SPOTLIGHT Blurring the Divide Improving Special Education by Strengthening Core Instruction Mark Wiernusz and Christopher Cleveland I t has been 45 years since the passage of the Education for All Handicapped Children Act in 1975 (now known as the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act [IDEA]), which required states to protect the rights of students with disabilities. 1 Over the decades, there has been much debate on how to best educate students with mild to moderate disabilities, and a myriad of changes and increased standards have been introduced. Despite the variety of eorts over almost ve decades, the most recent results from NAEP, the “nation’s report card,” show a signicant gap between the scores of students with disabilities and of those without disabilities ( Exhibit 1 ). 2 This unrelenting gap has numerous causes, but it may be at least partially attributable to the prevalent belief that students with mild to moderate disabilities and students without disabilities represent two distinct types of students that require two distinct approaches of learning support. Indeed, common practice in many districts is to handle special education as separate from general education. DMGroup Spotlight represents the thinking and approach of District Management Group. 12 D I S TRI C T MAN AGE M E N T G R O U P ww w . d m g r o u p K 1 2 . c o m