Imperious, detailed rules and regulations make it difficult for state and local educational authorities to bring about constructive changes. This means teaching students in their native language, which denies them the very experience they most need, practice in English. Such programs, moreover, have perverse incentives that make them grow in size, cost, and ineffectiveness. Since the federal funds pay for teaching and administrative posts, it is like paying doctors to keep their patients sick. Bilingual and special education categorical programs thus create conflicts of interests between educators' jobs and their students' success.
Much research shows that federal special education classifications are scientifically unreliable.
They stigmatize students and segregate them from others. Placing students in special and bilingual programs gives them an excuse not to learn, and they rarely escape. Though such programs can cost two or three times that of regular education, their students are often worse off. Categorical program regulations, moreover, assume that the federal government knows better than citizens and state and local educators about their preferences, their students' needs and which educational methods work best. Yet, a quarter century of research revealing failure of categorical programs shows these are false assumptions.