Like many of you, I did not pay attention to special education when my kids were in school. I knew this part of the public school system existed but did not realize its oversized impact on all children and society.
As I worked with more and more children with dyslexia, I learned about the world of special education. Each case was like a microcosm of how the problem was playing out across the country. Every party was unhappy and frustrated with the situation.
The children. There are two classes of students with reading difficulties: those who get special services and those who do not. Both groups may be performing in the bottom third, but schools can only afford to provide services to barely half of them.
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Neither group is happy. The students who do not get any support feel hopeless. The ones who do get services are equally frustrated. Research shows that a struggling reader in third grade will likely struggle throughout school regardless of intervention. Imagine getting a lion’s share of teacher assistance yet still failing in class. “Defeatism” in education describes children who have become empty shells of their former vibrant selves.
The parents. It is heartbreaking to see your child call themselves “stupid.” But quiet moments of reflection are often overwhelmed by evenings of meltdowns and tears as adults and children tussle over how to get homework done.
The world of special ed is not easy to navigate. There are IEPs, 504s and an alphabet soup of assessments. Families often have to hound school staff all year to get their children on the waiting list for one-on-one evaluations with certified specialists. One parent I know had to stage a sit-in at her school to get her child evaluated and classified with a disability, a prerequisite to getting services.
The teachers. After meeting college and certification requirements to become teachers, reading specialists have to undergo more training. Some schools pay $10,000 for this training for each teacher.
After all this training and support, a special ed teacher in New Jersey told me why she quit. The work had become impossible. A sixth-grade special ed student may have gone through 20 different assessments, not counting state and quarterly tests and dyslexia screeners. Teachers are supposed to interpret these results pupil-by-pupil and differentiate instruction when planning lessons.
The administrators. This intervention is also not feasible fiscally. As a nation, we pay over $120 billion for special ed every year. A big chunk goes to reading intervention. It is too costly due to the extensive teacher training, labor-intensive instruction and administration—plus the year-over-year services for the same students who cannot read on grade level.
So, schools are forced to ration this costly service. Denying services to students with reading or learning disabilities violates a federal mandate. Yet schools have to make up for a $10 billion shortfall in federal funding in this area every year. Occasionally, violations are exposed in the media, as in Texas.
The taxpayers. $120 billion is a lot of money to pay out every year. Yet literacy outcomes for students with disabilities are often considerably worse than for others. In my school district in New York, this group does not meet state standards on nearly all measures every year.
All children. Ineffective interventions harm all students. Special ed already claims a disproportionate share of the education budget. A bigger crisis looms ahead due to school shutdowns during the pandemic. It is not yet clear how the language development of young children has been impacted and how much this additional problem will cost. Higher special ed spending means cutting the education budget in other areas, such as enrichment, extracurriculars, the arts and field trips for all students.
Society. By now, you probably realize that this is the biggest and costliest problem in education. Lack of literacy exacts a huge toll on individuals and society. Lost human potential and lifetime earnings among those who cannot read and write—these you already know.
Lesser known is that at least half the prison population in the U.S. has a learning disability (mainly dyslexia). Once again, taxpayers assume the high cost of supporting this population.
AI breakthrough
This problem can be solved with autonomous AI. In 2017, Dysolve AI was launched for individual users. The experiences and the swift successes of the beta testers were documented in our book, Dyslexia Dissolved: Successful Cases of Learning Disabilities, ADHD, and Language Disorders. The early users later thrived in high school and college, recounting their transformations in the press. The struggles of these children and families became a thing of the past.
The Dysolve AI platform for schools was completed last year. I hope that the struggles of schoolteachers and administrators will become a thing of the past, bringing relief to taxpayers and benefits to all children and society.
