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  • Essay / The underrepresentation of children of color in special education

    According to George Farkas and Paul Morgan, two researchers, studied the disproportion in children with special needs between children of color and white children. These findings were strangely misapplied in their claims that children of color, particularly black children, were in fact underrepresented in special education and that the number of black children diagnosed needed to increase. Their argument included that poverty was to blame and that black children were at greater risk of lead poisoning which would harm their cognitive abilities, that they had lower birth weights than most other children of their race and that they lacked medical resources. which would give them poorer health during their childhood (Farkas, Morgan, 2015). This caused an outcry among black communities, civil rights lawyers and even the federal government. Shortly afterward, the New York Times wrote an article titled “Is Special Education Racist?” » The Atlantic Times wrote an article explaining exactly what was wrong with this research and why it was flawed. Farkas and Morgan made sweeping statements that ignored the complexity of these issues, perpetuating the idea that children of color are incapable of succeeding in school and that children with poor physical health automatically warrant being diagnosed a disability. Additionally, children of color in special education being misrepresented and misdiagnosed are two separate issues that overlap, but are not or are not the same thing. People of color are generally underrepresented, but that’s not the problem. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on “Why Violent Video Games Should Not Be Banned”? Get the original essay Children of color are misdiagnosed as disabled at an alarming rate compared to white children and who make up more than 53% of the U.S. population. population. According to this, children of color need to receive much closer attention. Children of color should be paired with teachers who are not white and, if possible, even from the same culture/race. Children of color actually learn more from teachers of color than from white teachers, and this logic applies the same way when they are assessed for a disability. The reason behind this is clearly shared experience and understanding. According to the Huffington article, What I Learned Teaching Black Students, a new, young white teacher visited inner-city Atlanta schools with the idea of ​​"saving" "those" white kids, a complex white savior (Norman, 2015). This being a separate topic, due to her ignorance and lack of knowledge of the black culture and community, she brushed aside the behaviors and words mentioned in class. She thought hair was just hair and had no meaning in her classroom full of black kids who are inherently hated by the world, from their skin tone to the texture, color, and length of their hair. Having failed to share her experiences with racism and colorism, she lacked the capacity to address issues that were seriously affecting her students' learning and safety. Regardless of her new trial-and-error learning, her students will remember it forever, as will the children she taught before unlearning some of her ignorance. For this one, among many white educators and child care professionals at.