The History of Special Education: From Isolation to Integration

Chapter 12. Approaching Integration

Part 4 Segregation to Integration Introduction World War I changed forever the face of Europe and the world balance of power. Dozens of grand monarchies disappeared, federal states emerged, borders were redrawn) tiny countries were swallowed up, national entities subjugated . Revolutionary Russia began its march to world prominence; the League of Nations was formed to ensure that such mayhem would never again violate humanity. The nations of the New World moved into new phases of political and economic growth and social responsibility. Across North America the expansion of industry brought soaring production, the concentration of capital, and the need for a more organized and skilled labor force. North American confidence transformed the 1920s into a decade of sparkling optimism. Joy in the new era filtered to all levels of society, and, not surprisingly, special education expanded and flourished. In the post-World War I euphoria special education was no longer seen as a distant relative, remembered only occasionally with a few fiscal crumbs. Although it was not yet accepted as an equal member of the educational family, it was now at least invited to family functions. Institutional settings remained important for serving a discrete population of disabled individuals. But from the firm establishment of segregated classes in about 1910 until well into the 1970s, the education of learning- and behaviorally disordered children was generally equated with special class models of service delivery. The reason for the continuity of special classes is fairly obvious: they both removed from regular classrooms children perceived as disruptive or un363 364 Part 4 / Segregation to Integration able to perform and ostensibly provided specialized instruction designed to remove or ameliorate their deficits in learning and behavior. Which function, clientele, and type of segregated class might be best was still being worked out in practice during the 1920s. Generally, however, segregated instruction was viewed as a good thing. Calls for improvements focused on expansion, on making more special education available to more children affected by more varied types of disabling conditions. But with the 1930s came a steady evaporation of the optimism surrounding special education, especially segregated classes. In the wider social milieu the times brought the financial burdens of the Depression and later the fiscal focus on winning World War II. Within the school system the 1930s brought mounting dissatisfaction with inadequately planned special classes staffed by untrained or poorly trained teachers , the watered-down curriculum, the total segregation of exceptional students, and the misinterpretation of the ideology and practice of Progressive education. Under fiscal and philosophical pressures, school district involvement declined drastically. At the same time, professional and parental complaints mounted. Both directly and indirectly, World War II encouraged important advances in special education, in social perceptions of disabled persons, and in their care and treatment. More liberal and flexible views emerged. New techniques were developed. In medicine great strides were accomplished in prevention, intervention , and care of disabling conditions. Technological advances improved the functioning of scores of disabled people. In educational circles apathy dissipated : the field became professionalized, and attention shifted to the technical problems of assessment, pedagogy, classroom management, and curriculum. Segregated classes were again promoted enthusiastically, with a strong impetus coming from parents, who combined forces to demand special facilities, outside the institutions, for their children. An upsurge of funding by the states and the federal government peaked during the late 1950s and 1960s (Reynolds, 1975). The quality of life and education for disabled children and adults, especially those mentally retarded, improved greatly throughout the 1960s. Disabled persons found friends in the White House, and federal commitment expanded quickly. During the 1960s the problems of differential programming, along with some possible solutions, were mapped out in detail. Parents increased their demands that their exceptional children be provided with educational services in local school districts. Educators began to critically question the value of special classes; numerous efficacy studies delved into the justification for and effects of educational segregation. By the 1970s a more humanistic movement had emerged; it represented a gradual but positive change in society's attitudes toward exceptional persons. The traditional notions that exceptional children should be educated separately from their peers or that mentally handicapped people should be herded into large institutional settings were now rejected. A key goal of society became the normalization of all exceptional individuals, which meant regarding exceptional people as individuals and treating them fairly and humanely. As segregated facilities that were once taken...