Understanding

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Understanding Addressing Disproportionality

• Leslie Pyper David Anderson
• Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction
• (OSPI)
• August 9, 2007

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This module looks at...

• Defining disproportionality
• Why disproportionality is on the front burner
• IDEA 2004s provisions
• Measuring disproportionality
• Significant disproportionality
• Resources

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What is Disproportionality?

• of students of a specific ethnicity or race

Overrepresentation
In special education
In schools population
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• The overrepresentation of minority students in
  certain disability categories continues to be one
  of the most persistent and complex issues in the
  field of special education

Skiba, et al, 2006
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• They always say that time
• changes things,
• but you actually have to
• change them yourself.
  
• - Andy Warhol

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On Sept. 20, 2002, Dr. Billy C. Hawkins was
formally inaugurated as the 20th President of
Texas College in Tyler, Texas.
Among the well-wishers and dignitaries from
across the country in attendance at Hawkins
inauguration was U.S. Rep. Ralph Hall and
baseball legend Henry Hank Aaron.
http//www.ferris.edu/htmls/alumni/cg/spring2003/
hawkins.htm
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• The professional literature distinguishes between
  
• judgmental or high-incidence
• and
• nonjudgmental or low-incidence
• disability categories.

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• African American students are the most
  overrepresented group in special education
  programs in nearly every state, and
  disproportionate representation is most
  pronounced in MR and ED
• African American students are 2.88 times more
  likely than European American students to be
  labeled as MR and 1.92 times more likely to be
  identified as ED.

Skiba, Russell J., et al. (2006)
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dpi.wi.gov/sped/ppt/dis-losen.ppt
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• Disproportionality is especially apparent for
  African American males in high-incidence
  categories such as mental retardation and
  emotional disturbance.

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Impact -Students with EBD, compared to both
other disabled students as well as their
non-disabled peers, are more likely to

• miss classes
• receive poor grades
• be retained at years end
• be disciplined, suspended and expelled
• be placed in more restrictive settings
• leave school prior to graduation as drop- outs
  or
• 
  pushouts

USED, 1994
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dpi.wi.gov/sped/ppt/dis-losen.ppt
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dpi.wi.gov/sped/ppt/dis-losen.ppt
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African American males in special education
programs areplaced in more restrictive
environmentsreceive corporal punishment at
almost four times the rate that would be
expectedsuspended at almost three times the
rate that would be expected
Harry Anderson (1994)
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• African Americans (33) and Hispanics (28) are
  more likely to spend more than 60 of their
  school day outside of the general education
  classroom

US Dept of Education, Office of Special
Education Programs
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Restriction Risk by Disability Category

• 80-90 percent of students with MR, and over 70
  percent with ED are educated in resource rooms or
  substantially separate settings.
• Approximately 56 percent of students with
  specific learning disabilities are in full
  inclusion placements (pulled out less than 21
  percent of the school day).
• Overrepresentation for ED and MR significantly
  increases the risk for blacks of being educated
  in a substantially separate program.

dpi.wi.gov/sped/ppt/dis-losen.ppt
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• To the extent that minority students are
  misclassified, segregated, or inadequately
  served, special education can contribute to a
  denial of equality of opportunity, with
  devastating results in communities throughout the
  nation
• (The Executive Summary from the Conference on
  Minority Issues in Special Education - The Civil
  Rights Project, Harvard University, 2000)

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• Osher, Woodruff and Sims (2002) point out that
  receiving inappropriate services may be more
  harmful than receiving none at all and that
  higher rates of disciplinary action and
  placements in correctional facilities are more
  common for minority students.
• Minority youths are over-represented in the
  juvenile justice system , especially in secure
  confinement, in every state in the nation.
  (Childrens Defense Fund Action Council)

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75 African American students vs. 47 White
students are not employed two years out of high
school.52 African American vs. 39 White young
adults are still not employed three to five years
out of school.Within three to five years after
leaving high school, the arrest rate for African
Americans with disabilities is 40 as compared to
27 for Whites.
Oswald, Coutinho Best (2000)
Post-high school outcomes
students with disabilities
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dpi.wi.gov/sped/ppt/dis-losen.ppt
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To believe with certainty, we must begin by
doubting. Polish Proverb
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Percent of Population

• Disability by Ethnicity (2005)

