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INTRODUCTION
A United States Department of Education Office for Civil Rights survey reveals that since the 1970s there has been persistent overrepresentation of minorities in certain special education eligibility categories.1 The greatest overrepresentation occurs for black students.2 In the 1980s, black students represented only 16% of the total school population while representing 38% of children in classes for the intellectually disabled.3 Almost forty years later, little has changed-black children constitute 17% of total school enrollment and 33% of enrollment in classes for the intellectually disabled.4
The reasons for the growing disparity in the identification of black students in certain special education disability categories are complex. There are several interacting factors contributing to the disparity, "including unconscious racial bias of educators, large resource inequities that run along liens of race and class, unjustifiable reliance on [intelligence tests], educators' inappropriate responses to the pressures of high-stakes testing, and power differentials between parents of students of color and school officials."5 In one of the most cited examples explaining the occurrence of the overrepresentation of minorities in special education, Representative Chaka Fattah testified before the U.S. House of Representatives Committee on Education and the Workforce on October 4, 2001, about the story of Billy Hawkins:
[F]or the first fifteen years of his life, Billy Hawkins was labeled by his teachers as "educable mentally retarded." Billy was backup quarterback for his high school football team. One night he was called off the bench and rallied his team from far behind. In doing so, he ran complicated plays and clearly demonstrated a gift of the game. The school principal, who was in the stands, recognized that the "retarded boy" could play, and soon after had Billy enrolled in regular classes and instructed by his teachers to give him extra help. Billy Hawkins went on to complete a Ph.D. and is now Associate Dean at Michigan's Ferris State University.6
Another troubling finding is that black students are twice as likely as white students to be educated in a more restrictive environment.7 Among the majority of racial groups, there has been a modest decline in percentages of students labeled intellectually disabled.8 However, for the period between 2000 and 2001, U.S. Department of Education data indicates that at least thirteen states labeled more...