Introduction: What is Overrepresentation?

For years, there has been discussion about racial minorities being given adequate supports, without being held back from their full potential, in school special education (SPED) programs. Fingers have been pointed at racially biased testing procedures, lack of general education classroom teacher support for students of color, and societal factors that may be causing students of color to need more support in the classroom, among other factors. In order to understand all of this, it is important to clarify the difference between overrepresentation and underrepresentation, and the issues that both cause. Kristen Harper and Edward Fergus, in their article “Overrepresentation of Black Students in Special Education,” define overrepresentation as, “circumstances in which a racial or ethnic group has greater representation in special education than in the general population.” The same authors define overidentification as, “any situation where a child is inappropriately identified with a disability and placed in special education.” In simpler terms, overrepresentation refers to outside societal factors causing a disproportionately large number of students of color to be in need of special education services, while overidentification refers to the issue of students of color being wrongfully thought to need special education services, leading to more students of color in SPED programs than the students in need of or benefitting from these services.