It’s Not Easy Being Green: Addressing Overrepresentation in Special Education Through Culturally Responsive Pedagogy

Abstract

The author explores the overrepresentation of Black and Latino students in special education in the United States and offers critical strategies to begin to address the issue with culturally responsive teaching and minimization of subjectivity.

Keywords:

• assessment
• culturally responsive pedagogy
• special education

Notes

1 Black students are overidentified at the national level in the United States and in all regions and policy contexts research has addressed. Latino students are overidentified—primarily in the most subjective categories—only in certain regions and states. Patterns of underrepresentation of Latinos in other regions, reflecting distinctions in context and policy, may explain these overall differences (see Artiles, 2013).

2 Some researchers question the existence of overrepresentation (e.g., Morgan et al., 2015), arguing that Blacks and Latinos are under-identified for special education services. However, these findings have been questioned based on the methodology used, lack of theoretical specificity in the framing of the problem, models tested, and interpretation. For decades, research has identified overrepresentation by race in special education referrals (Skiba et al., 2016; Sullivan et al., 2020).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Christopher J. Cormier

Christopher J. Cormier is an Associate Professor in the School of Education at Loyola Marymount University. Email: [email protected]