GIFTED CHILDREN WITH DESABILITIES

Approximately 6.4 million students in U.S. public school students ages 3-21 received mandated special education services to address a range of disabilities that would have otherwise had an adverse impact on their educational performance (NCES, 2015). The majority of students with disabilities are identified as having specific learning disabilities (35%), followed by speech/language impairments (21%), other health impairments (12%), autism (8%), intellectual disabilities (7%), developmental delays (6%) and emotional disturbance (6%) (NCES, 2015) As such, these students are entitled to educational interventions and services under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA; 2004). The IDEA operationalized the term ‘a child with a disability’ to signify a student “with mental retardation, hearing impairments (including deafness), speech or language impairments, visual impairments (including blindness), serious emotional disturbance (referred to in this title as ‘emotional disturbance’), orthopedic impairments, autism, traumatic brain injury, other health impairments, or specific learning disabilities” (p. 6).