Court Faults Illinois in Chicago Spec. Ed. Case

By Joetta L. Sack

Saying Illinois has ignored its duty to monitor Chicago's treatment of students with disabilities, a federal court has found the state education department liable for the segregation of disabled students in the Chicago public schools.

The school system has repeatedly placed disabled students in "separate and unequal educational environments," and the Illinois state school board abdicated its responsibility to force the district to change its procedures to comply with the federal law, U.S. District Court Judge Robert W. Gettleman of Chicago wrote in a decision handed down last month.

The strongly worded decision will affect nearly all of the 50,000 disabled children in the 420,000-student Chicago district, the nation's third largest, and leaves the state to come up with a plan for revamping its monitoring and...