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Given 60 seconds, use 4 straight lines to connect
all of the dots without lifting your pen
Center on the Social Emotional Foundations for
Early Learning CSEFEL U.S. Dept of Health
Human Services http//www.csefel.uiuc.edu/m
odules.html
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CSEFEL
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Why?
Some Hypotheses

• Failure of general education to educate children
  from diverse backgrounds
• Misidentification, misuse of tests
• Lack of access to effective instruction
• Insufficient resources
• Teachers who are less well prepared
• Poverty

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Inadequate supports in regular and special
education settingsIneffective management of
behavior
Two major issues that have tremendous impact
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Harvards Research Findings

• Subjectivity of assessment confounds
  determinations of special education eligibility.
• Race/Ethnicity and gender are highly correlated
  with significant overrepresentation of minority
  students in special education, even after
  accounting for the effect of poverty.
• Under-servicing of minority students with
  disabilities increases the likelihood of
  discipline problems and school failure.
• High-stakes testing can contribute to serious
  problems for minority students with disabilities.
• Minority students are more likely to receive
  services in restrictive special education
  settings.

dpi.wi.gov/sped/ppt/dis-losen.ppt
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Many school professionals need further training
in classroom management so that they avoid
contributing to a childs challenging behavior.
(Reschly, 2002 National Alliance of Black School
Educators (NABSE) ILIAD Project, 2002
Division For Early Childhood, 1999)
Professional development opportunities in a
variety of areas are a must for educators to be
able to effectively maintain an active learning
environment where the quality of the educational
experience is optimal for each and every student.
NABSE ILIAD Project, 2002 Coutinho Oswald,
2000
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States With Extraordinarily High Percentages of
Students with Mental Retardation (MR) are Mostly
in the South
U.S. Dept. of Ed. OSEP 2000-2001 DATA available
at www.ideadata.org. The states are Alabama,
Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Indiana, Iowa,
Kentucky, Montana, Nebraska, North Carolina,
Ohio, South Carolina, West Virginia (8 of 13 are
southern). Iowa does not use the IQ discrepancy
test. If OCR data were used, Louisiana would be
added.
dpi.wi.gov/sped/ppt/dis-losen.ppt
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There are gross racial disparities for
Blacks compared to Whites and Hispanics in mental
retardation and emotional disturbance, but not in
the category of specific learning disabilities or
medically diagnosed disabilitiesThere are
dramatic differences in the risk for disability
from one state to the nextHispanics have
substantially lower risk for mental retardation
and emotional disturbance compared to Whites, and
even lower compared to Blacks, even though
Hispanics and Blacks share a far greater risk for
poverty, exposure to environmental toxins and low
academic achievement and There are large
disparities in cognitive disability
identification rates between boys and girls
generally, and especially between Black boys and
girls.
Losen, 2002
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The Civil Rights Project (CRP) and The National
Research Council (NRC) Say

• School policies and practices are contributing
  factors.
• Inadequate teacher training and support for
  classroom and behavior management may contribute
  to racial disproportionality.
• Research indicates that special education
  over-identification and overly restrictive
  placements reflect some inappropriate use of
  special education as a disciplinary tool.

dpi.wi.gov/sped/ppt/dis-losen.ppt
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Areas of Agreement Continued CRP NRC

• To focus on reducing numeric disparities alone,
  without ensuring that minority students are
  making meaningful academic progress, is ill
  advised.
• Numerous studies demonstrating that racial
  stereotypes and bias affects decisions teachers
  make about students (Chapter 5 of NRC Report).
• Socio-economic and environmental factors likely
  contribute to heightened incidence of disability.

The Civil Rights Project Harvard
University
dpi.wi.gov/sped/ppt/dis-losen.ppt
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leadership is needed at all levels ---
classroom, building, district, school, community
to ensure that all students receive an
appropriate education.
National Alliance of Black School Educators
(NABSE) And the ILIAD Partnership
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Congress addresses the issue

• IDEA 97
• Identification
• Placement

• IDEA 04
• Identification
• Placement
• Discipline
• Significant
• Disproportionality

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IDEA 2004

• Sec. 616 (a)(3) MONITORING PRIORITIES The
  Secretary shall monitor the States, and shall
  require each State to monitor the local
  educational agencies located in the State using
  quantifiable indicators in each of the following
  priority areas, and using such qualitative
  indicators as are needed to adequately measure
  performance in the following priority areas
• FAPE
• General Supervision
• Disproportionate Representation

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WAC 392-172A-07010 Monitoring

