March 2007

More than 250,000 U.S. students (7 percent) receive special 

education services under the Individuals with Disabilities 

Education Act (IDEA) at age 5, the kindergarten year for 

most students (Office of Special Education and Rehabilitative 

Services [OSERS] 2003).1 By age 9, when most U.S. students 

are completing third grade, more than 500,000 students (12 

percent) are receiving special education. However, relatively 

little is known about how these changes in the characteristics 

of the special education population occur over the first years 

of school. For example, it has been shown that 17 percent of 

special education students across the later elementary grades 

receive special education services for only 2 years (Walker et 

al. 1988), but these figures are not available specifically for 

the primary grades. 

A first step in understanding more about students receiving 

special education in the primary grades (kindergarten 

through third grade) is a basic description of the timing 

and duration of special education services provided over 

these grades, including when students first receive special 

education, for how long, and how the timing and duration of 

special education may differ by the demographics of students 

and the school settings in which students are served: In what 

grades or combinations of grades do students receive special 

education in the primary grades? Are there differences in the 

timing and duration of special education for girls and boys? 

Students of different racial/ethnic backgrounds? Poor and 

nonpoor students? Students in public and private schools? 

Students in different regions of the country or in urban and 

rural schools? Students in schools that serve higher and lower 

percentages of poor students? 

Recent data released by the National Center for Education 

Statistics (NCES) Early Childhood Longitudinal Study, 

Kindergarten Class of 1998–99 (ECLS-K) allow a study of 

the provision of special education services in U.S. public and 

private schools over the years between kindergarten and 

third grade. Through the ECLS-K, NCES has followed a 

nationally representative sample of school children who were 

in kindergarten in the 1998–99 school year through 2003–04, 

when most children in the sample were in fifth grade. This 

Issue Brief focuses on the primary grades and uses special 

education data collected in spring 1999 (kindergarten), 2000 

(first grade), and 2002 (third grade).2

Data for the Issue Brief were drawn from surveys of the 

children’s parents and school administrators. At each time 

Timing and Duration of Student Participation in 

Special Education in the Primary Grades 

U.S. Department of Education

NCES 2007–043

Issue

Brief

point, a school administrator provided information on whether 

a student received special education services. The school 

administrator also reported information on characteristics of 

the school, such as school sector, the proportion of students 

in the school eligible for free or reduced-price lunch through 

the National School Lunch Program, and the setting of the 

school neighborhood. Parents were asked about the student’s 

sex and race/ethnicity, as well as questions about household 

size and income that could then be used to determine the 

student’s poverty status.3 

The Issue Brief presents the percentage of students receiving 

special education in at least one of the three grades 

(kindergarten, first grade, and third grade). Then, among 

students who received special education in at least one of 

the grades, the Issue Brief presents information on which 

of the three grades students first received services and the 

combinations of grades in which students received them. 

Results are reported separately by sex, race/ethnicity, student’s 

poverty status, school sector (public or private), the urbanicity 

and region of the school, and the poverty concentration of 

the school (schools were coded “high poverty” if at least 50 

percent of students were eligible for free or reduced-price 

lunch through the National School Lunch Program). 

Findings

Overall, 12 percent of students received special education 

services in kindergarten, first, or third grade (table 1).4 Males 

were more likely than females to receive special education 

in at least one grade (16 vs. 8 percent). Poor students were 

more likely than nonpoor students to receive services (18 vs. 

10 percent). Also, higher percentages of public school rather 

than private school students (14 vs. 3 percent), students in 

small town/rural rather than central city schools (15 vs. 10 

percent), and students in the South or Northeast rather than 

the West (15 and 13 percent vs. 9 percent) received special 

education in at least one grade.

In the primary grades, the most common entry to special 

education occurred after first grade (that is, students received 

services in third grade but not in kindergarten or first grade). 

Among students who received special education in at least 

one grade, 43 percent received special education in third 

grade but not in kindergarten or first grade, 34 percent began 

receiving services in kindergarten, and 23 percent began in 

first grade. This later entry was more prevalent among males 

(46 percent received in third grade but not kindergarten or 
2 NCES 2007-043 Issue Brief March 2007

