Veronica Melendez

Included

I heard hundreds of people cheering with excitement as flashing lights shined in my

eyes. I was twelve years old, wearing my favorite dress and attending the Night to Shine prom

for special needs people. They were all walking down the red carpet with smiles on their faces as

my mom & I saw the people she aided and the people I considered my friends. I felt so happy for

them. I had never seen them smile bigger or heard them laugh harder. People with special needs

have been a part of my life ever since I could remember. As a child I would often go to work

with my mom and pass time with the ones she aided. I remember one of her clients asking me if I

could help them find a blue crayon. As a little kid, I felt so proud of being able to help and that

was when I discovered that helping people with special needs was a passion of mine. I would

attend all of the events like the Special Olympics, Night to Shine proms, and 5K fundraisers to

send youth and adult special needs persons to events like such. Since I was young, I have had a

passion for bettering the lives of individuals with disabilities, even if it were just to help them

with something as simple as finding a blue crayon.

As I got older and more educated, I realized that the education of students with

disabilities can be a tricky and a controversial topic. As a neurotypical, general education

student, I haven’t faced the many challenges that special education students go through on a day

to day basis at school. I do not know what it is like to feel different in the sense that I have to be

in a separate classroom from my peers. I don’t know how it feels to always have an aid with me

everywhere I go. I also don’t know how it feels to have a different way of learning than my

fellow students. But one thing I do know is that integration is a topic that has been discussed and
debated in the special education world for decades. Integration, also known as mainstreaming

and inclusion, is when both special education students and general education students are

combined to be in the same learning environment. Many educators and administrators take

different approaches and hold various opinions on this idea of mixing kids of different abilities

with one another. Although this topic is debated often, we lack a true answer as to what is best

for students with special needs. For that, my question is: What is best for special education

students: Inclusion or separation?

To understand this topic of inclusion, we first have to be aware of how a student is

considered a student with special needs. The special education process is extensive and to

summarize it is extremely difficult. Firstly, It is important to know what the Individuals with

Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) is. This federal education law “governs how states and public

agencies provide early intervention, special education, and related services to more than 6.5

million eligible infants, toddlers, children, and youth with disabilities” (About IDEA). Under this

law there are several steps that need to be taken to properly evaluate a student. A school district

will follow through with their obligation to “‘identify, locate and evaluate’ all children with

disabilities who may be eligible for special education” (Information on Evaluations/

Assessments), meaning that they will give a student an assessment to determine whether or not

they need an Individualized Education Program (IEP), which is required to be considered a

students with special needs. Under IDEA, there are thirteen recognized areas of impairment. If a

child is impaired in at least one of the thirteen ways and it clearly affects their ability to learn,

they are eligible for an IEP. The thirteen areas of impairment include the following:

1. Hearing impaired
2. Visually impaired
3. Both hearing and visually impaired
4. Speech or language impaired
 5. Severely orthopedically impaired
6. Impaired in strength vitality or alertness due to chronic or acute health problems
7. Other health impaired
8. Exhibiting autistic-like behaviors
9. Mentally retarded
10. Seriously emotionally distrurbed
11. Learning disabled
12. Multiple disabilities
13. Traumatic brain injury

(Lee 2019).

After the assessment is completed by the IEP team, it is now up to the district to offer FAPE

which is the combination of services that constitute a Free and Appropriate Public Education

under IDEA on how to place them (Bartlett 67). Placement is the last consideration for the IEP

team because placement is driven by the individual's goals, needs, and services. The goal for

each student according to the IDEA, is to be provided service in the Least Restrictive

Environment, or LRE (Bartlett 91). “This means that, to the extent possible, they will be

educated with their non-disabled peers, and school systems will provide additional support and

modifications to make this happen. This is the case for students with severe and multiple

disabilities as well as those with mild ones” (Special Education). This is because IDEA has a

“strong presumption that students with disabilities will be included with peers without

disabilities in general education settings” (Penry). It is also important to note that there is not one

answer as to where a child will be placed because each school district has a different continuum

of education environments and also because different IEP team members may have a different

opinion as to what placement is appropriate. For instance, parents may disagree with the district

about what is an appropriate placement or what constitutes placement. This is further

complicated by the fact that not all districts have the full continuum of placement options. In
simpler terms, not all school districts have the same exact special education environments.

