Responsiveness to Intervention: An Alternative Approach to the Identification of Learning Disabilities

Frank M. Gresham, University of California-Riverside
Learning Disabilities Summit: Building a Foundation for the Future White Papers

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The process by which public schools identify students as learning disabled often appears to be confusing, unfair, and logically inconsistent. In fact, G. Reid Lyon of the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development has suggested that the field of learning disabilities is a sociological sponge whose purpose has been and is to clean up the spills of general education. Research indicates that substantial proportions of school-identified students with learning disability (LD) fail to meet state or federal eligibility criteria (Lyon, 1996; MacMillan, Gresham, & Bocian, 1998; Shaywitz, Shaywitz, Fletcher, & Escobar, 1990; Shepard, Smith, & Vojir, 1983). In discussing this situation, MacMillan and Speece (1999) noted that although this finding is not in and of itself surprising, the magnitude of the percentage of school-identified LD students who fail to meet eligibility criteria ranged from 52 to 70%.

It may be tempting to interpret such findings as a reflection of the failure on the part of school personnel to comply with state special education codes governing eligibility determination. Keogh (1994), however, suggested that classification has three purposes: advocacy, services, and scientific study. "Error rates" in school identification of LD students can be estimated by validating cases of schools for purposes of service delivery against criteria specified in state education codes that are relevant for scientific study.

Unlike diagnosing children with physical or sensory disabilities or those with more severe forms of mental retardation, efforts to detect students exhibiting milder disabilities such as LD or mild mental retardation (MMR) are fraught with much "error" in the sense that children meeting criteria often go undetected. Because diagnosis of these milder disabilities primarily occurs in public schools, only those children referred for assessment are at risk for formal labeling. Previous work examining students whom general education teachers referred has shown that almost half of those referred had IQ scores between 71 and 85 and an additional 16% scored below an IQ of 70 (MacMillan, Gresham, Bocian, & Lambros, 1998). Clearly, teachers perceive low aptitude students as among the most difficult to teach. When MacMillan et al. applied the current IQ cut scores recommended by the American Association on Mental Retardation (IQ < 75), they found that approximately 30% of all referred children scored below that level.

Despite the abundance of children psychometrically eligible for labeling as mildly mentally retarded, only 14% of the 43 children with IQ < 75 were classified by schools as such (MacMillan, Gresham, Siperstein, & Bocian, 1996). More germane to the current topic, 44% of these cases were labeled as LD by the schools, a finding consistent with that of Gottlieb, Alter, Gottlieb, and Wishner (1994) who found school-identified urban LD students to have a mean IQ that was substantially lower than that of suburban LD students and to resemble mildly mentally retarded students of the 1970s.

The LD category now accounts for 52% of all students with disabilities served in special education under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA). Between 1976-77 and 1996-97, the number of students served as LD increased from 797,213 to 2,259,000--a 283% increase. During this same period, the number of students served as MR decreased from 967,567 to 584,000, representing a 60% decrease (U.S. Department of Education, 1998). In commenting on the dramatic increase in LD, MacMillan and colleagues suggested, "Were these epidemic-like figures interpreted by the Center [sic] for Disease Control, one might reasonably expect to find a quarantine imposed on the public schools of America" (MacMillan, Gresham, Siperstein, & Bocian, 1996, p. 169).

Frankly, there is neither a completely accurate nor universally accepted explanation for these data. However, the increase in LD, in part, is attributable to school practices of classifying LD on the basis of absolute low achievement regardless of IQ level or a discrepancy between IQ and achievement--and including in substantial numbers children who meet criteria for MMR (MacMillan et al., 1998). In fact, an analysis of current classification practices suggested the following: (a) a small minority of such children are classified as mildly mentally retarded, (b) a substantial proportion of these children are served (erroneously) in special education as LD, and (c) some unknown proportion avoid detection, are overlooked by teachers, or are not referred by teachers despite concerns about the child's academic performance (MacMillan, Gresham, Bocian, & Siperstein, 1997; MacMillan, Siperstein, & Gresham, 1996).

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