• (2)(d) Review and analysis of such quantifiable
  and qualitative indicators as are needed to
  measure performance in the following areas
• FAPE
• General Supervision
• Disproportionate Representation
• 34 CFR 300.600

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IDEA 2004

• Sec. 614 (b)(2)(A) EVALUATION PROCEDURES -- the
  local education agency shall use a variety of
  assessment tools and strategies
• (b)(2)(B) not use any single measure or
  assessment as the sole criterion
• (b)(3)(A) assessments and other evaluation
  materials are selected and administered so as
  not to be discriminatory on a racial or cultural
  basis and are provided and administered in the
  language and form most likely to yield accurate
  information

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WAC 392-172A-03020 Evaluation

• (2)(a) Use a variety of assessment tools and
  strategies
• (2)(b) Not use any single measure or assessment
  as the sole criterion
• (3)(a) Assessments and other evaluation
  materialsare selected and administered so as
  not to be discriminatory on a racial or cultural
  bias and are provided and administered in the
  students native language or other mode of
  communication and in the form most likely to
  yield accurate information

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• It's a little like wrestling a gorilla.

You don't quit when you're tired,
you quit when the gorilla is tired.
Robert Strauss
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How do you measure disproportionality?
Technical Assistance Guide fromU.S. Department
of Education
www.ideadata.org/docs/Disproportionality20Techni
cal20Assistance20Guide.pdf
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Disproportionality Measures

• Composition
• Risk
• Risk Ratio
• Weighted Risk Ratio
• OSEP/Westat Disproportionality Task Force

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Composition

• What percentage of special education students in
  a category (disability, LRE, etc) are from a
  specific racial/ethnic group?
• Composition ( from racial/ethnic group in
  category / in category)100
• Comparison with groups percentage of district or
  state enrollment
• Limitation Composition varies directly with
  demographics and is of little value with
  extremely homogeneous distributions

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CompositionState Example

• 3,110 Black students in MR category
• 8,033 All students in MR category
• Composition (Black students in MR category /
  All students in MR category)100
• (3,100 / 8,033)100
• 38.7
• In the state, 38.7 of students receiving special
  education services for MR are Black

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Risk

• What percentage of students from a specific
  racial/ethnic group are in a specific category?
• For Child Count data Risk ( from
  racial/ethnic group in disability category /
  enrolled from racial/ethnic group)100
• For LRE data Risk ( from racial/ethnic group
  in LRE category / with disabilities from
  racial/ethnic group)100

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Risk (contd)

• Comparison of risk for a specific group with the
  risk for all other groups combined
• Strength Risk does not vary with the underlying
  racial/ethnic distribution
• Limitation Risk does vary with the
  identification rates (higher identification rates
  produces higher estimates of risk)

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Risk--Example

• 3,110 Black students in MR category
• 75,653 Black students enrolled
• Risk (Black students in MR category / Black
  students enrolled)100
• (3,110 / 75,653)100
• 4.2
• Of the Black students enrolled, 4.2 receive
  special education services for MR.

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Risk Ratio

• What is a specific racial/ethnic groups risk of
  receiving services as compared to the risk of all
  other students?
• Risk Ratio (risk for racial/ethnic group for
  category / risk for comparison group for
  category)
• Comparison group All students with disabilities
  in category

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Risk Ratio (contd)

• Interpretation A risk ratio of 1.0 means no
  difference between racial/ethnic group and
  comparison group
• Best single measure of disproportionality because
  it is not dependent upon the racial/ethnic group
  distribution or identification rates
• Small numbers can be problematic

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Risk Ratio--Example

• 3,100 Black students in MR category
• 75,653 Black students enrolled
• 4,923 All other students in MR category
• 324,472 All other students enrolled
• Risk for Black students in MR 4.222503
• Risk for All other students in MR 1.517234
• Risk Ratio (MR Risk for Black students / MR
  Risk for All other student)
• (4.222503 / 1.517234)
• 2.78
• For students receiving special education services
  for MR, the ratio of the percent of Black
  students compared to the percent of all other
  students is 2.78

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Weighted Risk Ratio

• Comparing risk ratio across districts
• Each racial/ethnic group contributes to the risk
  for the comparison group in proportion to its
  size relative to the entire comparison group
  (proportion of state enrollment)
• Weighted Risk Ratio (Riskcomposition of focus
  group / sum of riskcomposition for other groups)
• Adjust for variability in district level
  demographics
• Better data for targeting assistance
• Small numbers can be problematic

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Weighted Risk Ratio--Example