Table 1. Percentage of the kindergarten class of 1998–99 receiving special education in kindergarten, first, and third grade, by student 

and school characteristics: 1998–99, 1999–2000, and 2001–02

Among special education students

Student or school 

characteristic

Special 

education 

in at least 

one grade

Grade student first 

received special education

First received special 

education in kindergarten

Special education 

in first grade

Kindergarten1st 

grade

3rd 

grade

All three 

grades

Kindergarten 

and 1st 

grade but not 

3rd grade

Kindergarten 

and 3rd 

grade but not 

1st grade

Kindergarten 

but not 

1st grade or 

3rd grade

1st and 

3rd grade

1st but not 

3rd grade

All

students 12.3 33.9 22.8 43.3 35.1 16.0 15.8 33.1 56.2 43.8

Student characteristics

Sex

Male 16.0 32.1 21.5 46.4 34.1 16.9 17.0 32.0 64.2 35.8

Female 8.4 37.6 25.3 37.1 36.9 14.5 13.7 35.0 42.4 57.6

Race/ethnicity

White 12.2 34.8 23.0 42.2 37.3 16.4 14.1 32.2 57.2 42.8

Black 14.2 35.4 28.0 36.6 32.2 23.5 19.3 25.0 43.8 56.2

Hispanic 11.5 34.3 15.2 50.5 29.4 7.7 15.4 47.6 68.3 31.7

Other/More 

than once 

race, nonHispanic 10.7 22.8 24.6 52.7 42.5 11.8 24.8 ! 20.9 67.4 32.6

Poverty Status

Poor 17.7 32.3 26.8 40.9 26.9 ! 18.0 ! 35.7 ! 19.4 66.2 33.8

Nonpoor 10.0 32.6 22.0 45.4 36.2 14.6 13.9 35.3 48.7 51.3

Changed 

poverty status 16.2 36.3 22.6 41.1 34.3 12.1 13.2 40.4 59.0 41.0

School characteristics

School type

Public 13.7 34.4 22.8 42.7 36.3 15.4 16.5 31.8 56.7 43.3

Private 3.1 38.7 17.0 ! 44.3 29.8 ! 14.7 ! 11.9 43.7 32.1 ! 67.9

Changed 

school type 7.7 22.9 24.5 ! 52.6 4.3 ! 34.9 ! # 60.8 ! 54.6 ! 45.4 !

Urbanicity

Central city 9.9 26.9 17.9 55.3 40.5 16.3 16.6 26.6 62.5 37.5

Urban fringe/

large town 12.4 37.0 19.0 44.0 36.9 19.0 17.4 26.7 60.4 39.6

Small town/rural 15.3 35.9 34.8 29.3 35.4 10.7 13.7 40.2 56.7 43.3

Changed 

urbanicity 14.5 36.3 19.7 43.9 14.7 ! 16.9 ! # 55.3 19.6 ! 80.4

Region1

Northeast 13.4 36.1 22.7 41.2 36.1 12.7 17.1 34.1 67.1 32.9

Midwest 10.5 24.5 25.3 50.2 47.5 12.4 20.1 ! 20.0 52.3 47.7

South 14.9 37.1 26.3 36.6 35.5 20.2 15.3 29.0 50.8 49.2

West 9.0 30.0 10.8 59.2 26.8 6.1 ! 9.0 ! 58.2 79.1 20.9

National School 

Lunch Program 

(NSL) eligibility

50 percent or 

more 13.4 34.2 24.5 41.3 34.2 18.1 24.1 23.5 58.1 41.9

Less than 50 

percent 11.0 29.3 25.2 45.5 31.4 14.7 17.6 36.3 52.5 47.5

Changed NSL 14.1 41.5 18.9 39.6 39.5 15.6 6.5 38.4 59.8 40.2

# Rounds to zero.

! Interpret data with caution. Standard error is more than one-third as large as the estimate.

1

 A “Changed region” row has not been included because there were too few cases in the sample for reliable estimates.

NOTE: Race categories exclude Hispanic origin unless specified. Detail may not sum to totals because of rounding. Not all apparent differences in this table 

are statistically significant. Standard errors are available at http://nces.ed.gov/pubsearch/pubsinfo.asp?pubid=2007043.

SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Early Childhood Longitudinal Study, Kindergarten Class of 1998–99 (ECLS-K), 

“Special Education Teacher/Service Provider Questionnaire,” spring 1999, spring 2000, and spring 2002.
NCES 2007-043 Issue Brief March 2007 3

Conclusion

This analysis of the timing and duration of special education 

in the primary grades illustrates the complexity of the growth 

of the special education population between kindergarten and 

third grade. Overall in the U.S. kindergarten class of 1998–

99, higher percentages of students began receiving special 

education after first grade than in kindergarten or first grade. 

Of those who entered special education in kindergarten, 

about one half were no longer receiving special education in 

third grade. Conversely, those who entered special education 

in first grade were more likely than not to be receiving special 

education again in third grade. Patterns in the timing and 

duration of special education in these grades differed by sex, 

racial/ethnic background, poverty status, and the sector and 

geographic setting of their schools. 

Whether or not the third grade special education students 

continue to receive services will not be clear until future years 

of ECLS-K data are analyzed. The ECLS-K is scheduled to 

follow children through the cohort’s eighth grade year. 

References

Office of Special Education and Rehabilitative Services. (2003). 

Twenty-fifth Annual Report to Congress on the Implementation 

of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act. U.S. 

Department of Education. Washington, DC: Author.

