Students with disabilities (SWD) who are Black or Hispanic have been reported to be more likely to be placed primarily outside of general education classrooms while attending U.S. schools. Federal law and regulation require monitoring of special education placement based on race or ethnicity. Yet, whether and to what extent racial or ethnic disparities in placement are explained by bias or by other explanatory factors is currently unclear. We evaluated for racial and ethnic bias in special education placement by analyzing longitudinal data from two independent samples of SWD (N values range 590-1,130) attending U.S. elementary schools. We statistically controlled for plausibly exogenous sociodemographic, academic, and behavioral risk factors measured in kindergarten in analyses of the students as they attended first, third, and fifth grades between the 1999-2000 and 2015-2016 school years. Of the resulting 12 Black or Hispanic grade-year-specific tests, 11 (i.e., 92%) indicated that controls for kindergarten explanatory factors-particularly significant academic difficulties-fully explained the risk initially attributable to race or ethnicity. We observed little evidence that bias explains racial or ethnic disparities in special education placement in U.S. elementary schools.

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哪些残疾学生主要被安排在美国小学普通教育教室之外？

据报道，黑人或西班牙裔残疾学生 (SWD) 在美国学校就读时更有可能被安排在普通教育课堂之外。联邦法律和法规要求对基于种族或族裔的特殊教育安置进行监督。然而，目前尚不清楚种族或族裔的安置差异是否以及在多大程度上是由偏见或其他解释因素来解释的。我们通过分析就读美国小学的两个独立社会福利署样本（N 值范围 590-1,130）的纵向数据，评估了特殊教育安置中的种族和民族偏见。我们对 1999-2000 学年和 2015-2016 学年一年级、三年级和五年级的学生进行分析，对幼儿园测量的看似合理的外生社会人口、学业和行为风险因素进行统计控制。在最终进行的 12 项针对黑人或西班牙裔年级的测试中，有 11 项（即 92%）表明，对幼儿园解释因素（尤其是重大学业困难）的控制充分解释了最初归因于种族或民族的风险。我们观察到几乎没有证据表明偏见可以解释美国小学特殊教育安置中的种族或民族差异。