The Slow Death of Special Education

One could argue that the system and the policy of "deinstitutionalization" are at the breaking point.

The trouble is that under the current regime you have two classes of students and parents: if your child is "special" you can write to the state and the state will send a letter to the superintendant and light a fire under his ass. If your child is not "special" nobody cares what you think.

It's a regime where you don't have any rights unless you have a diagnosis so no wonder why the kind of wealthy parent who is highly "engaged" with the school is going to get their child diagnosed with Autism or ADHD or Dyslexia just to get an accommodation as simple as "being able to go to the bathroom whenever they want" (might be all you get!)

All the teachers I know come home crying sometimes from the moral injury of not being able to do right by their students, frequently they report being assaulted, often the bottom 5% of students in the class who are uneducatable cause problems for the teachers and the other students, nobody is sticking up for their rights.

Ithaca built a low-income housing development that literally casts a shadow on city hall, the police are called multiple times a day, there are multiple Narcan cases a week, arson attempts are routine, windows are busted out. Out of the 181 units most of the people are poor but able to live inside, there are literally a handful of people there who have severe mental illness who require involuntary treatment and probably commitment.

If we don't reverse deinstitutionalization we may as well give up on any investment in cities or community. No matter how much you spend on the bus people won't ride it unless they feel safe at the stop. If there are people screaming in the streets other people are going to order a private taxi for their burrito rather eat at a restaurant. They're going to shop at Amazon rather than a vendor that has a presence. They're going to move to the suburbs. They're going to vote Republican.