Therefore, placement considerations may vary by district.

In order to gain a better understanding of what inclusion entails and special education as

a whole, I spoke with Sara Castille, a program coordinator that works for the Contra Costa

County SELPA. She received her moderate/severe teaching credential and degree at CSU East

Bay. We met on a sunday morning and as Castille’s daughter was playing outside in the sun, we

were discussing inclusion as I was very interested, yet very lost because special education is a

complex topic. We began the interview by me broadly asking her how beneficial she believes

inclusion is. “I think it’s so beneficial!” she says ecastically. She goes on to say that “It’s not

only beneficial for the kids who have a disability, but it’s beneficial for the general ed students

that don’t.” This wasn’t a surprise to me as I’ve heard the same thing from various educators.

Many people see that inclusion positively affects both sides of the spectrum. I then asked “ But

aren't there schools that are just for special education students? How do you feel about those

schools?” She replies, “So a little bit about me, I’ve always worked in inclusion and that’s how I

was trained and that’s the program I was in and that’s just my belief.... I know though that not

every kid is going to make it being fully included in their entire school career. So I understand

why you need to have a continuum of options for students. We’ve definitely worked to place

kids there because sometimes they just can not be in a regular school.” I then go on to ask if a

majority of the kids that are referred to non-public schools are on the moderate to severe side of

the spectrum and she explains that she has successfully included moderate to severe kids as she

is a moderate/severe teacher. She has only made 2 referrals to non-public schools and both of

those kids had moderate/severe mental health issues. I then asked “how does inclusion affect

general education students?” “Well, I’ve seen it be really really positive and research will say
that it is positive” she responds, “but I also know that depending on the situation, it can be really

really hard, so kids with really intensive behaviors can really take away from the learning of

general education students who have no IEP, no disability” She continues to say that it can also

take away from other students with IEPs if there is disruptive behavior. She also mentions that

“just because you have a big behavior doesn’t necessarily mean that you have a disability, so it

could easily be a very typically developing kid who’s taking away from someone else’s

education.” This goes to show that it is not just students with IEPs that can disrupt learning, it

can also be kids that are neurotypicals. She then concludes with “I think if it’s done correctly,

and the resources are there to do it, which is really hard right now, I think inclusion is really

good, it’s great, it’s wonderful for everyone, but again it has to be done in a thoughtful way,

there needs to be training.” This insightful interview led me to research more about the qualities

and downfalls that inclusion has on both special education and general education students.

To begin, I first want to discuss how inclusion affects students with disabilities.

Obviously inclusion is not for every student, hence having non-public schools be apart of the

continuum of placement options. But as I was researching, I found Castille to be 100% correct. I

found multiple studies that go to show that inclusion can be much more beneficial than self-

contained classrooms. For starters, inclusion benefits students with disabilities socially. First, I

spoke with Megan Render, a special education coordinator from the Liberty Union High School

District in Brentwood, California. She received a variety of credentials and a masters in special

education from Chico State, Brandman University, and National University. We met at Liberty

Union High school as she was giving me a tour of the programs there. I then asked her questions

via email a couple weeks later. I asked her how inclusion can benefit special education students

after they have completed their education. She responded with the importance that inclusion
holds when talking about socialization. “It is imperative that students with special needs have as

much access to peer modeling as possible. Even those with intensive needs should be given the

opportunity to integrate with peers.” This is because it can be difficult for children with special

needs to create positive relationships with their peers, but thankfully evidence shows that

students that are in integrated classrooms, are more likely to have better social relationships and

less feelings of loneliness. In 1994, Hunt, Farron-Davis, Beckstead, Curtis, and Goetz studied

how the learning environment affects the student and “they found that in addition to higher

overall quality if their IEPS, students with disabilities who were full-time members of a general

education class were significantly more actively engaged and initiated more to others than

students in special education classes” (Jorgensen 61). In the Summary of Evidence of Inclusive

