How Do Educational Reforms Change the Share of Students in Special Education? Trends in Special Education in Finland

Autor/inn/en	Pulkkinen, Jonna; Räikkönen, Eija; Jahnukainen, Markku; Pirttimaa, Raija
Titel	How Do Educational Reforms Change the Share of Students in Special Education? Trends in Special Education in Finland
Quelle	In: European Educational Research Journal, 19 (2020) 4, S.364-384 (21 Seiten)Infoseite zur Zeitschrift PDF als Volltext Verfügbarkeit
Zusatzinformation	ORCID (Pulkkinen, Jonna)
Sprache	englisch
Dokumenttyp	gedruckt; online; Zeitschriftenaufsatz
ISSN	1474-9041
DOI	10.1177/1474904119892734
Schlagwörter	Foreign Countries; Special Education; Inclusion; Educational Change; Disability Identification; Educational Finance; Municipalities; Educational Policy; Educational History; Elementary Secondary Education; Student Placement; Finland + Suchen Sie Ihr Suchwort? Ausland; Special needs education; Sonderpädagogik; Sonderschulwesen; Inklusion; Bildungsreform; Bildungsfonds; Magistrat; Politics of education; Bildungspolitik; History of education; Bildungsgeschichte; Schülerpraktikum; Finnland
Abstract	Recent European and global trends in education have been to promote inclusive education and expand education, resulting in the increased provision of special education. In promoting inclusive education, recent special education reforms have also aimed to curtail the rise in identification rates for students in special education, for example, by focusing more on early support and discontinuing fiscal incentives to identify students with special educational needs. Using official special education statistics, we studied how Finland's special education system reforms changed the share of students in special education. In addition, we examined variations in special education provisions among municipalities before and after the reforms, and identified municipal-level predictors of variations. This study utilised piecewise linear latent growth curve modelling to analyse changes, thereby providing an example of how this method can be applied in policy reform studies. The results indicated, in particular, that the funding reform has incentivised municipalities to decrease identification rates for students in special education and to diminish special education provision. However, different municipalities have different special education provisions and have changed these provisions in varied ways. In particular, we found that small and large municipalities differ in special education practices and reform implementation. (As Provided).
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Erfasst von	ERIC (Education Resources Information Center), Washington, DC
Update	2024/1/01