Walker, D., Singer, J., Palfrey, J., Orza, M., Wenger, M., and Butler, 

J. (1988). Who Leaves and Who Stays in Special Education: A 

2-year Follow-up Study. Exceptional Children, 54, 393-402.

Endnotes

1

 Percentage of children receiving special education calculated from 

OSERS (2003) report of children receiving special education by 

age and U.S. Census Bureau (Summary File 1 of the 2000 Census, 

retrieved August 15, 2006 from http://factfinder.census.gov/

servlet/DatasetMainPageServlet?_ds_name=DEC_2000_SF1_U&_

program=DEC&_lang=en) table QT-P2 of population by age.

2

 These grades refer to data collection waves; not all children in the third 

grade wave were third graders. Data on special education were not 

collected in the second grade year. The sample includes 13,694 children 

who were in the ECLS-K study sample in the spring kindergarten, 

first grade, and third grade administrations, including 1,184 students 

who were identified as requiring special education services in either 

the kindergarten, first, or third grade administrations. The analysis 

weighted cases using the C245CW0 weighting variable. 

3

 Household poverty status was determined using U.S. Census Bureau 

weighted average poverty thresholds.

4

 This Issue Brief refers to children by the grade of the overall ECLS-K 

cohort at the time, although not all children in the analytic sample 

were enrolled in the grade. In the spring of 2000, 96 percent of 

children in the analytic sample were in first grade; in the spring of 

2002, 91 percent of the sample were in third grade.

first grade) than females (37 percent). Also special education 

students included in the Other/more than one race, nonHispanic racial/ethnic category were more likely than Black 

special education students to receive services in third grade 

but not the two earlier grades (53 vs. 36 percent). Higher 

percentages of special education students in central cities 

(55 percent) and urban fringes/large towns (44 percent) 

than small towns/rural areas (29 percent) received special 

education in third grade but not the earlier grades. And, a 

higher percentage of special education students in the West 

(59 percent) than in the South (37 percent) received special 

education in third grade but not the earlier grades. 

Students who received special education services in 

kindergarten did not necessarily continue with special 

education in later grades. Thirty-three percent did not receive 

special education in first or third grades and another 16 

percent received special education in first but not in third 

grade. This means that about half (49 percent) of students 

who received special education in kindergarten had stopped 

receiving special education by third grade. Among Hispanic 

students who received special education in kindergarten, 

48 percent received services only in kindergarten, a higher 

percentage than the other racial/ethnic groups. Also, in the 

West, 58 percent of kindergartners receiving special education 

received services in kindergarten only, a higher percentage than 

in the other regions. In contrast, in the Midwest, 20 percent 

of kindergartners receiving special education received it in 

kindergarten only and 48 percent received special education 

in all three grades (these percentages differ measurably only 

from the West; apparent differences with other regions cannot 

be confirmed because of large standard errors). 

Students who were new to special education in first grade 

were more likely than not to be receiving special education 

in third grade as well (56 percent of students first receiving 

special education in first grade). The relatively small number 

of students in the analytic sample who first received special 

education in first grade makes it difficult to draw inferences 

about differences among the subgroups of students—some 

large apparent differences are not statistically significant. 

However, some notable differences did emerge. For example, 

a higher percentage of male students than female students 

new to special education in first grade continued to receive 

services in third grade (64 vs. 42 percent). A higher percentage 

of Hispanic students than Black students new to special 

education in first grade continued to receive services in third 

grade (68 vs. 44 percent). And a higher percentage of students 

in the West than those in the South or Midwest new to special 

education in first grade continued to receive services in third 

grade (79 percent vs. 51 and 52 percent, respectively).

The Issue Brief series presents information on education topics of current interest. All estimates shown are based on samples and are subject to sampling variability. 

All differences discussed are statistically significant at the .05 level as measured by two-tailed Student’s t tests; this means a difference is discussed only if the 

probability that it is due to chance (i.e., sampling variability) is less than 1 in 20. No adjustments were made for multiple comparisons. In the design, conduct, 

and data processing of National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) surveys, efforts are made to minimize the effects of nonsampling errors, such as item 

nonresponse, measurement error, data processing error, or other systematic error. 

This Issue Brief was authored by Emily W. Holt (American Institutes for Research), Daniel J. McGrath (American Institutes for Research), and William L. Herring 

(MacroSys Research & Technology) of the Education Statistics Services Institute (ESSI). This Issue Brief was desktopped by by Michael Stock (MacroSys Research 

& Technology) of ESSI. For further information, contact Edith McArthur, NCES, at 202-502-7393 or Edith.McArthur@ed.gov. To order additional copies of this Issue 

Brief or other NCES publications, call 1-877-4ED-Pubs. NCES publications are also available on the Internet at http://nces.ed.gov. 
Timing and Duration of Student Participation

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The Issue Brief series presents information on education topics of current interest.

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