Education, a graph also shows that students who are mainstreamed also have positive effects

when it comes to their behavior. In fact, they are 3.6% more likely to be involved in a school

group allowing them to socialize with peers and are visibly more engaged. To gain a teacher

perspective, I spoke with a Willow Cove Elementary teacher, Sarah Watson, and she said that

special education students emulate what they see when they interact with neurotypical students.

“It’s beautiful,” she said. She explained how special education students almost mimic their

general education peers. “So when the [general education] kids are focused and involved, so are

they.”

Moreover, there is plenty of hard evidence that goes to show how inclusion improves

academic results. Students that are mainstreamed are shown to have better performance on

standardized tests, have completion of their IEP goals, better grades, and more motivation to

academically succeed in the classroom compared to students separated from the general

education setting (News). More evidence I encountered while researching, included a study in
2000 which evaluated the outcome of 11,000 students with a variety of disabilities. The study

revealed that higher time spent in a general education classroom corresponded with higher

attendance rates, fewer referrals of misbehavior, and more post-secondary education and

employment opportunities (Wagner). Which brings me to how the positive effects that inclusion

provides students with disabilities are long lasting. For example, a study I came upon that was

conducted in 1988 that lasted over a span of 15 years, found that students with disabilities that

were instructed in an inclusive setting had an employment rate of 73% while those in segregated

programs had an employment rate of 53% once reached adulthood(Home). Render also remarked

that inclusion is so important for special education students to “get exposure to the environment

that will set them up for post-secondary realities” because “The real world is not a cozy little

self-contained space.”

When talking about inclusion though, it is important to also focus on how nondisabled,

general education students are impacted because the success of all students is so entirely

important. According to Render, inclusion is rewarding for neurotypical students. She says, “ On

the other side of the spectrum, I have also seen such positive impacts on students in the general

education population when students with disabilities are strategically and appropriately included

in their classes,” she said. “ There are many lessons of acceptance, helping others, perspective

building, and patience that can be embedded into the experience.” This is proven by surveys and

studies done by the University of Kansas. This university is a “national leader in helping schools

transform and create conditions in which all students learn together in blended classrooms with

specialized supports available for all students” (Lawrence). That being said, they have conducted

multiple studies and focus groups to gain students' perspectives which can often be overlooked.

To summarize, students on all points of the spectrum were interviewed and spoke about a feeling
of togetherness and unity they have experienced being a part of an inclusion school. Non-

disabled students claimed to be aware of their inclusive culture and “they realized expectations

were high and reported they had support to meet those expectations and were connected to their

teachers and peers” (Lawrence). A student without disabilities said “This is the school where

nobody can get picked on or judged by who they are … we have a variety of nice, different

learners, and we’re unique and all creative and determined and responsible.” This serves to

demonstrate how inclusion can change a school’s culture to be an encouraging place to learn and

can show students the importance of accepting differences. The positive impacts that inclusion

does for neurotypical students are also long-lasting. Render talks about how inclusion

experiences can lead to more people being interested in special education, like myself. “I have

had the pleasure of working with many typical students who have felt such a connection to my

students that they have chosen to align their career pathway with this experience.” Overall,

inclusion can also benefit general education students as well.

Taking into account all of this information, inclusion is the way to go regarding special

education. The federal law, IDEA, rightfully guides educators into creating a positive learning

experience for their students with disabilities. From academic performance, attendance, overall

behavior and socialization with peers, inclusion leaves both disabled and nondisabled students

with smiling faces and a better education.

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