"High Expectations" and "Special Education" Not Mutually Exclusive

I've been reading a little about the new Common Core State Standards that set specific educational goals for every child in the U.S., even those in special education. I'm excited to see ambition and high expectations applied to special ed, where even the best teachers I've met seem resigned to making the best of less. I'm interested to see guidelines that treat mainstreaming as a given, and mandate meaningful educational support.

At the same time, I'm skeptical that, unless there's a magic wand involved, absolutely every individual child will suddenly be able to learn with identical rigor. And I worry about kids who, without the creative development and application of a behavior intervention plan, will never be able to manage the stress of this tremendous challenge and wind up expelled or scapegoated.

Whatever comes of these standards, though, they may have the power to transform those meetings -- you know the ones, where professionals outline the devastating results of your child's evaluations and kindly inform you that your child will never learn, never catch up, never be in a regular classroom, never amount to anything. How sweet would it be to plop a copy of the "Application for Students With Disabilities" document on the table and say, "Well, thank you for sharing, but it is the position of the federal government that every child, even those with 'the most significant cognitive disabilities,' can learn to the same high standards as everybody else, can do so in a mainstream classroom, and can go on to college and a career -- and furthermore, that it's your job to figure out how to make that happen. Whatcha got?"

_{Photo by Dave Einsel/Getty Images}

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