IDEA is 50 — and Endangered in Idaho

This year marks a milestone: It’s been 50 years since Congress passed the Education for All Handicapped Children Act, a milestone piece of civil rights legislation that forever changed the nation’s public schools.  

• The act was renamed the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act in 1990.  

• The legislation has been revised and expanded several times, but funding to achieve the promise of IDEA — both at the state and federal levels — has been precarious at the best of times. And this is not the best of times: Idaho is staring down a nearly $60 million budget shortfall this fiscal year.  

A brief history of IDEA: The act now known as IDEA was groundbreaking. Before IDEA, an estimated 1 million children were excluded from the public school system — and if their parents could not afford special schooling, children were uneducated altogether.  

 • The legislation came on the heels of other unprecedented and life-changing civil rights legislation, including Brown vs. Board of Education. If children of different races did not have to be subjected to separate-but-unequal schools, why should disabled children be shut out of public education?  

• When the act was first passed in 1975, it represented a step few other countries had yet taken, providing essentials like assessments, transportation, corrective and supportive services like speech pathology and audiology, medical and counseling services and more.  

• From the beginning, there were funding warnings: The bill promised the federal government would foot 40% of special education costs. When President Gerald Ford signed the legislation, he released a statement: “Unfortunately, this bill promises more than the Federal Government can deliver.”  

Essential but underfunded: Fifty years later, the federal government has never lived up to its 40% promise, kicking the costs to states.  

• Idaho is an example of the consequences of that underfunding.  

• The state has created the perfect storm for a special education crisis: A huge influx of new residents, a chronically underfunded system, and an outdated funding formula that uses the U.S. Census to estimate how many SPED students are in Idaho. The problem? That census number consistently underestimates the number of special education students actually being served in public schools — to the tune of $80 million a year.  

• That gap must be made up somewhere. Idaho public schools use Medicaid to help pay for special education, but it's still not enough. School districts try to make up the gap, usually in the form of bonds and levies paid by local taxpayers. If funding isn’t found at the local level, students suffer.  

• Even worse: In 2023, a federal investigation found that Idaho is out of federal compliance and denying services to students who should be eligible for services under IDEA.  

• At the federal level, the gutting of the U.S. Department of Education threatens enforcement and future funding.  

The pain point for SPED educators: Melissa Scott, a SPED educator and member of the Middleton Education Association, said the gap leaves her frustrated for her students. “The districts rely on Medicaid-eligible students in order to pay for different services,” she said. “But there is so much more that the children need. A one-case-fits-all does not fit most students. Those with significant needs require more services and need more items in order to receive a free and appropriate public education.” 

SPED could be a key issue during the legislative session: Idaho Superintendent of Public Instruction Debbie Critchfield has made closing the SPED funding gap a priority for her office.  

• With a nearly $60 million deficit on the books for fiscal year 2026 — and estimates of a $1 billion deficit for fiscal year 2027 — the appetite for increasing SPED funding may be nonexistent at the state level. Even a $3 million stopgap proposed by Rep. Ben Fuhriman (R-Shelley) failed last year.  

The opportunity: As lawmakers scramble to find funding and prioritize spending, IEA members have the opportunity to make their voices heard: All Idaho students, no matter their background, deserve a quality education.  

"Educators have been working hard to ensure students with disabilities receive the education that they are entitled to as Americans,” said IEA Political Director Chris Parri. “It's high time that both Congress and the Legislature support our educators by fully funding IDEA and providing state support for our students with disabilities."