Recent Influences of Law Regarding the Identification and Educational Placement of Children

Toward Securing the Right of the Mentally Retarded to Public Education in the United States of America∗

“…In 1919 the Supreme Court of Wisconsin ruled in one of its cases that "the rights of a child of school age to attend the public schools of the state cannot be insisted upon, when his presence therein is harmful to the best interests of the school-" The child in question was shown not to be a physical threat and was able to compete in the school environment. The major argument presented by the School District for exclusion of the child was that his physical condition, namely cerebral palsy, produced a "depressing and nauseating effect on the teachers and school children," and that he required an undue portion of the teacher's time and attention (Weintraub, 1971). The Court ruled that the child could be exempted from school because he made the teachers "sick.…”

Children's Rights in Assessment and School Placement

“…Changes in working, if not always workable, definitions of special education classifications, for example, have been generated by legislators and judges, rather than by professionals within the systkm itself. Weintraub (1972) refers to judicial decision as the Sword of Damocles over the education system, and Haubrich and Apple (1975) note the change "from an institution that enjoyed a uniquely protected status acting in the role of the parent, to that of a public agency having to conform to basic constitutional guarantees" (p. viii). Traditionally schools operated with total authority regarding placement of children.…”