BY HALEY VELASCO
Zooming out
Looking ahead
Special education has been a challenge for Texas, said Jolene Sanders, advocacy director for Coalition of Texans with Disabilities, an advocacy organization for people with disabilities, according to its website. The state has seen a spike in students needing special education, which came after a series of investigations and lawsuits dating back to the late 2010s that found Texas was not providing special education services to enough students, Sanders said. Previously, Texas had what officials considered a cap on the number of students a school district could classify as needing special education at 8.5%, Sanders said. Since removing the cap in 2017, that number across the state has increased from around 9% of students in the 2017-18 school
year to 14% during the 2023-24 school year. For the U.S., the average number of students receiving special education services is 15%, according to data from the National Center for Education Statistics. From 2017-21, Texas saw a 21% spike in students needing special education, TEA data shows, the highest increase of any state. The second-highest increase was less than 12%, and the national average was 3%. Sanders said this correction has not only led to more students in special education but has created funding challenges. Advocacy group Disabilities Rights Texas noted in a 2023 report that school districts funded $6.3 billion worth of special education programs in 2020-21, of which the state paid for $4 billion, creating a $2.3 billion gap.
The TEA does a systematic review of every school district’s special education department over a six-year time period, according to the TEA. While FISD will have its review in January, Driskell said the district has already partnered with Region 4 Education Services Center—a service center for Greater Houston area school districts, which assists school districts in improving and operating more efficiently and economically— and TEA liaisons to learn more ways to improve its special education practices, including trainings and audit practices. PISD will have its review in spring 2025. Nixon said in a previous review from 2018, TEA highlighted the district for its “data-driven decision making, as well as inclusive practices and supporting families.” Meanwhile, AISD, FISD and PISD officials and special needs advocates said they’re looking to the upcoming legislative session in January and hoping for some changes to both funding and the special education model. Sanders said she believes the current model, which bases much of the funding districts get on the physical placement of a student, is “woefully inadequate.” Instead, advocates are looking to a service intensity model, which would base services for individual students around their specific needs—and providing funding based on that. The 2023 legislative session did not net much in the way of public education funding, Sanders said. The base student allotment of $6,160, which has been the amount since 2019, remained in place. Many other funding bills were also left on the cutting-room floor due to, in many cases, officials attaching items to them that didn’t receive as much support from the legislature, such as school vouchers. “The [current] model hasn’t been revised in over 30 years,” Sanders said. “[Legislators] are fighting back and forth because everyone wants their bills passed and their priorities. And somehow special [education] funding ends up being a bargaining tool. And nobody has won so far.”
Increase in special education students by state
KEY
States that decreased
+0-5%
+5.1-10%
+10.1-15%
+15.1-20%
+>20%
Texas is the lone state in the country to increase its special education enrollment by over 20% from 2017-21.
+21%
Texas made up more than half the national growth in special education students from 2017 to 2021.
+106,000 additional students in Texas
The nation saw an average of 3% growth in special education students from 2017-21.
SOURCE: TEXAS EDUCATION AGENCY/COMMUNITY IMPACT
In their own words
and evolving?” Landingin said. PISD parent Leigh Ann Cutting, who also has a child in the district’s special education program- ming, said she looks for ways to accommodate her child’s specific needs. Her child has been in special education since pre-K as well, she said. “I’m generally content with the services,” Cutting said. “However, I do wish there were more unique and innovative opportunities for students who learn at grade level, but in different ways.”
PISD parent Maria Landingin has a child who’s been in special education programming within the district since pre-K. She said she has concerns on a statewide level for funding and a lack of resources from the state. “[My child] needs speech [therapy] more. He needs longer sessions, but when you have 50 to 60 kids in the school, how is that one therapist supposed to provide enough support for all these kids on an ongoing basis to where they’re growing
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