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Connecticut Asylum for the Education and Instruction of Deaf and Dumb Persons was started by Rev. Thomas Gallaudet. It is now called the American School for the Deaf and is still in operation. After its opening the staff appealed to the Legislature of Connecticut for aid and received an appropriation of five thousand dollars which set a precedent for other future schools to rely on State support. -
Originally known as the National Association of Parents and Friends of Retarded Children, it was founded when parent groups met in Minneapolis unified by the collective desire to raise their children at home without institutionalization. It was the first organization to fund research on intellectual and developmental disabilities. It was also involved with a group of other national organizations that helped enact Medicare and Medicaid. -
The Supreme Court of the United States ruled that the segregation of black and white students, the separate but equal doctrine established by the previous Plessy Vs. Ferguson case, was unconstitutional. The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) spearheaded the legal efforts during the case. This was an instrumental turning point in the growing Civil Rights movement at the time in the United States.
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The Elementary and Secondary Education Acts (ESEA) was enacted by congress to try to mediate the inequality that underprivileged students faced. It provided resources to states to facilitate better access to a quality education. A year later an amendment to ESEA added a grant program to help states start and expand programs. -
The Rehabilitation Act is the first Federal law to prohibit the discrimination of individuals with disabilities and is the foundation for many future disability nondiscrimination laws like the ADA. Section 504 specifically prohibits discrimination against qualified individuals with disabilities in any areas that receive Federal funding or are run by Federal Agencies. It ensures that students are not excluded, segregated, or denied services. -
The EHA was signed into law by President Gerald Ford and guaranteed a free, appropriate public education (FAPE) for all children in the U.S. Its main goals were to support local and state programs in providing for the rights and needs of children with disabilities and their families as well as assessing and evaluating how effective those efforts were. It also provided financial incentives to allow states to comply with the new regulations and expectations. -
This is a reauthorization of the EHA that includes amendments for special issues and special populations. It addressed the issue of early intervention by creating a mandate for states to provide services for families of children with disabilities from birth. Before the implementation of this reauthorization, services would not be available for the children and their families until they reached the age of three. -
The ADA provides protections for individual with disabilities, prohibiting discrimination and ensuring everyone has the same opportunities in everyday activities, employment, economically, and participating in state and local government programs. The ADA has five title sections: 1 covers employer, 2 covers state and local governments, 3 covers public businesses, 4 covers telecommunications, and 5 covers other requirements for law implementation.
https://www.ada.gov/topics/intro-to-ada/ -
The No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) was signed into law by President George W. Bush. It is a reauthorization of the ESEA that mandated education reform through the implementation of annual standardized assessments and emphasis on high standards with measurable goals. Each state set their own achievement standards, create the assessments, and give them to all students in specific grade levels to receive school funding.