Category: Disability Rights

So what accounts for the drastic change? The answer points squarely to the passage of the Education for All Handicapped Children Act on December 2, 1975 (later renamed the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, IDEA). The law passed because the federal government decided it was in the national interest to help States and localities provide programs to meet the educational needs of children with disabilities. IDEA mandated that children with disabilities receive a free and appropriate public education in the least restrictive environment.

So with December 2^nd now designated as #SpecialEducationDay, the focus is on IDEA’s implementation. It’s one thing to get a law passed, it’s quite another for it to be followed. As a former special education advocate, I attended hundreds of Individual Education Plan (IEP) meetings to resolve IDEA’s hot button issues on student eligibility, placement, accommodations, services, and fidelity.  

In determining whether a student is eligible for special education services, parents and school personnel often disagree. Psychological and/or neurological evaluations are needed to resolve the dispute. Once eligibility is settled, an annual IEP is written to document the student’s free and appropriate public education. Measurable goals and objectives are included to ensure the student makes meaningful progress. The IEP also contains needed services, placement, and accommodations.

Placement is an individualized assessment based on the needs of each student. It is by far the most contentious IEP issue as it wrestles with the mandate that students be educated in the least restrictive environment. IEP teams decide what percentage of the day a student will be educated in a regular classroom, a separate special education classroom, a combination of the two, a separate school for children with disabilities, virtual school, or hospital homebound.

Inclusion in regular classes is IDEA’s default position and a student will only be segregated from their peers when the special education services are more appropriate in another setting. School district budgets and resource allocations are not supposed to be part of the equation. But sadly, students are often relegated to separate classes or schools because funds are not available to support the student’s needs in the regular classroom or neighborhood school.

Although a lot of progress has been made since 1975, there is a long way to go before students with disabilities are assured equal protection under the law. Advocacy is needed to secure adequate funding for special education. Vigilance is vital to ensure children with disabilities are identified early and receive equal education opportunities. For more of my writings go to https://angelamuirvanetten.com where you can subscribe to my weekly blog and find several retail links to Pass Me Your Shoes: A Couple with Dwarfism Navigate Life’s Detours with Love and Faith.

Thirty is a great age—young enough to meet the world head on and old enough to be taken seriously. The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) reached this milestone on July 26, 2020—the day when disability rights were finally recognized as civil rights.

At 30, the ADA is old enough to be taken seriously by people who ignore the right of people with disabilities to be fully included at school, in the work-force, or on public transportation, to name a few protected rights.

It is against the law for school districts and colleges to deny equal access to programs or facilities.  The photo of a student with a disability can’t be left out of the year book, students must be included on field trips, reasonable accommodations must be provided.  Yet the ADA is young enough that people with disabilities are still twice as likely as those without a disability not to finish high school. Disability advocates must fight for student inclusion and accommodations.

The ADA is violated when employers refuse to hire someone because they are perceived as being too short, looking different, talking funny, making customers uncomfortable, or otherwise not fitting in. Yet the ADA is young enough that many people with disabilities ready and able to work are still denied this opportunity. According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, in 2019, only 19.3% of people with a disability were employed compared to a 66.3% employment rate for people without a disability. The 7.3% unemployment rate for people with disabilities was double the 3.5% rate for those without a disability.

Federal law is broken when local governments deny people with disabilities access to public transportation. Buses without lifts should not be bought, roads without curb cuts should not be built, door-to-door service should not be denied to those unable to get to a bus stop, taxi companies should not be operating without a sufficient number of accessible vehicles to service customers unable to board regular taxis. Yet the ADA is young enough that people with disabilities are denied access to public transportation all across the country on a daily basis.

At age 30, the ADA can meet the world head on as a powerful tool people with disabilities, families and advocates can use to achieve justice and equality for all. We can’t sit around waiting for somebody else to enforce the rights protected by the ADA. Nothing will change until somebody becomes the someone who cares enough to do something. And that somebody needs to be me! Not me alone, but me and many others working together as a coalition. Not only is the world too big for one person to conquer, the task is so huge that one person will buckle under the weight. Tapping into our collective power is essential.

“So, let’s not get tired of doing what is good. At just the right time we will reap a harvest of blessing if we don’t give up.” Galatians 6:9 (New Living Translation)

Look for the Fall release of my book—PASS ME YOUR SHOES: A Couple with Dwarfism Navigates Life’s Detours with Love and Faith—which discusses what happens when God intervenes in a marriage complicated by dishonesty, dwarfism, discord, and discrimination.