"A child’s IEP need not aim for grade-level advancement if that is not a reasonable prospect. But that child’s educational program must be appropriately ambitious in light of his circumstances, just as advancement from grade to grade is appropriately ambitious for most children in the regular classroom. The goals may differ, but every child should have the chance to meet challenging objectives."

Nationally, about 15% of students have an Individualized Education Program (IEP). California identifies fewer.

Different states have different processes to guide how a district identifies a student as having special needs, and the percentage of students identified varies accordingly. Nationally, about 15% of students have an IEP. California districts identify fewer special education students, about 13% of enrollment as of 2020, according to KidsData.org.

In order to evaluate learning progress for all students, students with disabilities or learning differences are been included in annual testing. Students can be given extra time or other accommodations (such as having the test read to them) in order to enable them to participate in and complete the test. A small fraction of disabled students is given a different test, the California Alternate Assessment (CAA). (See Lesson 9.3 for more.)

What about Gifted Students?

The special needs of gifted students are frequently overlooked. There is no special funding for gifted students in California, but some school districts set aside money to create programs or services for them. (Learn more about gifted students in the Ed100 blog.)

Universal Design for Learning (UDL)

In the early decades of federal funding for special education, students were designated as having "special needs" in a rather binary way — students were deemed to have either them or not. With time and further studies into disabilities and disorders, these definitions and approaches have matured. Increasingly, teachers and school leaders have concluded that everyone learns a little differently. For some, learning a melody is easy, but mastering a math concept is hard. For some, math is easy but names are hard to remember. Increasingly, teachers are using the term learning difference rather than disability to discuss how students learn.

Great teachers learn to present concepts in flexible ways so that they engage all of their students, get them involved in their own learning, and permit them to show their understanding in different ways. The 2015 Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) mentions this approach under the label Universal Design for Learning (UDL). ESSA did not attach new funds or incentives to the UDL approach, but its use of the term has raised its profile.

Addressing Special Needs Takes Resources

The cost of providing special education services varies significantly among schools and districts. Nearly 800,000 students in California receive special education services — about one in every eight students.

According to 2019 estimates by the California Legislative Analyst Office (LAO), the average annual cost of educating a student with disabilities is almost triple the cost to educate a student without disabilities.

Federal and state funds specifically for special education don't fully cover the costs. Local funds contribute, too.

Federal and state funds specifically for special education don't fully cover the costs, and the portion of the cost of special education that is locally funded grew from 49 percent of the cost in 2007-08 to 61 percent in 2017-18. This unreimbursed portion is sometimes insensitively called encroachment or encumbrance, terms that irritate families whose children have special needs.

The state budget for 2022-23 mitigated this issue somewhat, adding about $150 per student for special education.

Special needs are funded as a block, not per student

The state funding model (LCFF) doesn't include special education.

Money is allocated to school districts based on the total number of children attending, regardless of students' disability status. This policy creates a bittersweet problem for schools that do a great job of educating students with disabilities. If their success becomes well known, eventually they will attract more families that want a great program for their kids. A district can become a victim of its own success.

The state funding model doesn't vary state or federal money in response to individual learning needs: it assumes that students with special needs are evenly distributed among the general population across the state. The logic of this policy is to avoid creating incentives to label kids, but it’s a flawed assumption with an unequal impact. There are patterns in which students are evaluated for disabilities: Many students from marginalized groups do not receive the resources they are eligible for.

To help mitigate these financial impacts, and also to create some economies of scale related to uncommon and high-cost disabilities (such as blindness), the state distributes disability funding through a regional network more than 130 Special Education Local Planning Areas (SELPAs). State law requires that every school district, county office of education, and charter school belong to a SELPA. Most of the state's largest school districts have their own SELPA; smaller districts join together and negotiate the use of funds for students.

Will Special Education Finance Be Overhauled?

SELPAs receive widely varying funding per student. The reasons for this variation are grounded in historic practices, and calls for change have been growing louder with time. In 2015, a much-anticipated task force recommended a major overhaul of the special education system, including specific actions to equalize funding and address the shortcomings of the SELPA system. It also called for additional funding.

The task force findings led to additional research; in 2018 analysis of California's special education system was included as part of the Getting Down to Facts II group of studies. In 2019 a group of policy researchers further expanded the scope of inquiry with a set of 13 studies that collectively take a broader view. Changes to the SELPA system are necessary, they conclude, but not sufficient. In particular, the researchers highlight the need for better data, improved teacher training, and interagency collaboration with child-serving systems beyond schools.

In his proposal for the 2020-21 budget, Governor Newsom called for an increase in base funding, funding for dyslexia research, teacher training, and investments in services for preschool-age children with disabilities. The pandemic of 2020 created tremendous challenges for the mental health of students, educators and parents. Responding to these pressures, the booming budget of 2021-22 increased funding for districts to train and hire special education teachers. Funding also increased for counseling and psychiatric services.

In 2021, Wested updated its research in this area. For current developments in special education policy, follow the topic on EdSource.

Help for Parents

When children have special needs, families struggle to figure out the financial implications of supporting them. If they can, some families hire consultants to help them navigate the system. The Simple Dollar, which focuses on family financial planning, offers some free advice.

Updated September 2017, October 2017, March 2018, April 2018, September 2018, October 2018, April 2019, September 2019, October 2019, February 2020, August 2021, July 2022, Feb 2023.