Special education advocates are visiting lawmakers on Capitol Hill this week, urging them to dedicate more funding to student mental well-being and special education teacher shortages to improve outcomes for students with disabilities.

Many of the challenges facing special education are connected. For example, advocates say more funding and resources are needed under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act to meet the demand for special education personnel and related service providers. And without qualified staff, it is a challenge to meet students’ mental health needs, advocates said.

Those comments came during this week’s Special Education Legislative Summit, hosted by the Council for Exceptional Children and the Council of Administrators of Special Education with more than 225 participants from across the country.

The Statistics Around the Special Education Educator Shortage

According to the National Center for Education Statistics, about 70% of surveyed schools reported special education teacher shortages in the 2023-24 school year. About 50% of special education teachers leave the profession within the first five years of teaching, according to CEC and CASE.

At the same time, more and more students are being served under IDEA. About 7.5 million students were identified with disabilities in 2022-23 — equaling about 15% of the pre-K, elementary and secondary student population, according to NCES. CEC and CASE estimate the number of students with disabilities will rise to 7.94 million during the 2024-25 school year.

On Monday, Glenna Wright-Gallo, assistant secretary of the U.S Department of Education’s Office of Special Education and Rehabilitative Services, told summit attendees of the nonnegotiables in how she approaches her job. They include building the conditions for special education professionals to succeed and sending a message of urgency for supporting students, preventing special education teacher shortages.

″​​Because what happens today impacts those children for the rest of their lives, we do not have time to say, ‘We can’t get to that. I’ll get to that next year. That’s part of my three-year plan,’” Wright-Gallo said. “We have to do it now.”

Read the full article about special education funding by Kara Arundel at K-12 Dive.