Special Education: The Myth of a Bed of Ease

Education that helps children and young adults with various special needs gain life-skills for functional independence and meet standards of a school’s core curriculum; is called Special Education. This area of education requires systematically monitored arrangements; adaptive equipment and materials; various interventions and individualized teaching techniques and procedures. Phew!  A mouthful! Yet this does not complete the gamut of special education involvement with its many challenges. The reality, for educators, like myself, in the field of special education; is that it is administratively, physically, mentally and pedagogically demanding. Briefly tabulating some of the challenges should help to dispel the myth that “special educators have it easy.”

These may be considered among the top challenges of special education:

1.      Low teacher morale:  A lack of appreciation for the work that special educators do affects their sense of contribution to students’ progress in general and grade level achievements of students on standardized tests.

2.      Paper work: The regular and time- consuming paper work requirements leave little time and energy to the special educator to do the greater work: help special needs students achieve their IEP goals and the core curriculum standards.

3.      Limited parental support: Many parents virtually “drop” their children on the school and relieve themselves of full participation in the academic and social development of their children. This is something that I have observed for more than 8 years in the field of special education. The special education teacher can also have a “double-edged sword situation of limited support from the school’s administration. In some instances, to be seen as managing, the special educator must contain and confine to the classroom the various problems that can arise and not be requesting backups too frequently.

4.      Scheduling related teachers: On a daily basis the special educator has to coordinate   his schedule with other teachers of services that are mandated for the students. These are counselors, speech pathologists, psychologists, occupational therapists and so on.

5.      Supervising and training paraprofessionals: The academic assistant may be assigned to the class in general or to a certain child. And it is not uncommon to see more than one paraprofessional with the special educator because of what is mandated for students. This represents additional work for the specialist to plan, schedule, guide and evaluate not just the students, but also the paraprofessionals whose actions the specialist is held accountable.

6.      Data collection:  The specialist has to keep minute by minute record of some students ‘behaviors that would be necessary for evaluation, behavior plans and future appropriate placement .All this is expected in a class of mixed  and varied degrees of disabilities including children classified as emotionally disturbed .All this this is in keeping with my first -hand experience.

7.      Great variations in students’ needs: The differences which challenge the delivery of differentiated instruction range from  disparities in learning styles; grade levels; rate of understanding concepts ;nutrition of students and mandated instructional goals. 

The above mentioned issues do not exhaust the challenges in special education. It is in the interest of time and space that only mention must be made of the fact of the high attrition or “burn-out rate of special education teacher: 50 percent leave the classroom every 5 years. Those who make it past 5 years leave within 10 years (Dage, 2006).  I am one of the statistics. Not in the least are the challenging effects of cuts in education budget on special education; the difficulties of measuring certain goals of special needs students by simply filling in a bubble of standardized test that reforms in education must consider; the racial disproportion of Colored and Hispanics minorities to Caucasian children in special education and much more that cannot now be listed here.  The perception that special educators have the easiest job with 12 students and assisting paraprofessionals is a myth amidst the multitude of evidence to the contrary.

—Submitted by: Dr. Wilford Hyatt, M.S.Ed., N.D.