• Calculate District MR risk for all groups
• Calculate proportion of State enrollment for all
  groups

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Weighted Risk Ratio--Example
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Weighted Risk Ratio--Example

• Weighted Risk Ratio (1-State Black
  composition)District Black MR risk / Sum of
  (State composition District MR risk) for all
  other groups
• (1-0.185)0.051 / (0.005 0.035)
  (0.035 0.015) (0.175 0.020) (0.600
  0.021)
• 2.46
• When taking into account state enrollment
  proportions, the ratio of the percent of Black
  students to the percent of all other students
  receiving special education services for MR is
  2.46

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Disproportionality Trends

• Washington State Data
• (1999 2006)

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Defining Significant Disproportionality
State defines for LEAs and for state in general
State determines criteria for what level of
disproportionality is significant
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WAC 392-172A-07040 Disproportionality

• (3) Significant disproportionality means
• The overall percentage of students eligible for
  special education in the district is greater than
  the statewide average plus one percent
• The weighted risk ratio for a school district as
  calculated by the state is greater than 3.0 in
  one or more racial or ethnic groups by disability
  category or discipline when compared to all
  students within the school district, and
  placement when compared to all eligible students
  within the school district and
• Placement of one or more racial or ethnic groups
  on the least restrictive environment tables
  published by the OSPI annually is greater than
  the statewide average plus one percent

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Disproportionality
To Determine Significant Disproportionality

• of all students eligible gt state average plus
  1
• Weighted risk ratio gt 3.0
• specific category discipline
  placement
• Placement LRE Table 3 gt state average
• plus 1
• Must meet all three

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Determining Significant Disproportionality
Is based on collection and examination of data --
-- and not on a districts policies, procedures,
or practices.
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What happens if theres a determination of
significant disproportionality?
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For Determinations of Significant
Disproportionality

• States must

• Provide for the review and revision (if
  appropriate) of policies, procedures, and
  practices used in identification or placement of
  children

Do they comply with requirements of IDEA?
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For Determinations of Significant
Disproportionality

• States must

• Require LEAs to use 15 of Part B funds for
  early intervening services

particularly, but not only, for children in
those groups significantly overidentified.
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For Determinations of Significant
Disproportionality

• The LEA must

• Publicly report on the revision of policies,
  practices, and procedures

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Reporting

• States must annually report under 6-year State
  Performance Plan (SPP) on

in special education and related services
of districts with DR of racial and ethnic groups
that results from inappropriate identification.
in specific disability categories
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What Disability Categories?
mental retardation specific learning disabilities
emotional disturbance speech or language
impairments other health impairments autism
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Sources of Technical Assistance

• IDEA authorizes and supports

• Technical assistance
• Demonstration projects
• Dissemination of information
• Implementation of scientifically based research

www.nccrest.org
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NCCRESt Resources
www.nccrest.org
How-to guides.

• Data maps.

Practitioner briefs.
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On Sept. 20, 2002, Dr. Billy C. Hawkins was
formally inaugurated as the 20th President of
Texas College in Tyler, Texas.
There is no small amount of irony in Hawkins
successful career in higher education. As a child
he was mislabeled as being a slow learner and
placed in special education classes from the
third through the 10th grades. Today he is
recognized for his expertise and insights into
the education of young people.
http//www.ferris.edu/htmls/alumni/cg/spring2003/
hawkins.htm
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• The future is not a result of choices among
  alternative paths offered by the present, but a
  place that is created -- created first in the
  mind and will, created next in activity.
• The future is not some place we are going to, but
  one we are creating. The paths are not to be
  found, but made, and the activity of making them,
  changes both the maker and the destination.
  - John Schaar, futurist

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Resources

• http//www.ideadata.org/docs/Disproportionality20
  Technical20Assistance20Guide.pdf
• http//www.taalliance.org/research/disprop.htm
• http//www.nichcy.org
• http//www.nasponline.org/
• http//idea.ed.gov/explore/view/p/,root,dynamic,To
  picalArea,7,
• http//www.emstac.org/registered/topics/disproport
  ionality/intro.htm
• OSPI Learning Improvement
• http//www.k12.wa.us/SpecialEd/RTI.asp
  x
• http//www.ccsso.org/
• http//rrfcnetwork.org/
• http//www.rrfcnetwork.org/component/option,com_bo
  okmarks/Itemid,28/mode,0/catid,48/navstart,0/searc
  h,/

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What is your next step?