| Historically, African American students' educational experience in this country has been subjected to exclusion by the dominant culture through slavery, Jim Crowism, and by special educational placement. In spite of the safeguards in legislation, there remains a concern with lack of explanation, about the disproportionately high number of minority students referred by general education teachers and subsequently placed in special education. This investigation focused on the relationship between social skills development and special education placement of specifically African American male students. Forty-four randomly selected third, fourth, and fifth grade African American male elementary students were the participants. There were three groups of students: mild to moderately learning disabled (12 students), mild to moderately emotionally disturbed (10 students) and general education (22 students). The special education students were matched with general education students in their mainstreamed homeroom on such potentially confounding variables as sex, ethnicity, SES, and grade level.;There were also 22 general education teacher participants who were homeroom teachers for a special education and a general education student participant in the mainstream classroom. Data were gathered through examiner interviews of student participants and teacher ratings of a minimum of two of their student participants (one special education student and one general education student).;A series of ANOVAs ;The results are discussed in reference to the literature on teacher referral. It is concluded that school systems and teaching strategies must begin to meet the needs of a diverse population of students before the student drops out. There is a discussion about the implications for teacher and student training for empowerment. |
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