in schools, we should be providing the resources to support it and allowing all children to reap its benefits.
karen salomon [ ksal@comcast.net ] 17-Dec-07
There is no data that supports segregated education. Research is clear on the benefits of inclusion – for children with special needs and their typically developing peers. Research documents that children with disabilities in inclusive settings demonstrate higher academic and social achievement than their segregated peers. Post-graduate outcomes are also better – included children are more likely to be employed after leaving school; they even earn more money than do peers who were primarily segregated.
I would like to see the WSJ do articles on the self-contained classrooms in most schools. What are kids learning in these classes? Are they even doing grade level work? Please review state test scores for kids with IEPs and see how many are proficient in reading and math. These self-contained classes often are much, much farther behind the typical curriculum, and there are often many behavioral problems that disrupt teaching. Kids in these classes get further and further behind.
If the WSJ is "recommending" more restrictive placements, you owe it to your readers to educate them on what those classes are really like, and what the long-term outcomes are for children placed in these classes.