NYC: Special education crisis

Sept 11, 2025, NY New Amsterdam News: What NYC special needs students face in school, and why families are pushing back 

Limited time, overcrowded classrooms, poorly trained teachers are leaving students with disabilities with fewer options; parents are demanding better

With the 2025–2026 school year having arrived, families and school members are preparing their children. Community members and officials are signing and reworking legislation tailored to helping all children thrive, especially those with disabilities.

New York is home to numerous school districts, labeled by borough and then detailed specifically to the schools in those cities and neighborhoods. According to the city’s Department of Education, about 200,000 children in the public school system have Individualized Education Programs (IEPs) that help support coping with a disability that hinders their learning.

Enjoli Morris is a mom raising three special needs daughters living with autism: Winter, 11, and twins Skylar and Sanae, 9; Sanae also lives with cerebral palsy. For several years, they attended a New York City school dedicated to giving specialized instructional support to students with disabilities, yet their time there was met with hard conversations and quick decisions to be made.

 “In the beginning, we were in District 75 schools and that was a little hard for her and myself because of the way they approached Winter,” Morris said. “She was dealing with dysregulation … and she was nonverbal at the time, and I did not know what direction she would go.” NYC Department of Education District 75 schools cater specifically to special needs students living with things like autism spectrum disorders, emotional disabilities, and other challenges. The behavior and actions taken toward Winter, who was dealing with elopement, a behavior where someone with autism leaves a safe space with their caregiver without supervision or permission, to try to help regulate her were disheartening, resulting in Winter not wanting to attend school anymore and even running away at one point, with school officials having to chase her down.

Their situation belies a problem faced by many special needs children in New York’s public school system and school systems across the country. While many are attending the schools, their families discover it is difficult for them to adjust to traditional learning environments, which ultimately leads to parents being forced to find alternatives. In the case of the Morris family, this meant specialized private school.

“Some methods they tried with Winter [were] holding her down, restraining her, not working to understand who she is as a person and why she may be dysregulated,” Morris said. “It came to a point where she did not want to go to school and would have tantrums … eventually, I had to take her out of school because it was just too much for her.”

Responding to concerns

Students with emotional, behavioral, or attention disabilities are more likely to be subjected to harsher punishments and disciplinary actions, rather than positive reinforcement and second chances. According to a report by Advocates for Children staff, specific subsections of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) prohibit schools from segregating special education students from class due to their disabilities, as well as hold schools accountable for only providing students with “necessary behavioral support.”

“You have to meet these kids where they are,” said Hazel Adams-Shango, a New York City independent special education advocate and family worker. “Get down to their level and see what they need — it won’t be the same for every child.”

With the overpopulation of students in NYC public schools, lack of funding for public schools, and lack of teachers in the schools, the use of negative behavioral methods like suspensions have been up and down. According to a report by Public Funds Public Schools, New York has been underfunding their public schools since 2003, creating “one of the most inequitable school funding systems in the nation,” according to EdTrust New York. However, IDEA funding has been increased by the city to $13 million, bringing its revenue to $304 million, according to a report from State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli.

Although funding for New York City public schools has been on the rise, lack of individuals wanting to work in education and with special needs children continues to create gaps in the school system.

“You have competing interests in careers in New York City. You have people going to law school, nursing, careers that pay way more than being a teacher does,” Adams-Shango said.

“It creates shortages in other special education pieces, like behavioral therapists, speech and language pathologists, occupational therapists, and a host of others. These careers are not ones African American students know about unless they’ve experienced it themselves in childhood.”

Faults of the system and schools

Suspension for long periods of time creates negative consequences for a child, especially a special education child. With their brains and bodies signaling different messages to them than another child, it’s hard to keep them regulated and attentive when suspensions are used for discipline.

In 2015, the Solutions Not Suspensions Act, used to reform discipline in NYC schools, was passed to help limit the duration of suspensions and missed class time for students.

Although the act was meant to ease the spread of suspensions, the numbers continued to rise, especially among Black and Latino students, who represent an overrepresented and underdiagnosed population when it comes to qualifying for an IEP program, according to 2020–2021 school year data from the Civil Rights Data Collection.

Dominic Buchmiller, a New York City special education attorney, said information about what an IEP entails for the student can get lost in translation, leaving parents confused and searching for more answers — and more suspensions have not helped. He supports using early childhood diagnosis to help create more in-school and outside-of-school support for special needs children. . . .

Reworking the system for a better future

The work of advocacy and transparency is never done in families who have special education children. The state of New York is home to about 382,658 special education students who make up around 15% of the total student population. Among those students, NYC hosts about 200,000 of them. According to New York State Education Department data, special education parents did not report that the schools their children attended during the 2020–2021 school year facilitated parental involvement to help improve services their children were receiving. . . .