Equal Education Opportunity

The Education for All Handicapped Children Act (Public Law 94–142) is noted as the statute that has had the most influence on the establishment of learning disabilities services for students in public schools. In 1990 this law was updated as the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA; Public Law 101–476). The IDEA was revised as the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) of 1997 (Public Law 105–17).

Due to this series of laws, all children and youth ages 3 through 21 with disabilities have the right to a free and appropriate public education (FAPE). Additionally, each state must have a plan that is in agreement with the federal law. On December 3, 2004, President George W. Bush signed into law the reauthorized Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (H.R. 1350). The Individuals with Disabilities Education Improvement Act (IDEIA) of 2004 (Public Law 108–446) went into effect [Page 349]July 1, 2005. The IDEA legislation represented a dramatic change in how young people with special learning needs were treated within the educational system. It establishes clear principles for classroom teachers in terms of addressing the needs of children with disabilities and it provides for the development of a written record vis-à-vis the needs of the student as well as the procedures used to address those needs.

Learning disabilities is the classification of disabilities in the legislation with the most changes. Learning disabilities are difficulties that influence the learning process for many children, adolescents, and adults, affecting their education and adjustment to society. A learning disability is a disorder in one or more of the basic processes involved in understanding spoken or written language and may show up as a problem in listening, thinking, speaking, reading, writing, or spelling or in a student's ability to do math, despite at least average intelligence. Individuals with learning disabilities encounter difficulty in one or more of seven areas: receptive language, expressive language, basic reading skills, reading comprehension, written expression, mathematics calculations, or mathematics reasoning. Learning disabilities are inherent to the individual, are presumed to be due to central nervous system dysfunction, and may occur across the life span.

The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) is both a grants statute and a civil rights statute. Even though much of the basic constitution of IDEA has been retained, Public Law 108–446 does make a number of noteworthy changes. Among these are the definition of “highly qualified” teachers, calculation of maximum state grants, funding for high–need children with disabilities, revised state performance goals and requirements for children's participation in state and local assessments, changes in the private school provisions, exceptions to certain financial requirements, changes in procedural safeguards, and changes in compliance monitoring to focus on student performance.

The Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA), as revised by the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB), mandates that each state educational agency (SEA) have a plan to ensure that all public school teachers teaching in core academic subjects meet the definition of a “highly qualified teacher.” The Individuals with Disabilities Education Improvement Act requires that all special education teachers—not just those who teach core subjects—meet certain requirements. Public Law 108–446 further modifies the requirements with respect to two groups of special education teachers: (1) those who teach only the most severely disabled children and (2) those who teach more than one core subject. The reformed IDEA provides that a child with a disability may be placed in a private school by the local educational agency (LEA), state educational agency (SEA), or by parents as a means of fulfilling the FAPE requirements.

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