ERIC Number: ED606851
Record Type: Non-Journal
Publication Date: 2017-Apr-30
Pages: 13
Abstractor: As Provided
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: ISSN-
EISSN: N/A
Are We Correctly Measuring Disproportionality in Special Education?
Kennedy, Alec
AERA Online Paper Repository, Paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the American Educational Research Association (San Antonio, TX, Apr 27-May 1, 2017)
Annually, states are required to monitor whether school districts disproportionately refer certain student groups into special education services. However, these monitoring methods do not account for student factors theorized to be associated with the presence of a learning disability. I explore whether conclusions drawn from current measures of disproportionality remain unchanged once relevant student-level factors are accounted for. Using parameters estimated from logit models, I construct a weighted adjusted risk ratio (WARR) that accounts for student-level characteristics. Comparing the WARR with the commonly used weighted risk ratio (WRR), I find that the unconditional WRR tends to overstate overrepresentation for some minority groups. However, the differences are not large enough to reverse any conclusions about the direction of disproportionality in districts.
Descriptors: Disproportionate Representation, Special Education, Measurement Techniques, Student Characteristics, Minority Group Students, School Districts, Racial Differences, Ethnicity, At Risk Students, Elementary Secondary Education, Socioeconomic Status, English Language Learners, Homeless People, Migrants, Gender Differences
AERA Online Paper Repository. Available from: American Educational Research Association. 1430 K Street NW Suite 1200, Washington, DC 20005. Tel: 202-238-3200; Fax: 202-238-3250; e-mail: subscriptions@aera.net; Web site: http://www.aera.net
Publication Type: Speeches/Meeting Papers; Reports - Research
Education Level: Elementary Secondary Education
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: N/A
Identifiers - Location: Washington
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A