More Students With Disabilities Spend Their School Day in General Education Classrooms, GAO Finds – But Progress Is Uneven Across States

The number of students with disabilities being taught alongside their non-disabled peers has risen dramatically over the past decade, according to a new report by the Government Accountability Office; however, how much improvement a student sees is still highly dependent on the situation, and even what school district you live in.

report, Special Education: More Students with Disabilities Educated in General Education Settings, but Regional Trends Vary Widelyfound that the number of students with disabilities included in regular education classes for at least 40 percent of their school day increased by 25 percent nationally between the 2012-13 and 2023-24 school years, rising from 4.6 million to 5.7 million students, an increase of 1.1 million.¹ That growth outpaced the total number of students with disabilities during the same period, which increased by 21 percent. The biggest jump came among students with disabilities who spent 80 percent or more of their day in general education classrooms, suggesting that this shift is not just about partial inclusion, but toward full-time integration for a growing share of students.

About 7 million children ages 6 to 21 received special education and related services under Part B of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act in the 2023–24 school year. Under IDEA, schools are required to educate children with disabilities in a “minimally restrictive environment,” a legal standard that generally favors placing students next to their non-disabled peers whenever appropriate. The Ministry of Education has also encouraged this practice by using guidelines that state that processes involving all students can benefit all students academically and that every child deserves a sense of belonging in the classroom.

Widespread Benefits, But Sharp Regional Differences

The transition to mainstream education did not stop in a few states. The GAO found that the share of students with disabilities who spend most of their day in general education classrooms increased in 42 of the 50 states and the District of Columbia over the 11-year period studied. (New Mexico was not included in the most recent year of data because statistics were not available.)

But the magnitude of that change is very different. The District of Columbia posted the largest gain, with a 7.7 percent increase in the share of students with disabilities in general education settings. At the other end of the spectrum, North Dakota moved in the opposite direction entirely, with the share of students with disabilities in regular education classes for at least 40 percent of their day dropping 3.2 percent over the same period.

That range, from meaningful gains in some states to outright declines in others, is central to the GAO’s finding that national averages mask very different realities in the world depending on where a student ends up in school.

What’s Driving the Trend

To understand what separates districts with high inclusion rates from those with low rates, GAO conducted a regression analysis using the most recent available data, from the 2022–23 school year. Three district-level factors stand out as being associated with high percentages of students with disabilities who spend at least 40 percent of their day in general education classrooms:

• Districts at both ends of the poverty spectrum. Both high-poverty and low-poverty counties showed higher levels of inclusion than middle-income counties.
• Districts that do not have a private special education school. Districts that did not have a separate school dedicated to special education tended to place more students with disabilities in general education classes.
• Districts with the lowest per pupil income. Districts that used less funding per student were associated with higher rates of general education inclusion.

Availability of Special Education Schools

The presence or absence of a dedicated special education school within the district makes a measurable difference. Districts that did not have a separate special education school were associated with a 5.2 percent increase in the share of students with disabilities in general education classes for at least 40 percent of their day, compared to districts that did, on average, suggesting that the presence of a separate special education school attracts students who might otherwise be placed in regular education settings.

Income Per Student

Funding levels also tracked closely with placement patterns, though the relationship went in a direction that might surprise some students: districts with lower per-pupil income were associated with a higher percentage of students with disabilities in general education classes at least 40 percent of their day.² Specifically, the GAO found that a 30 percent decrease in individual district income was associated with a 1.6 percentage point increase in the share of students with disabilities in general education settings, on average, raising questions about whether some of the shift to inclusion is driven by resource constraints as much as by teaching philosophy.

Other Things

The GAO analysis also identified two additional factors with statistical associations with placement, although the actual effect of each was small. The number of students in the school counselor’s caseload showed an inverse relationship with inclusion: 100 additional students added to the counselor’s caseload was associated with less than a 1 percent (0.35) decrease in the share of students with disabilities in general education classrooms, on average. During that time, the district’s percentage of English learners moved in the same direction as that of inclusion, but modestly – a 1 percent increase in the district’s number of English learners was associated with less than a 1 percent (0.07) increase in the share of students with disabilities in general education settings, on average.

Notably, the GAO regression also excluded several factors that some might expect to be important. The analysis found no correlation between general education placement rates and the ratio of teachers to students, the ratio of other support staff to students (such as nurses and social workers), or other demographic characteristics at the district level, including student race, ethnicity, and gender.

Beyond statistical patterns, the GAO’s work pointed to more human-scale explanations. Investigators visited 12 districts and eight schools across Connecticut, Illinois, and Washington, and interviewed Department of Education officials and local administrators and teachers. Throughout those visits, officials often pointed to three factors that make up where students with disabilities learn: the resources a school or district has, how involved parents are in placement decisions, and the broader school environment — including both physical resources and school culture.

The Reality of Building an Inclusive Classroom

The GAO report also examined how schools work to make inclusion meaningful once students are placed in regular education settings, not just physically present in the classroom. Officials described a combination of successes and persistent obstacles.

At one school, funding constraints meant administrators could not hire an additional athletic trainer with the specialized training needed to include students with disabilities in sports programs — a gap that limited inclusion outside the classroom as it grew within it. However, at a school in one district, officials and teachers said they found success in fostering a sense of belonging because of small group work that intentionally included students with disabilities and students without disabilities, rather than relying on random interactions.

Those examples illustrate a theme that runs throughout the report: physical placement in the general education classroom is part of the equation. Whether that placement translates into actual placement depends on resources, planning, and school culture that vary as much as the placement statistics themselves.

Why Is It Important?

The results come as school districts nationwide continue to grapple with the tension between the federal mandate for inclusive education and the practical constraints of staffing, funding, and resources. As the number of students with disabilities in general education classrooms continues to grow — and growing more rapidly for those who spend nearly their entire day there — the report suggests that the most pressing question for policymakers may no longer be whether inclusion is increasing, but why it’s happening so unevenly, and what it will take to close the gap between states like the District of Columbia and those like North Dakota.

Source: US Government Office

Footnotes

1. GAO-26-107814, footnote 17. ↩
2. GAO-26-107814, footnote 27. ↩