A growing percentage of students enrolled in the nation’s public school system are identified as having disabilities, according to newly released federal data, and these children continue to face a disproportionately high likelihood of experiencing physical restraint, seclusion, and other forms of exclusionary discipline compared to their non-disabled peers.
The findings are part of the latest civil rights data collection released by the U.S. Department of Education, providing a comprehensive look at equity and access across the country’s educational landscape. According to the report, students with disabilities now account for 19% of the nearly 50 million children attending public schools nationwide. This represents a notable increase from the 17% identified in the previous civil rights data collection released two years prior, highlighting an ongoing expansion in the identification and reporting of student support needs across preschool through high school grade levels.
The comprehensive figures are derived from mandatory reports submitted by 17,591 school districts, representing over 97,000 individual schools across the United States during the 2023–2024 academic year. While the U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights initially published raw numbers from this collection in August, the agency has now published a detailed first-look report highlighting key trends, disparities, and metrics nationwide.
The Office for Civil Rights typically conducts this comprehensive civil rights data collection every two years. The sweeping survey asks all public school districts, charter schools, alternative learning environments, juvenile justice facilities, and other educational entities receiving federal financial assistance to report on a wide variety of metrics. These include overall student enrollment, student access to advanced academic courses and qualified teachers, disciplinary actions, and various support services.
According to the latest findings, the student population receiving specialized support is broadly divided under two primary federal frameworks. Approximately 15% of all public school students are served under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA), while another 4% receive accommodations and targeted services under Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973.
Further breaking down the demographics of children served under IDEA—which encompasses roughly 7.6 million students ranging from preschool to high school—the data reveals a distinct gender breakdown. Approximately two-thirds of the students receiving services through individualized education programs are boys, mirroring long-standing historical trends in special education identification patterns.
However, it is the intersection of disability identification and disciplinary practices that has drawn the most intense scrutiny from civil rights advocates, educators, and families. While children with individualized education programs represent 15% of the total public school population, they bear a staggering and disproportionate burden when it comes to extreme disciplinary measures and crisis interventions.
The data reveals that students with individualized education programs account for an overwhelming 68% of all children who experience seclusion in public schools. Furthermore, these students represent 73% of all children who are subjected to physical restraint by school personnel. These intervention methods, which are intended to be used only as emergency safety measures when a student poses an imminent threat of physical harm to themselves or others, are heavily concentrated among students with developmental, behavioral, or learning disabilities.
Beyond physical restraint and seclusion, the disparities extend to traditional exclusionary discipline practices such as suspensions and expulsions. According to the federal report, students served under IDEA account for about a quarter of all students receiving either in-school or out-of-school suspensions. Additionally, this same student group makes up 23% of all expulsions nationwide, meaning they are pushed out of the classroom environment at rates far exceeding their actual share of the overall student population.
These persistent statistical disparities have sparked renewed concern and criticism from advocacy organizations dedicated to protecting the civil and educational rights of children with disabilities. Denise Marshall, the chief executive officer of the Council of Parent Attorneys and Advocates—a national nonprofit organization commonly known as COPAA that advocates for the rights of students with disabilities and their families—spoke out about the implications of the new data.
Marshall emphasized that the findings point to systemic issues that have yet to be adequately resolved by school districts across the country. She noted that students with disabilities, alongside Black students, continue to be subjected to disproportionately high levels of exclusionary discipline, physical restraint, and seclusion within the public education system.
According to Marshall, every instance in which a school relies on suspension, restraint, or seclusion represents a fundamental breakdown in the educational process, signaling that the child is not learning and that the established program or support structure has failed them. She stressed that educational institutions are well aware that better, evidence-based alternatives are available to support students experiencing behavioral or emotional challenges, and argued that schools must be held accountable for implementing those alternatives rather than resorting to punitive measures. Marshall concluded that simply gathering and reporting out the data is no longer sufficient to address the deep-seated inequities facing vulnerable students in classrooms nationwide.
