Does Compliance Matter in Special Education?

This book asks a question that many educators may think, but won’t say out loud: Does compliance with IDEA legislation matter? The author acknowledges that, while compliance with IDEA (Individuals with Disabilities Education Act) is important, it can also be an administrative burden that detracts from practitioners’ capacity to adequately serve students with disabilities.

Using data collected from three suburban school districts, Voulgarides helps us to understand how compliance with IDEA intersects with decades of evidence of racial inequities in student outcomes. This timely and thought-provoking book unpacks the civil rights history of IDEA, examines the impact of its procedural focus on educational practice, and questions why racial inequities in special education persist despite good intentions by policymakers, educators, and school personnel.

Book Features:

• Uses empirical evidence to examine the common assumption that compliance with IDEA leads to educational equity.
• Focuses on the different dimensions of the equity concern that lie at the intersection between race, disability, and educational policy.
• Challenges practitioners to think about the roles they play in both the production and the disruption of educational inequities.

Catherine Kramarczuk Voulgarides is an assistant professor of special education at the City University of New York (CUNY)—Hunter College.

" As a former school principal, I recommend the book as a useful district-level book study for educators and district leaders to examine practices within their districts. In addition, the book is an excellent source in higher education for students in teacher education and principal preparation programs to learn about the limits of IDEA and the complexities of procedural compliance. The book will spark many discussions and hopefully also spark ideas to reduce disproportionality and inequities in special education."

— Teachers College Record

“This important book addresses critical issues related to the education of students with disabilities and makes the case for why new approaches are needed to ensure that the educational needs of all children are met. Insightful and well researched, this book will be an invaluable resource for educators everywhere.”
—Pedro A. Noguera, Distinguished Professor of Education, UCLA Graduate School of Education & Information Studies

“This book provides a necessary discussion of racial/ethnic disproportionality and its intersection with special education policy, particularly forcing us to consider a critical question of IDEA: is it enough? Voulgarides shares an amazing description of how policy, individual actors, political forces, and racial/ethnic dynamics operate within a school district and unintentionally result in racial disparities. This is a necessary read for special education policy champions.”
—Edward Fergus, Temple University

Tentative Table of Contents

Preface

Acknowledgments

Introduction
   What Is Disproportionality?
   Technical Remedies for Addressing Disproportionality Through IDEA
   The Limits of IDEA to Address Complex Inequities
   Examining Compliance and Equity in Everyday Actions
   Organization of the Book
   Holding Ourselves Accountable for Inequity

Chapter 1. The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act: Enacting Equal Opportunity Through Procedural Compliance
   Civil Rights for Students with Disabilities
   Policy Implementation Within Local Contexts
   The Limits of IDEA and Compliance

Chapter 2. Educational Opportunity and Racial Inequities in Special Education
   Educational Opportunity Gaps and Disproportionality
   Disproportionality Is Complex

Chapter 3. The Crucial Role of Educational Leadership
   Leading for Equity
   Enacting Change for Educational Equity

Chapter 4. Parental "Power" and IDEA
   Social Reproduction and Educational Outcomes
   Special Education and Opportunity Hoarding
   Individual Remedies for Systemic Inequities

Chapter 5. The Logic of Compliance
   Civil Rights Intent and Procedural Compliance
   Solving Disproportionality Through the Logic of Compliance
   The Limits of the Law

Conclusion: Moving Beyond the Compliance Paradigm
   Does Compliance Matter in Special Education?
   The Boundaries of the Compliance Paradigm
   Challenging the Compliance Paradigm
   What is the Answer to the Question?

Appendix A: Methodology
   Fieldwork Details
   Analysis Strategy
   Site Selection and Positionality

Appendix B: State Performance Plan Indicators

Appendix C: Interview Protocols
   District Staff Interview Protocol
   Outside Adults Interview Protocol

Notes

References

Index

About the Author

Below is an excerpt from The Washington Post article written by Valerie Strauss and Catherine Kramarczuk Voulgarides originally published March 20, 2018.

Why DeVos’s plan to delay Obama-era rule on minority special-education students is a mistake

President Trump’s Education Department is on its way to delaying by two years the implementation of an Obama-era rule that is intended to address the disparities in the treatment of students of color with disabilities.

The rule amended regulations that are part of the Individuals With Disabilities Education Act (IDEA). John King, the U.S. education secretary in December 2016, said then:

“Children with disabilities are often disproportionately and unfairly suspended and expelled from school and educated in classrooms separate from their peers. Children of color with disabilities are overrepresented within the special education population, and the contrast in how frequently they are disciplined is even starker.”

Current Education Secretary Betsy Devos is not a fan of the rule, and last month, the Education Department published a notice in the Federal Register seeking public comment on a proposal to delay the rule’s implementation, which was supposed to start in the 2018-2019 school year. The notice says the department wants to make this move to ensure the rule’s “effectiveness” can be ensured.

The “Equity in IDEA” rule is just one of a number of Obama-era regulations  aimed at protecting the rights of students that the Trump administration has either rolled back or expressed interest in doing so.

In this post, a special education expert explains why delaying the rule —  is such a bad idea. It was written by Catherine Kramarczuk Voulgarides, an assistant professor of special education at Touro College in New York City. She has a book coming out in April of 2018 entitled: “Does Compliance Matter in Special Education? IDEA and the Hidden Inequities of Practice.”

Read the full post.

2020 American Sociological Association Outstanding Publication in the Sociology of Disability Award